Otlpjsonfile Receiver

Available in: contrib Maintainers: @atoulme Source: opentelemetry-collector-contrib

Supported Telemetry

Overview

The receiver will watch the directory and read files. If a file is updated or added, the receiver will read it in its entirety again. The data is serialized according to the OpenTelemetry Protocol File Exporter.

Getting Started

The following settings are required:

include: set a glob path of files to include in data collection

Example:

receivers:
  otlp_json_file:
    include:
      - "/var/log/*.log"
    exclude:
      - "/var/log/example.log"

[!NOTE] The deprecated component type otlpjsonfile (without the underscores) can still be used as an alias and will log a deprecation warning.

Configuration

Field	Default	Description
`include`	required	A list of file glob patterns that match the file paths to be read.
`exclude`	[]	A list of file glob patterns to exclude from reading. This is applied against the paths matched by `include`.
`exclude_older_than`		Exclude files whose modification time is older than the specified age.
`start_at`	`end`	At startup, where to start reading logs from the file. Options are `beginning` or `end`.
`multiline`		A `multiline` configuration block. See the File Log Receiver documentation for details.
`force_flush_period`	`500ms`	Time since last time new data was found in the file, after which a partial log at the end of the file may be emitted.
`encoding`	`utf-8`	The encoding of the file being read. See the list of supported encodings below for available options.
`preserve_leading_whitespaces`	`false`	Whether to preserve leading whitespaces.
`preserve_trailing_whitespaces`	`false`	Whether to preserve trailing whitespaces.
`include_file_name`	`true`	Whether to add the file name as the attribute `log.file.name`.
`include_file_path`	`false`	Whether to add the file path as the attribute `log.file.path`.
`include_file_name_resolved`	`false`	Whether to add the file name after symlinks resolution as the attribute `log.file.name_resolved`.
`include_file_path_resolved`	`false`	Whether to add the file path after symlinks resolution as the attribute `log.file.path_resolved`.
`include_file_owner_name`	`false`	Whether to add the file owner name as the attribute `log.file.owner.name`. Not supported for windows.
`include_file_owner_group_name`	`false`	Whether to add the file group name as the attribute `log.file.owner.group.name`. Not supported for windows.
`include_file_permissions`	`false`	Whether to add the file permissions as the attribute `log.file.permissions` in 3-digit octal format (e.g., `755`). Not supported for windows.
`include_file_record_number`	`false`	Whether to add the record number in the file as the attribute `log.file.record_number`.
`include_file_record_offset`	`false`	Whether to add the record offset in the file as the attribute `log.file.record_offset`.
`poll_interval`	200ms	The duration between filesystem polls.
`fingerprint_size`	`1000`	The number of bytes, read from the start of a file, used to uniquely identify it. Must be at least `16`. Decreasing this value will trigger re-ingestion of files larger than the new fingerprint size.
`initial_buffer_size`	`16KiB`	The initial size of the to read buffer for headers and logs, the buffer will be grown as necessary. Larger values may lead to unnecessary large buffer allocations, and smaller values may lead to lots of copies while growing the buffer.
`max_log_size`	`1MiB`	The maximum size of a log entry to read. The behavior for oversized log entries is controlled by `max_log_size_behavior`. Protects against reading large amounts of data into memory.
`max_log_size_behavior`	`split`	Behavior when a log entry exceeds `max_log_size`. Options are `split` (default) which splits oversized entries into multiple log entries, or `truncate` which truncates the entry and drops the remainder.
`max_concurrent_files`	1024	The maximum number of log files from which logs will be read concurrently. If the number of files matched in the `include` pattern exceeds this number, then files will be processed in batches.
`max_batches`	0	Only applicable when files must be batched in order to respect `max_concurrent_files`. This value limits the number of batches that will be processed during a single poll interval. A value of 0 indicates no limit.
`delete_after_read`	`false`	If `true`, each log file will be read and then immediately deleted. Requires that the `filelog.allowFileDeletion` feature gate is enabled. Must be `false` when `start_at` is set to `end`.
`acquire_fs_lock`	`false`	Whether to attempt to acquire a filesystem lock before reading a file (Unix only).
`file_cache_advise`	`false`	Hints the operating system to release cached file pages after they are read, helping reduce page cache usage for large sequential workloads. (Linux only).
`storage`	none	The ID of a storage extension to be used to store file offsets. File offsets allow the receiver to pick up where it left off in the case of a collector restart. If no storage extension is used, the receiver will manage offsets in memory only.
`header`	nil	Specifies options for parsing header metadata. Requires that the `filelog.allowHeaderMetadataParsing` feature gate is enabled. Must not be set when `start_at` is set to `end`. Note: because this receiver does not run a stanza pipeline, attributes produced by `header.metadata_operators` are not propagated to emitted records; the `header` block is accepted only to allow header lines to be consumed without being parsed as OTLP JSON.
`header.pattern`	required for header metadata parsing	A regex that matches every header line.
`header.metadata_operators`	required for header metadata parsing	A list of operators used to parse metadata from the header.
`ordering_criteria.regex`		Regular expression used for sorting, should contain a named capture groups that are to be used in `regex_key`.
`ordering_criteria.group_by`		Regular expression used for grouping, which is done pre-sorting. Should contain a named capture groups.
`ordering_criteria.top_n`	1	The number of files to track when using file ordering. The top N files are tracked after applying the ordering criteria.
`ordering_criteria.sort_by.regex_key`		Regular expression named capture group defined in `ordering_criteria.regex` to use for sorting.
`ordering_criteria.sort_by.sort_type`		Type of sorting to be performed (e.g., `numeric`, `alphabetical`, `timestamp`, `mtime`)
`ordering_criteria.sort_by.location`		Relevant if `sort_type` is set to `timestamp`. Defines the location of the timestamp of the file.
`ordering_criteria.sort_by.format`		Relevant if `sort_type` is set to `timestamp`. Defines the strptime format of the timestamp being sorted.
`ordering_criteria.sort_by.ascending`		Sort direction
`compression`		Indicate the compression format of input files. If set accordingly, files will be read using a reader that uncompresses the file before scanning its content. Options are “, `gzip`, or `auto`. `auto` auto-detects file compression type. Currently, gzip files are the only compressed files auto-detected, based on its headers See RFC 1952. `auto` option is useful when ingesting a mix of compressed and uncompressed files with the same receiver.
`polls_to_archive`	`0`	This setting controls the number of poll cycles to store on disk, rather than being discarded. By default, the receiver will purge the record of readers that have existed for 3 generations. Refer archiving in the File Log Receiver documentation and polling for more details. Note: This feature is experimental.
`on_truncate`	`ignore`	Behavior when a file with the same fingerprint is detected but with a smaller size (indicating a copytruncate rotation). Options are `ignore`, `read_whole_file`, or `read_new`. See handling copytruncate rotation.
`replay_file`	`false`	If `true`, the receiver will not track file offsets and will re-read files from the beginning on every poll.

Supported encodings

Key	Description
`nop`	No encoding validation. Treats the file as a stream of raw bytes
`utf-8`	UTF-8 encoding
`utf-8-raw`	UTF-8 encoding without replacing invalid UTF-8 bytes
`utf-16le`	UTF-16 encoding with little-endian byte order
`utf-16be`	UTF-16 encoding with big-endian byte order
`ascii`	ASCII encoding
`big5`	The Big5 Chinese character encoding

Other less common encodings are supported on a best-effort basis. See https://www.iana.org/assignments/character-sets/character-sets.xhtml for other encodings available.

Time parameters

All time parameters must have the unit of time specified. e.g.: 200ms, 1s, 1m.

Handling Copytruncate Rotation

When log files are rotated using the copytruncate strategy (where the file is copied and then truncated in place), the receiver can detect when a file has been truncated by comparing the stored offset with the current file size. The on_truncate setting controls how the receiver behaves when truncation is detected:

ignore (default): The receiver keeps the original offset and will not read any data until the file grows past the original offset. This prevents duplicate log ingestion when a file is rotated.
read_whole_file: The receiver resets the offset to 0 and reads the entire file from the beginning. Use this mode when you want to ensure no data loss, even if it means potentially re-reading some logs.
read_new: The receiver updates the offset to the current file size (the position after truncation). This allows reading new data that is written after the truncation without re-reading existing content.

Example configuration:

receivers:
  otlp_json_file:
    include:
      - /var/log/otlp/*.json
    on_truncate: read_whole_file  # Read entire file after copytruncate rotation

Configuration

Example Configuration

otlp_json_file:
  include:
    - "/var/log/*.log"
  exclude:
    - "/var/log/example.log"
otlp_json_file/all:
  include_file_name: true
  include_file_path: true
  include_file_name_resolved: true
  include_file_path_resolved: true
  start_at: "beginning"
  fingerprint_size: 32768
  max_log_size: 10000
  max_concurrent_files: 4
  encoding: "UTF-8"
  on_truncate: "ignore"
  multiline:
    line_start_pattern: "<"
    line_end_pattern: ">"
  include:
    - "/var/log/*.log"
    - "/tmp/*.log"
  exclude:
    - "/var/log/example.log"

Last generated: 2026-08-24

​Otlpjsonfile Receiver

​Supported Telemetry

​Overview

​Getting Started

​Configuration

​Supported encodings

​Time parameters

​Handling Copytruncate Rotation

​Configuration

​Example Configuration

Otlpjsonfile Receiver

Supported Telemetry

Overview

Getting Started

Configuration

Supported encodings

Time parameters

Handling Copytruncate Rotation

Configuration

Example Configuration