#1130 - using keys with OIC File Server

Introduction

This is more of a note for myself, but others may also find it useful.

Generate the keys

 Here I use the following cmd -

ssh-keygen -t ed25519 -C "OIC-FileServer"

You can check out the keygen options here.

I then give a name for the keys -

 

Use the Keys in OIC

Now I go to my user settings in OIC File Server - and upload the public key -

I will use the private key in an FTP connection I make to this File Server - 

Test the connection - 

#1129 - OCI Log Analytics MCP Server

Introduction

As you all know, I'm a great fan of OCI Log Analytics, especially in respect of OIC. Before delving into the MCP aspect, let's have a quick recap on what Log Analytics offers the OIC administrator -

• OOTB OIC focused dashboards, especially useful for OIC fleet management based on - 
• OCI Service Metrics for Oracle Integration
• OIC Activity Stream logs

• Ability to create one's own specific dashboards for OIC

• Enables ad hoc querying of the OIC Activity Stream, via Log Explorer

• Ability to trace requests over multiple OCI services e.g.
• OCI API Gateway to OIC

• Enables long term storage of OIC Logs

• etc. etc.

Net, net, a very compelling addition to the OIC Admin toolkit. OIC Log Analytics also offers LoganAI, the ability to query your logs using natural language. Please check out my blog post on this topic, before continuing. 

This cool feature has now been augmented with the ability to connect to Log Analytics from your favourite AI Assistant.

A big thanks to my ORCL colleague, Rishabh G. His repo is available here.

As he states - this enables an - MCP server that connects AI assistants to OCI Log Analytics. Query, analyze, and explore your logs through natural language. No query language expertise required.

Log Analytics MCP Server

This is running on a compute node - 

Claude as my AI Assistant

As you can see, I've added the MCP server to my Claude config.

I'm running Claude on windows, hence my use of PuTTY.

Before firing up Claude, let's enter a couple of orders in OIC. These run with trace set to audit - 

The integration will behave as follows - 

• All orders for an iCar will be rejected, as we don't stock such a product.
• Every order for an iBoat takes longer due to extra processing required for this cool product
• Orders over 10k for customer NiallC will be rejected, as it breaks his credit limit
• All other orders will be approved and processed.

I will execute 7 orders -

• orderNr 100 - order for an iCar - this will fail
• orderNr 101 - order for an iBoat - this will take longer to process
• orderNr 102 - order for iBike - approved and processed
• orderNr 103 - order for an iBoat - this will take longer to process
• orderNr 104 - order for iScooter - approved and processed
• orderNr 105 - order for iBike - approved and processed
• orderNr 106 - order over 10K from NiallC - rejected

The tracking fields are as follows - 

Now to Claude -

I now make many a couple of api calls - pushing thru orders number 100 and 101.

I can ask questions, such as - 

As you can see, there was a peak on March 16th. I was running large SOAP UI tests.

This is significant — cross-referencing with the order volumes from the chart earlier, that hour saw 415,786 total logs and out of those 94,379 were authentication errors. It looks like something went wrong with authentication credentials/tokens during the high-volume processing window on March 16, causing roughly 1 in 4 flows to fail at the trigger. No errors have occurred since.

I validate the numbers in OIC Observability - 

Excellent!

Here's another example of searching for errors - 

Note the advice from claude -

This strongly suggests iCar is not in the integration's approved product catalogue and orders for it will always be rejected until the product is added or the validation logic is updated.

I now run an integration, that will, at runtime, throw an error in the MAP action - 

Summa Summarum

This is a great addition to your monitoring toolkit. Kick the tyres, you won't regret it!

 

  

#1128 - Pushing OIC Activity Stream Logs directly to OCI Log Analytics

Introduction

OCI Log Analytics is a great value add to OIC monitoring, especially in respect of OIC fleet management.

Previously, we needed to send the logs via OCI Logging, and, from there, via a Connector to OCI Log Analytics. Some customer also experienced data truncation, when pushing the activity stream logs bia OCI Logging.

Net, net, the above problem is solved, as you will see, we've simplified this completely. 

Just go to your service instance page in the OCI console, select your service instance and then check out the Settings section on the Details tab  - 

 

Now for a bit of reading, check out the docs here. 

We have to ensure we have a log group for OIC logs in OCI Log Analytics - 

Click on Administration - 

We need to create a policy to allow uploads from OIC.

For this we need the OIC client id; this can be retrieved by the Oracle Cloud Services app, auto-created when you provisioned your instance.

Click on the link -

Click OAuth configuration and then scroll down to General Information, here you find the client id - 

We will add this client id to a dynamic group, which we will now create - 

Now to the Policy which will grant permissions to the dynamic group.

allow dynamic-group DynamicGroup to {LOG_ANALYTICS_LOG_GROUP_UPLOAD_LOGS} in compartment LogGroup_Compartment

allow dynamic-group DynamicGroup to {LOG_ANALYTICS_SOURCE_READ} in tenancy

allow dynamic-group DynamicGroup to use loganalytics-ondemand-upload in tenancy

allow dynamic-group DynamicGroup to {LOG_ANALYTICS_LOG_GROUP_UPLOAD_LOGS} in tenancy

That's the prep work done, all we need to do now is enable this in the OIC service instance page -

Click enable and enter the ocid of your target OCI Log Analytics log group.

Sanity Test

Here's the data in OCI Log Analytics Log Explorer - 

Note, I ran the integration in Debug mode.

Summa Summarum

We have made it even easier to ingest OIC activity stream logs to OCI Log Analytics. It's just so easy; no excuse for not trying it out!