Monitoring Azure Functions Service

The Azure Functions sensor can be disabled, and it can be filtered by tags and resource groups. You can configure the Azure Functions sensor by using the agent configuration in <agentinstall_dir>/etc/instana/configuration.yaml by:

com.instana.plugin.azure.functionapp:
  # Valid values: true, false
  enabled: false # enabled (true) by default
  # Comma separated list of tags in key:value format
  include_tags:
  # Comma separated list of tags in key:value format
  exclude_tags:
  # Comma separated list of resource groups
  include_resource_groups:
  # Comma separated list of resource groups
  exclude_resource_groups:

To disable monitoring of the Azure Functions services, use the following configuration:

com.instana.plugin.azure.functionapp:
  enabled: false

Multiple tags and resource groups can be defined, which are separated by a comma. Tags need to be provided as a key-value pair, which is separated by colon (:). To make the configuration easier, you can define which tags and resource groups you want to include in discovery or exclude from discovery. When you define a tag or resource group in both lists (include and exclude), the exclude list has a higher priority. If service filtering is not needed, you don't need to define the configuration. It's not mandatory to define all values to enable filtering.

To include services by tags into discovery, use the following configuration:

com.instana.plugin.azure.functionapp:
  include_tags: # Comma separated list of tags in key:value format (e.g. env:prod,env:staging)

To exclude services by tags from discovery, use the following configuration:

com.instana.plugin.azure.functionapp:
  exclude_tags: # Comma separated list of tags in key:value format (e.g. env:dev,env:test)

To include services by resource groups into discovery, use the following configuration:

com.instana.plugin.azure.functionapp:
  include_resource_groups: # Comma separated list of resource groups (e.g. rg_prod,rg_staging)

To exclude services by resource groups discovery, use the following configuration:

com.instana.plugin.azure.functionapp:
  exclude_resource_groups: # Comma separated list of resource groups (e.g. rg_dev,rg_test)

Discovery filtering can be configured on the global level for all Azure services. When you define filters for Azure Functions service, global filters are overridden. For more information about global Azure service discovery filtering, see Azure configuration.

Azure Functions is based on App Service. The installation and configuration process for Azure Functions and Azure App Services is the same.

To install the Instana Azure Functions tracers on Windows, complete the following steps:

1. Log on to Microsoft Azure portal.

2. Locate the Azure Function that you want to instrument.

3. Click Extensions in the Development Tools panel.

   

4. On the Extensions page, add the Instana Tracing AppService extension. After the Instana Tracing AppService extension is installed, configure the extension to use it.

5. Go to the Extensions page, and click URL on the Instana Tracing AppService extension. The Instana Tracing for App Services dialog is displayed.

   

   1. In the Instana Tracing for AppServices window, set Enable Tracing to on.

   2. Optional: Set Enable 64 bit to on.

   3. In the Agent Key field, enter the license key of your Instana host agent.

   4. In the Endpoint URL field, perform one of the following steps:

      • SaaS: Enter the endpoint URL for serverless monitoring.
      • Self-hosted: Enter the endpoint in the https://<IP address of the Instana backend>/serverless format and set the INSTANA_DISABLE_CA_CHECK parameter to true or 1.

   5. In the Log-Level field, enter one of the following log levels that you want to use:

      • NONE
      • DEBUG
      • INFO
      • WARN
      • ERROR

      The log information is generated in the root folder of the Azure Function application.

   6. Click Update Config. The information is saved for the Azure Function.

6. Restart Azure Function by clicking Restart. When you run your Azure Function, an Instana rewriter is attached to the application, and Instana starts collecting traces.

To view the traces in the Instana UI, open the dashboard of your Azure Function entity and click Upstream/Downstream. Then, you can see the traces that are collected for this entity. For more information about viewing traces, see Analyzing traces and calls.

To make Instana work in your Azure Function Application, add the following lines to your Dockerfile:

DOTNET_STARTUP_HOOKS="[AzureWebJobsScriptRoot]/bin/Instana.Tracing.Core.dll" \
CORECLR_ENABLE_PROFILING=1 \
CORECLR_PROFILER="{cf0d821e-299b-5307-a3d8-b283c03916dd}" \
CORECLR_PROFILER_PATH="[AzureWebJobsScriptRoot]/bin/instana_tracing/CoreProfiler.so" \
INSTANA_ENDPOINT_URL="[Serverless-ingress-URL-for-your-region]" \
INSTANA_AGENT_KEY="[Your-Instana-agent-key]"

The INSTANA_ENDPOINT_URL value depends on your region. For more information, see Endpoints for serverless monitoring documentation.

For more information about setting up Instana in .NET Core, see the .NET Core documentation.

When Azure Function Application is deployed on Azure by using the Docker Container option, you don’t need to install and use the Instana Nuget packages. Instead, you must copy all the Instana Nuget packages to the release folder where the application is deployed on Azure.

For more information about our packages, see the .NET Tracing documentation.

Make sure that you are using the latest version by downloading the latest Instana.Tracing.Core, Instana.Tracing.Core.Sdk, and Instana.Tracing.Core.Rewriter.Linux packages.

After the downloading process is finished, copy the following files to some folders in your Azure Function Application, which is easily accessible from Dockerfile:

• Instana.Tracing.Core.dll
• Instana.Tracing.Core.Common.dll
• Instana.Tracing.Core.Instrumentation.dll
• Instana.Tracing.Core.Transport.dll
• Instana.Tracing.Api.dll
• CoreProfiler.so
• instrumentation.json

Then, copy these files to the release folder on Azure as follows:

COPY "/[path-to-your-patch-folder]/Instana.Tracing.Core.dll" "[AzureWebJobsScriptRoot]/bin/Instana.Tracing.Core.dll"
COPY "/[path-to-your-patch-folder]/Instana.Tracing.Core.Common.dll" "[AzureWebJobsScriptRoot]/bin/Instana.Tracing.Core.Common.dll"
COPY "/[path-to-your-patch-folder]/Instana.Tracing.Core.Instrumentation.dll" "[AzureWebJobsScriptRoot]/bin/Instana.Tracing.Core.Instrumentation.dll"
COPY "/[path-to-your-patch-folder]/Instana.Tracing.Core.Transport.dll" "[AzureWebJobsScriptRoot]/bin/Instana.Tracing.Core.Transport.dll"
COPY "/[path-to-your-patch-folder]/Instana.Tracing.Api.dll" "[AzureWebJobsScriptRoot]/bin/Instana.Tracing.Api.dll"
COPY "/[path-to-your-patch-folder]/CoreProfiler.so" "[AzureWebJobsScriptRoot]/bin/instana_tracing/CoreProfiler.so"
COPY "/[path-to-your-patch-folder]/instrumentation.json" "[AzureWebJobsScriptRoot]/bin/instana_tracing/instrumentation.json "

Then, delete the Instana.Tracing.Core packages, and follow the instructions that are already described in this topic for copying library files to the release folder inside your Dockerfile.

FunctionApp Service Details	Description
Id	The unique ID for Function App.
Name	The name of the FunctionApp instance.
Type	The FunctionApp type.
Location	The region where the instance is located.
Kind	Indicates the type of FunctionApp account.
Subscription	The subscription ID of the FunctionApp service instance.
Resource Group	The resource group of the FunctionApp service instance.
State	Current deployment state of the instance.

Functions Service Details	Description
Id	The unique ID for Function.
Name	The name of the Functions service instance.
Type	Functions Service type.
Location	The region where the instance is located.
Subscription	The subscription ID of the Functions service instance.
Resource Group	The resource group of the Functions service instance.