NAME

     sfcapd — sflow collector for sflow version v2/v4 and v5

SYNOPSIS

     sfcapd -w flowdir [-C config] [-z] [-y] [-j] [-D] [-u userid] [-g groupid] [-S num]
            [-t interval] [-P pidfile] [-p port] [-I ident] [-b bindhost] [-4] [-6]
            [-j mcastgroup] [-R repeater] [-B buffsize] [-n sourceparam] [-M multiflowdir]
            [-i metricrate] [-m metricpath] [-e] [-x command] [-E] [-v] [-V]

DESCRIPTION

     sfcapd reads sflow data from the network and stores the records into binary formated files.
     The sflow implementation is based of sflowtool. The packet samples are converted into
     netflow compatible records.

     If you want to collect netflow data, please have a look at nfcapd which is also part of the
     nfdump tools.

     Sflow is an industry standard developed by InMon Corporation.  For more information see
     http://sflow.org.

     sfcapd is the twin of nfcapd and supports the same feature set. See also nfcapd(1) for more
     details.

     The options are as follows:

     -w flowdir
             Set the flow directory to store the output files. If a sub hierarchy is specified
             with -S the final directory is concatenated to flowdir/subdir.

     -C config
             Reads additional configuration parameters from config file.  sfcapd tries to read
             the config file from the install default path $prefix/etc/ which may be overwritten
             by the environment variable NFCONF , which again is overwritten by this option -C.
             If -C none is specified, then no config file is read, even if found in the search
             path.

     -p portnum
             Set the port number to listen. Default port is 9995

     -b bindhost
             Specifies the hostname/IPv4/IPv6 address to bind for listening. This can be an IP
             address or a hostname, resolving to a local IP address.

     -4      Forces sfcapd to listen on IPv4 addresses only. Can be used together with -b if a
             hostname has IPv4 and IPv6 addresses.

     -6      Forces sfcapd to listen on IPv6 addresses only. Can be used together with -b if a
             hostname has IPv4 and IPv6 addresses.

     -J mcastgroup
             Join the specified IPv4 or IPv6 multicast group for listening.

     -R host[/port]
             Enables the packet repeater. All incoming packets are sent additionally to another
             host and port.  host is either a valid IPv4/IPv6 address, or a symbolic hostname,
             which resolves to a valid IP address.  port may be omitted and defaults to 9995.
             Note: As IPv4/IPv6 are accepted the host/port separator is '/'.  Up to 8 additional
             repeaters my be defined. Use this methode to daisy chain collectors.

     -I ident
             Sets ident as identification string for the current source. This string is written
             into the output file to identify the source. Default is 'none'. If you have multiple
             sources, see option -n below.

     -n ident,IP,flowdir
             Configures a netflow source identified by the string ident, IP flowdir If you have
             multiple sources per collector, add multiple -n options. All exporters send the
             flows to the same port -p.  Do not mix single source configuration -I with multiple
             -n options.

     -M flowdir
             Set the flow directory for dynamic allocated exporters. New exporters are
             dynamically added when sending data.  All exporters send netflow data to the same
             port and IP. For each dynamically added source, a new sub directory is created under
             flowdir with the name of the IP address of the exporter. All '.' and ':" in IP
             addresses are replaced be '-'.  -D Set daemon mode: fork to background and detach
             from terminal.  sfcapd terminates on signal TERM, INT or HUP.

     -P pidfile
             Writes the running process ID into pidfilw.  Use this option to integrate sfcapd in
             start/stop files.

     -u userid
             Drop privileges of running process to user userid.  sfcapd needs to be started as
             user root.

     -g groupid
             Drop privileges of running process to group groupid.  sfcapd needs to be started as
             user root.

     -B bufflen
             Sets the network socket input buffer to bufflen bytes. For high volume traffic it is
             recommended to raise this value to typically > 100k, otherwise you risk to lose
             packets. The default is OS (and kernel) dependent.

     -S num  Adds an additional directory sub hierarchy to store the data files. The default is
             0, no sub hierarchy, which means all files go directly into flowdir.  The flowdir is
             concatenated with the specified sub hierarchy format to create the final data
             directory.  The following hierarchies are defined:
             0 default     no hierarchy levels
             1 %Y/%m/%d    year/month/day
             2 %Y/%m/%d/%H year/month/day/hour
             3 %Y/%W/%u    year/week_of_year/day_of_week
             4 %Y/%W/%u/%H year/week_of_year/day_of_week/hour
             5 %Y/%j       year/day-of-year
             6 %Y/%j/%H    year/day-of-year/hour
             7 %Y-%m-%d    year-month-day
             8 %Y-%m-%d/%H year-month-day/hour

     -t interval
             Sets the time interval in seconds to rotate files. The default value is 300s ( 5min
             ).  The smallest available interval is 2s.

     -z      Compress flow files with LZO1X-1 compression. Fastest compression.

     -y      Compress flow files with LZ4 compression. Fast and efficient.

     -j      Compress flow files with bz2 compression. Slow but most efficient. It is not
             recommended to use bz2 in a real time capturing.

     -e      Sets auto-expire mode. At the end of every rotate interval -t sfcapd runs an expire
             cycle to delete files according to max lifetime and max filesize as defined by
             nfexpire(1)

     -x command
             At the end of every -t interval and after the file rotate has completed, sfcapd runs
             the command command.  The string for command may contain the following place
             holders, which are expanded bevore running:
             %f   File name of new data file inluding any sub hierarchy.
             %d   Top flowdir.  The full path of the new file is: %d/%f
             %t   Time slot string in ISO format e.g. 201107110845.
             %u   Time slot string in UNIX time format.
             %i   Identification string ident string supplied by -I

     -m metricpath
             Enables the flow metric exporter. Flow metric information is sent to the UNIX socket
             metricpath at the rate specified by -i This option may by used to export flow metric
             information to other systems such as InfluxDB or Prometheus.  Please note: The flow
             metric does not include the full record. Only the flow statistics is sent.

     -i metricrate
             Sets the interval for the flow metric exporter. This interval may be different from
             the file rotation interval t and is therefore independant from file rotation.

     -v      Increase verbose level by 1. The verbose level may be increased for debugging
             purpose up to 3.

     -E      Equal to -v -v -v. Print netflow records in block format to stdout. Please note,
             that not all elements are printed, which are available in the flow record. To
             inspect all elements, use nfdump -o raw This option is for debugging purpose only,
             to verify if incoming netflow data is processed correctly.

     -V      Print sfcapd version and exit.

     -h      Print help text on stdout with all options and exit.

RETURN VALUES

     sfcapd returns 0 on success and 255 if initialization failed.

SEE ALSO

     http://sflow.org

     https://sflow.org/developers/licensing.php

     https://github.com/sflow/sflowtool

     nfdump(1) nfcapd(1) nfpcapd(1)

BUGS

     No software without bugs! Please report any bugs back to me.