For Linux machines (physical or virtual), you can manually deploy and configure the open source Telegraf agent using a standalone binary archive to receive custom data when automated methods or package managers are unavailable.

Products

• VCF Operations/Automation (formerly VMware Aria Suite)
• VMware Aria Operations (formerly vRealize Operations) 8.x

Issue/Introduction

For Linux machines (physical or virtual), you can manually deploy and configure the open source Telegraf agent using a standalone binary archive to receive custom data when automated methods or package managers are unavailable.

How to:

• Install the Telegraf agent manually from a binary archive

• Configure the Telegraf agent as a persistent background service

• Register the agent to VMware Aria Operations through a Cloud Proxy

Environment

VMware Aria Operations
VMware Aria Operations Cloud Proxy
Supported Linux OS

Cause

A manual binary deployment is necessary when automated agent lifecycle management (via the Aria Operations UI) is unfeasible due to strict network segregation, lack of direct credential sharing, or compliance policies requiring manual, script-driven provisioning.

Resolution

Prerequisite:

• In order to setup a telegraf agent, you must install the cloud proxy first. See Installing Cloud Proxy in Aria Operations.

• Network connectivity must be available between the target Linux server and the Cloud Proxy.

• Root or sudo access must be available on the target Linux server.

Install and Configure Open Source Telegraf agent manually

1. Download the required Telegraf Linux binary archive (e.g., telegraf-1.38.4_linux_amd64.tar.gz) and transfer it to the target Linux server. (https://www.influxdata.com/downloads/)

2. Extract the archive: tar -xvf telegraf-1.38.4_linux_amd64.tar.gz

3. Obtain the helper script from the cloud proxy: curl -kO https://<CloudProxy>/downloads/salt/telegraf-utils.sh

4. Activate execution permission of the script for Linux VM: chmod +x telegraf-utils.sh

5. Acquire an API authentication token from VMware Aria Operations. Note: The easiest way to capture this token is via local authentication using the Authorize button at the top right of the Aria Operations API home page (https://<operations_ip_or_fqdn>/suite-api). This performs a POST /suite-api/api/auth/token/acquire and returns a Bearer Token. You can also acquire this token via an API tool like Postman.

6. Copy the Telegraf binary and configuration files into the appropriate system locations:

7. cp telegraf-1.38.4/usr/bin/telegraf /usr/bin/ chmod +x /usr/bin/telegraf

   mkdir -p /etc/telegraf/

   mkdir -p /etc/telegraf/telegraf.d

   cp telegraf-1.38.4/etc/telegraf/telegraf.conf /etc/telegraf/

      Run the helper script to update Telegraf configurations:

  sudo bash -x ./telegraf-utils.sh opensource -c <Cloud_Proxy_IP> -t <Token> -d /etc/telegraf/telegraf.d -e /usr/bin/telegraf -v <FQDN_of_vROPS> -k 1 

8. Validate the Telegraf configuration: telegraf --test --config /etc/telegraf/telegraf.conf

9. Create a native Linux systemd service so that Telegraf runs automatically:

sudo tee /etc/systemd/system/telegraf.service > /dev/null << EOF
[Unit]
Description=The plugin-driven server agent for reporting metrics into InfluxDB
Documentation=https://github.com/influxdata/telegraf
After=network.target

[Service]
User=root
ExecStart=/usr/bin/telegraf --config /etc/telegraf/telegraf.conf --config-directory /etc/telegraf/telegraf.d
ExecReload=/bin/kill -HUP \$MAINPID
Restart=on-failure
KillMode=control-group

[Install]
WantedBy=multi-user.target
EOF

10. Enable and start the Telegraf service: sudo systemctl enable telegraf sudo systemctl start telegraf

11. Verify the service is running: sudo systemctl status telegraf

Additional Information

Additional Information / Troubleshooting

• Agent Registration: After the service starts successfully, the server should automatically register with VMware Aria Operations. Please allow approximately 5–10 minutes for the agent to establish communication. Verify the server is visible under Administration → Manage Telegraf Agents.

• API Authentication Issues: If you encounter a "You are not authorized for the request" message or if your API requests are failing due to authentication, Basic Auth might be disabled in your environment. To fix this, you must adjust the parameter to basicAuthentication.enabled=true and cycle the API service by running the service api restart command.