Prerequisites

You can use this receiver if you have the following permissions:

• VIEW SERVER PERFORMANCE STATE if you're using SQL Server 2022 or later versions.

• VIEW SERVER STATE if you're using previous versions.

Depending on the tasks you want to perform you also need at least one of the following permissions:

• CREATE DATABASE

• ALTER ANY DATABASE

• VIEW ANY DEFINITION

Check with your database provider's documentation for details.

Create a non-admin user

This is a basic example of how to create a non-admin, read-only SQL Server user:

        CREATE LOGIN [splunk-otel-collector] WITH PASSWORD = '<SECURE_PASSWORD>'; 
        CREATE USER [splunk-otel-collector] FOR LOGIN [splunk-otel-collector]; 
        GRANT VIEW SERVER STATE TO [splunk-otel-collector]; 
        GRANT VIEW ANY DEFINITION TO [splunk-otel-collector];

Get started

Follow these steps to configure and activate the component:

1. Deploy the Splunk Distribution of the OpenTelemetry Collector to your host or container platform:

   • Install the Collector for Linux with the installer script

   • Install the Collector for Windows with the installer script

   • Install the Collector for Kubernetes using Helm

2. Configure the MSSQL Server receiver as described in the next section.

3. Restart the Collector.

Sample configuration

To activate the receiver, add sqlserver to the receivers section of your configuration file:

receivers:
    sqlserver:
      collection_interval: 10s
    sqlserver/1:
      collection_interval: 5s
      username: sa
      password: securepassword
      server: 0.0.0.0
      port: 1433

Next, include the receiver in the metrics pipeline of the service section of your configuration file:

service:
  pipelines:
    metrics:
      receivers:
        - sqlserver

Configure a named instance on Windows

If you’re using a named instance on Windows, you need to specify a computer and instance name. For example:

receivers:
  sqlserver:
    collection_interval: 10s
    computer_name: CustomServer
    instance_name: CustomInstance
    resource_attributes:
      sqlserver.computer.name:
        enabled: true
      sqlserver.instance.name:
        enabled: true

Advanced configuration

The following settings are optional:

• collection_interval. 10s by default. The interval at which the receiver emits metrics.

• instance_name. Optional. The instance name identifies the specific SQL Server instance to monitor. If unspecified, metrics are scraped from all instances. If configured, you must also set computer_name when running on Windows.

These are the optional direct connection options:

• username. The username used to connect to the SQL Server instance.

• password. The password used to connect to the SQL Server instance.

• server. IP address or hostname of the SQL Server instance to connect to.

• port. Port of the SQL Server instance to connect to.

• datasource. Use this option to specify the direct connection using a string. It can't be used in conjunction with the username, password, server and port options. For more information refer to the example and to Microsoft's connection string descriptions in the MS SQL documentation.

The following are Windows-specific optional options:

• computer_name. The computer name identifies the SQL Server name or IP address of the computer being monitored. If specified, instance_name is also required. This option is ignored in non-Windows environments.

Enable built-in content

Splunk Observability Cloud provides built-in dashboards with charts that give you immediate visibility into the technologies and services being used in your environment. Learn more at Monitor the Collector with Splunk Observability Cloud’s built-in dashboards.

For more information:

• See the configuration that enables built-in content at SQL Server discovery yaml in GitHub.

• See the list of default and optional metrics at SQL server default and optional metrics in GitHub.

Enable metrics and resource attributes

Some resource attributes, such as sqlserver.instance.name, are deactivated by default.

To activate them, specify the option in your configuration file:

receivers:
    sqlserver:
      collection_interval: 10s
    sqlserver/1:
      collection_interval: 5s
      username: sa
      password: securepassword
      server: 0.0.0.0
      port: 1433
      resource_attributes:
        sqlserver.instance.name:
          enabled: true

Use datasource to specify your connection string

receivers:
    sqlserver:
      datasource: sqlserver://username:password@host/instance?param1=value&param2=value
      server: 127.0.0.1
      trusted_connection: true

Settings

The following table shows the configuration options for the Microsoft SQL server receiver:

Metrics

The following metrics, resource attributes, and attributes, are available.

receivers:
  samplereceiver:
    metrics:
      metric-one:
        enabled: true
      metric-two:
        enabled: false

receivers:
  hostmetrics:
    scrapers:
      process:
        metrics:
          process.cpu.utilization:
            enabled: true

Troubleshooting