Getting Data In

Testing renderXML=1 for Windows event logs in Splunk 6.2, why is the data contained in XML format different without XML?

wplank
Path Finder

Hello,

I'm currently testing the 6.2 Feature renderXML=1 for Windows Event Logs, but it seems to me the information which is contained in the XML format differs from the information without XML.

Do you have any experience with renderXML? I don't want to lose crucial data. For example, in the 4728 Event the message field contains valuable data about the changed group information. Is this data lost?

I only could test this in a smaller environment, and noticed a difference, for example the Event 5807:

Plain:

LogName=System
SourceName=NETLOGON
EventCode=5807
EventType=3
Type=Warning
ComputerName=XXXComputerNameXXX
TaskCategory=The operation completed successfully.
OpCode=Info
RecordNumber=171904
Keywords=Classic
Message=During the past 4.24 hours there have been 35 connections to this Domain Controller from client machines whose IP addresses don't map to any of the existing sites in the enterprise. Those clients, therefore, have undefined sites and may connect to any Domain Controller including those that are in far distant locations from the clients. A client's site is determined by the mapping of its subnet to one of the existing sites. To move the above clients to one of the sites, please consider creating subnet object(s) covering the above IP addresses with mapping to one of the existing sites.  The names and IP addresses of the clients in question have been logged on this computer in the following log file '%SystemRoot%\debug\netlogon.log' and, potentially, in the log file '%SystemRoot%\debug\netlogon.bak' created if the former log becomes full. The log(s) may contain additional unrelated debugging information. To filter out the needed information, please search for lines which contain text 'NO_CLIENT_SITE:'. The first word after this string is the client name and the second word is the client IP address. The maximum size of the log(s) is controlled by the following registry DWORD value 'HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\Netlogon\Parameters\LogFileMaxSize'; the default is 20000000 bytes.  The current maximum size is 20000000 bytes.  To set a different maximum size, create the above registry value and set the desired maximum size in bytes.
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XML:

<Event xmlns='http://schemas.microsoft.com/win/2004/08/events/event'>
<System>
<Provider Name='NETLOGON'/>
<EventID Qualifiers='0'>5807</EventID>
<Level>3</Level>
<Task>0</Task>
<Keywords>0x80000000000000</Keywords>
<TimeCreated SystemTime='2015-07-30T01:48:37.000000000Z'/>
<EventRecordID>171927</EventRecordID>
<Channel>System</Channel>
<Computer>XXXComputerNameXXX</Computer>
<Security/>
</System>
<EventData>
<Data>4.23</Data>
<Data>39</Data>
<Data>20000000</Data>
<Data>20000000</Data>
</EventData>
</Event>

As you can see, some values are missing (Type=Warning, Keywords=Classic, Message=...), and some values have different names (EventType).

Any best practices?

Kind regards

1 Solution

woodcock
Esteemed Legend

The renderXml view of the event is being generated by Windows, not by Splunk so you are barking up the wrong (corporate) tree. You should be asking this question in the Windows forums. This capability is the exact feature that you see when using the (native) Windows Event Viewer and you click on "Details" tab (default is "General") and then click on "XML". You will see that this is the same view of your event that is coming into Splunk when using renderXml (and this is all inside Microsoft Windows; nothing to do with Splunk at all).

View solution in original post

woodcock
Esteemed Legend

The renderXml view of the event is being generated by Windows, not by Splunk so you are barking up the wrong (corporate) tree. You should be asking this question in the Windows forums. This capability is the exact feature that you see when using the (native) Windows Event Viewer and you click on "Details" tab (default is "General") and then click on "XML". You will see that this is the same view of your event that is coming into Splunk when using renderXml (and this is all inside Microsoft Windows; nothing to do with Splunk at all).

azurite257
Explorer

Agree that it's microsoft issue, however Splunk when implemented the way of ingesting as Xml, certain fields should have been tokenized, or provide lookup for translation.

Leaving this on the user community to implement was a poor choice on Splunk part...

Furthermore, leaving tab delimiter in place should not have been allowed...

Now I have to create means to dealing with this on my own.

See below link for more info...
https://social.technet.microsoft.com/Forums/windows/en-US/0ec39516-5dcc-4453-9761-c1f94439a1cc/windo...

0 Karma

wplank
Path Finder

You are right, it is a Microsoft "issue".

But if Splunk is offering this kind of freature, I would like to find some more informations and examples and links and articles. At the moment there is only a few blog posts, and the user has to try out for himself what renderXML is showing or not.

bpaul_splunk
Splunk Employee
Splunk Employee

You can view the XML View option from the Windows Event Viewer.

  1. Open an event in the Event Viewer
  2. Click on the "Details" tab
  3. Click on the "XML View" radio button

This is the information which is ingested.

0 Karma

wplank
Path Finder

nice tips, but does not answer my question.

what i'm "complaining" about, that it seems to me some information change / is missing if you are using renderXML in the secuirty event logs.

0 Karma

woodcock
Esteemed Legend

Are you using suppress_text=0 (you should be)?

0 Karma

wplank
Path Finder

yes, im using supress_text=0 (default). In a security context supress_text=1 should never be used, because in the security event log some cruitial informations are delivered in the message part.

0 Karma
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