topic Re: How to Remove the data getting indexed? in Getting Data In

How to Remove the data getting indexed?

Inayath_khan — Wed, 30 Sep 2020 04:48:10 GMT

Hi Folks,

Can anyone suggest how to remove the below data getting indexed to indexer and also how to remove the data which is already indexed?

timestamp syslog_host user remote_host connection_id query_id operation database object

gcusello — Wed, 01 Apr 2020 08:25:32 GMT

Hi @Inayath_khan,
Splunk isn't a database, so you cannot modify or remove data after indexing:

You can filter data deleting them before indexing ( https://docs.splunk.com/Documentation/Splunk/8.0.2/Forwarding/Routeandfilterdatad ), in this way data aren't indexed and don't consume license;
you can replace a part of events ( https://docs.splunk.com/Documentation/SplunkCloud/8.0.2001/Data/Anonymizedata );
you can logically delete events using the | delete command; remember that the can_delete feature, by default, isn't available for all users, even if admins (and it isn't a good idea to enable admins to do this!); this command deletes events but only logically, bacause physically events remain in the index.
clean a full index by CLI, in this case deletion is also physical.

Ciao.
Giuseppe

Inayath_khan — Wed, 01 Apr 2020 08:54:09 GMT

Thanks @gcusello can you help me at a configuration level what changes has to be made to stop selective data getting indexed?

gcusello — Wed, 30 Sep 2020 04:48:11 GMT

In both cases you have to follow these steps:

identify events to filter (sourcetype or source or host);
identify rule to discard or take logs (regex);
modify props.conf and transforms.conf on indexers or (when present) on Heavy Forwarders;
put props.conf and transforms.conf in an App (better) or in $SPLUNK_HOME/etc/system/local .

Discard specific events and keep the rest:
In props.conf, set the TRANSFORMS-null attribute:

[your_sourcetype]
TRANSFORMS-null= setnull

in transforms.conf, set DEST_KEY to "queue" and FORMAT to "nullQueue":

[setnull]
REGEX = your_regex
DEST_KEY = queue
FORMAT = nullQueue

At the end restart Splunk Enterprise.

Keep specific events and discard the rest
In props.conf:

[your_sourcetype]
TRANSFORMS-set= setnull,setparsing

In transforms.conf:

[setnull]
REGEX = .
DEST_KEY = queue
FORMAT = nullQueue

[setparsing]
REGEX = your-regex
DEST_KEY = queue
FORMAT = indexQueue

At the end restart Splunk Enterprise.

Ciao.
Giuseppe