System requirements
The system requirements of NXLog Platform depend on the number of log-collecting agents that you plan to connect and your log storage needs.
The following sections provide initial resource provisioning guidelines for the different deployment sizes supported by NXLog. After completing the deployment, we recommend monitoring resource usage and increasing resources as necessary to ensure NXLog Platform runs smoothly.
Supported operating systems
You can deploy NXLog Platform on the following operating systems:
-
Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) 8
-
Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) 9
-
SUSE Linux Enterprise Server (SLES) 15
-
Ubuntu 22.04.x
-
Ubuntu 24.04.x
If you are using SELinux, you must make sure that it is running in permissive mode.
To verify the current mode, run getenforce
on the machine where you are deploying NXLog Platform.
To configure SELinux to run in permissive mode, follow these steps:
-
Edit the
/etc/selinux/config
file:$ sudo nano /etc/selinux/config
-
Configure the
SELINUX=permissive
option. -
Save the file and reboot the machine.
CPU and RAM requirements
NXLog Platform provides several deployment sizes depending on the number of agents that you run or plan to run in your environment. The following table lists the minimum CPU and memory requirements for each deployment size.
-
The Managed agents column represents the maximum number of agents supported by the agent management capability of NXLog Platform. Note that the number of agents sending logs to NXLog Platform can be lower or higher than that number depending on your log collection architecture.
-
CPUs must have an x86_64 architecture and support Advanced Vector Extensions 2 (AVX2) instructions. If you use virtualization, ensure that your hypervisor’s BIOS has AVX2 enabled and that the hypervisor allows AVX2 pass-through to the guest OS.
To verify that AVX2 instructions are present, run the following command on the machine where you are deploying NXLog Platform:
$ grep -io -m1 avx2 /proc/cpuinfo avx2
-
The RAM requirements depend on whether NXLog Platform will be used to store log data or not, as the built-in log storage database uses more memory to support high log ingestion rates. The values listed on the table are for the exclusive use of NXLog Platform, meaning that you must provision additional RAM for the operating system and any other applications running alongside NXLog Platform on the host machine. You will choose to store log data or not during the NXLog Platform installation process.
Deployment size | Managed agents | CPU cores | RAM without log storage |
RAM with log storage |
---|---|---|---|---|
small |
up to 1,000 |
2 |
11 GB |
19 GB |
medium |
1,001 to 10,000 |
3 |
14 GB |
22 GB |
large |
10,001 to 50,000 |
4 |
19 GB |
43 GB |
xlarge |
50,001 to 100,000 |
8 |
38 GB |
54 GB |
Storage requirements
Ensure that the following storage is available on the machine before you start deploying NXLog Platform:
For installation files and system logs:
-
30 GB of free disk space in
/var/lib/containers/storage/
. -
At least 10 GB of free disk space in
/var/log/
.NXLog Platform can exhaust this space more slowly or more quickly depending on the number of agents. If you expect a lot of activity, consider allocating more space and implementing rotation of the systemd journal and syslog logs.
-
1 GB of free disk space in
/var/
outside the aforementioned directories. -
1 GB of free disk space in
/usr/
for dependency OS packages.
For NXLog Platform data, including agent-collected logs:
-
At least 10 GB of free disk space.
By default, NXLog Platform stores data in the directory
/srv/nxp/data
, but you can change this directory during the installation process. We recommend mounting this directory on a dedicated physical disk or disk partition.
Network requirements
NXLog Platform runs as a set of containers that communicate with each other within an internal Podman bridge network on the host machine.
Ensure that the deployment machine and your network are set up as follows:
-
The machine has a static IP address.
-
The local network 10.89.0.0/24 is free to use and reserved for the NXLog Platform container services.
If needed, you can change the network used by the NXLog Platform containers after installation since the containers communicate with each other using the hostname. These changes require a reboot to take full effect.
-
Both your organization firewall and the host machine firewall allow the ports and hostnames described in the table below. Additionally, ensure that forwarded TCP traffic is allowed to reach the internal NXLog Platform container network.
If you are using Ubuntu with UFW enabled, the NXLog Platform installation process configures the host machine firewall automatically with the inbound rules in the table below. However, you are still responsible for configuring any additional firewall rules, such as allowing SSH access to the host machine or any other services running there.
We do not recommend turning off the firewall on production systems.
Direction | Service | Description |
---|---|---|
Inbound |
|
HTTPS endpoint for the NXLog Platform user interface. |
|
Agent management. |
|
|
Ingestion of logs sent by agents. |
|
Outbound |
|
DNS services. Change the port number if you are running your organization’s DNS server on another port. |
|
SMTP port for sending NXLog Platform email notifications, such as new user invitations. Depending on your SMTP server, allow either port 25, 465, 587, or a custom port. |
|
|
NXLog cloud backend for customer registration and management of the customer’s organizations, subscriptions, and invoices. |
|
|
Microsoft Azure Container Registry and Microsoft Azure Blob Storage. |
|
|
DigitalOcean Spaces CDN. |
|
|
Ubuntu only. Official Ubuntu APT system repositories.
Depending on your configuration, for example when using custom repository mirrors, you may need to allow access to different hostnames. |
|
|
RHEL only. Official Red Hat Enterprise Linux software repositories.
Depending on your configuration, for example when using custom repository mirrors, you may need to allow access to different hostnames. |
SMTP server requirements
Important NXLog Platform features such as creating user accounts and resetting account passwords rely on email. Ensure that you have the details of your organization’s SMTP server available, including network address, port number, and credentials in case of authenticated SMTP.
NXLog Platform supports plain-text, SSL/TLS, and STARTTLS SMTP communication. It uses a self-signed certificate for TLS. Ensure that your SMTP server accepts self-signed certificates or install an SMTP relay that does.
NXLog Agent compatibility
NXLog Platform currently supports the following NXLog Agent versions:
-
NXLog Agent 5.10 or later.
-
NXLog Agent 6.2 or later.
Consider regularly updating your agents, as each NXLog Agent version provides new features that improve the compatibility with NXLog Platform. For example, NXLog Agent 6.4 and later versions support auto-enrollment to NXLog Platform on installation, greatly simplifying the agent enrollment process. |