Regenerate integrations docs (#22549)
Co-authored-by: ilyam8 <22274335+ilyam8@users.noreply.github.com>
Netdata bot committed
May 23, 2026 at 12:19 UTC
b8cd8fe45537e8483aa99196a2373f78618fd05b
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src/collectors/COLLECTORS.md
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@@ -171,7 +171,7 @@ Need a dedicated integration? [Submit a feature request](https://github.com/netd
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| [systemd-nspawn Containers](https://github.com/netdata/netdata/blob/master/src/collectors/cgroups.plugin/integrations/systemd-nspawn_containers.md) | Monitor systemd-nspawn container resource utilization — CPU, memory, disk I/O, and network — via Linux cgroups. |
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| [vCenter Server Appliance](https://github.com/netdata/netdata/blob/master/src/go/plugin/go.d/collector/vcsa/integrations/vcenter_server_appliance.md) | This collector monitors [health statistics](https://developer.vmware.com/apis/vsphere-automation/latest/appliance/health/) of vCenter Server Appliance servers. |
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| [Virtual Machines](https://github.com/netdata/netdata/blob/master/src/collectors/cgroups.plugin/integrations/virtual_machines.md) | Monitor virtual machine resource utilization — CPU, memory, disk I/O, and network — via Linux cgroups. |
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-| [VMware vCenter Server](https://github.com/netdata/netdata/blob/master/src/go/plugin/go.d/collector/vsphere/integrations/vmware_vcenter_server.md) | This collector monitors hosts, VMs, datastores, clusters, and resource pools from `vCenter` servers. |
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+| [VMware vCenter Server](https://github.com/netdata/netdata/blob/master/src/go/plugin/go.d/collector/vsphere/integrations/vmware_vcenter_server.md) | Monitors vSphere resources from `vCenter` servers. |
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| [Xen XCP-ng](https://github.com/netdata/netdata/blob/master/src/collectors/xenstat.plugin/integrations/xen_xcp-ng.md) | This collector monitors XenServer and XCP-ng host and domains statistics. |
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### Operating Systems
src/go/plugin/go.d/collector/vsphere/integrations/vmware_vcenter_server.md
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@@ -63,42 +63,16 @@ The default `update_every` is 20 seconds, and it doesn't make sense to decrease
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It is likely that 20 seconds is not enough for big installations and the value should be tuned.
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-To get a better view we recommend running the collector in debug mode and seeing how much time it will take to collect metrics.
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+To size a job, run the collector in debug mode and compare the discovery and collection timing lines. Discovery runs in a separate goroutine, while collection timing must stay comfortably below `update_every`.
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-<details>
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-<summary>Example (all not related debug lines were removed)</summary>
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+Useful log lines include:
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-```
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-[ilyam@pc]$ ./go.d.plugin -d -m vsphere
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-[ DEBUG ] vsphere[vsphere] discover.go:94 discovering : starting resource discovering process
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-[ DEBUG ] vsphere[vsphere] discover.go:102 discovering : found 3 dcs, process took 49.329656ms
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-[ DEBUG ] vsphere[vsphere] discover.go:109 discovering : found 12 folders, process took 49.538688ms
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-[ DEBUG ] vsphere[vsphere] discover.go:116 discovering : found 3 clusters, process took 47.722692ms
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-[ DEBUG ] vsphere[vsphere] discover.go:123 discovering : found 2 hosts, process took 52.966995ms
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-[ DEBUG ] vsphere[vsphere] discover.go:130 discovering : found 2 vms, process took 49.832979ms
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-[ INFO ] vsphere[vsphere] discover.go:140 discovering : found 3 dcs, 12 folders, 3 clusters (2 dummy), 2 hosts, 3 vms, process took 249.655993ms
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-[ DEBUG ] vsphere[vsphere] build.go:12 discovering : building : starting building resources process
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-[ INFO ] vsphere[vsphere] build.go:23 discovering : building : built 3/3 dcs, 12/12 folders, 3/3 clusters, 2/2 hosts, 3/3 vms, process took 63.3µs
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-[ DEBUG ] vsphere[vsphere] hierarchy.go:10 discovering : hierarchy : start setting resources hierarchy process
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-[ INFO ] vsphere[vsphere] hierarchy.go:18 discovering : hierarchy : set 3/3 clusters, 2/2 hosts, 3/3 vms, process took 6.522µs
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-[ DEBUG ] vsphere[vsphere] filter.go:24 discovering : filtering : starting filtering resources process
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-[ DEBUG ] vsphere[vsphere] filter.go:45 discovering : filtering : removed 0 unmatched hosts
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-[ DEBUG ] vsphere[vsphere] filter.go:56 discovering : filtering : removed 0 unmatched vms
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-[ INFO ] vsphere[vsphere] filter.go:29 discovering : filtering : filtered 0/2 hosts, 0/3 vms, process took 42.973µs
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-[ DEBUG ] vsphere[vsphere] metric_lists.go:14 discovering : metric lists : starting resources metric lists collection process
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-[ INFO ] vsphere[vsphere] metric_lists.go:30 discovering : metric lists : collected metric lists for 2/2 hosts, 3/3 vms, process took 275.60764ms
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-[ INFO ] vsphere[vsphere] discover.go:74 discovering : discovered 2/2 hosts, 3/3 vms, the whole process took 525.614041ms
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-[ INFO ] vsphere[vsphere] discover.go:11 starting discovery process, will do discovery every 5m0s
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-[ DEBUG ] vsphere[vsphere] collect.go:11 starting collection process
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-[ DEBUG ] vsphere[vsphere] scrape.go:48 scraping : scraped metrics for 2/2 hosts, process took 96.257374ms
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-[ DEBUG ] vsphere[vsphere] scrape.go:60 scraping : scraped metrics for 3/3 vms, process took 57.879697ms
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-[ DEBUG ] vsphere[vsphere] collect.go:23 metrics collected, process took 154.77997ms
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-```
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-
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-</details>
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+- `discovering : discovered ... the whole process took ...`
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+- `scraping : scraped metrics for ... hosts, process took ...`
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+- `scraping : scraped metrics for ... vms, process took ...`
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+- `metrics collected, process took ...`
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-There you can see that discovering took `525.614041ms`, and collecting metrics took `154.77997ms`. Discovering is a separate thread, it doesn't affect collecting.
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-`update_every` and `timeout` parameters should be adjusted based on these numbers.
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+Adjust `update_every` and `timeout` based on those timings and on the number of enabled optional surfaces.
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## Setup
@@ -120,7 +94,21 @@ UI configuration requires paid Netdata Cloud plan.
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### Prerequisites
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-No action required.
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+#### vCenter read-only access
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+Configure a vCenter account that can read inventory objects, properties, and performance counters for the datacenters, clusters, ESXi hosts, VMs, datastores, and resource pools selected by the include filters.
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+#### Optional vSphere metadata permissions
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+`tag_categories` requires access to the vSphere Automation/CIS tagging APIs for the selected categories. `custom_attributes` requires access to custom field definitions and values for the selected inventory objects.
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+#### Optional datastore cluster, vSAN, and network data
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+`collect_datastore_clusters` requires read access to StoragePod objects. `collect_vsan` requires vSAN Management API access and the vSAN Performance Service on the target clusters. `collect_network_topology` requires read access to Network and Distributed Virtual Port Group inventory objects.
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### Configuration
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@@ -893,12 +881,19 @@ No additional configuration is required.
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#### Returns
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-Cached vSphere inventory topology. Actors represent discovered inventory objects and links represent parent-child, host-runs-VM, or host/VM-connects-network relationships.
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+Cached vSphere inventory topology payload. Actors represent discovered inventory objects and links represent parent-child, host-runs-VM, or host/VM-connects-network relationships.
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| Column | Type | Unit | Visibility | Description |
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|:-------|:-----|:-----|:-----------|:------------|
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+| schema_version | string | | | Topology payload schema version. |
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+| source | string | | | Topology source identifier. |
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+| layer | string | | | Topology layer identifier. |
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+| agent_id | string | | | Netdata Agent identifier for the node serving the function. |
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+| collected_at | datetime | | | Time when the cached topology response was built. |
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+| view | string | | | Topology view identifier. |
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| actors | array | | | vSphere inventory actors, including datacenters, clusters, ESXi hosts, VMs, datastores, optional networks, datastore clusters, and resource pools. |
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| links | array | | | Topology links between vSphere inventory actors. |
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+| stats | object | | | Counts of discovered inventory objects, actors, and links included in the response. |
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@@ -969,4 +964,19 @@ If your Netdata runs in a Docker container named "netdata" (replace if different
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docker logs netdata 2>&1 | grep vsphere
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```
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+### Missing performance samples
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+If the logs show `vsphere:host-no-perf-samples` or `vsphere:vm-no-perf-samples`, verify that the configured account can read vCenter performance counters for the selected hosts and VMs, and that the entities are powered on when performance metrics are expected.
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+### Periodic discovery errors
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+If the logs show `vsphere:periodic-discovery-error`, check vCenter reachability, account permissions for the enabled optional surfaces, and whether the configured `timeout` is large enough for the inventory size.
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+### vCenter reboot recovery
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+The collector cannot always recover an existing session after a vCenter reboot. Restart `go.d.plugin` if collection does not resume after vCenter becomes available again.
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