My EC2 instance is in Commercial Regions. How should I configure the CloudWatch agent to collect metrics in the local region and upload logs to AWS GovCloud Regions?

Question

I followed the documentation to create an AmazonCloudWatchAgent configuration file for the CloudWatch agent

sudo aws configure --profile AmazonCloudWatchAgent

Configured credentials and regions related to the us-gov-west-1 region

sudo aws configure --profile AmazonCloudWatchAgent list

The current logs can be uploaded to cloudwatch in the GOV region, but EC2 indicators cannot be collected to cloudwatch. How should I configure it?

Answer

1) Edit the CloudWatch Agent Configuration File: Locate the CloudWatch Agent configuration file on your EC2 instance. This file is typically located at /opt/aws/amazon-cloudwatch-agent/etc/amazon-cloudwatch-agent.json. Edit this file using a text editor.

2) Add EC2 Metrics Configuration: Within the configuration file, you'll need to add a section to specify which EC2 metrics you want to collect. Here's an example configuration for collecting basic EC2 metrics:
{
  "metrics": {
    "append_dimensions": {
      "AutoScalingGroupName": "${aws:AutoScalingGroupName}",
      "ImageId": "${aws:ImageId}",
      "InstanceId": "${aws:InstanceId}",
      "InstanceType": "${aws:InstanceType}"
    },
    "metrics_collected": {
      "cpu": {
        "measurement": [
          "cpu_usage_idle",
          "cpu_usage_iowait",
          "cpu_usage_user",
          "cpu_usage_system"
        ],
        "metrics_collection_interval": 60,
        "totalcpu": false
      },
      "disk": {
        "measurement": [
          "used_percent",
          "inodes_free"
        ],
        "metrics_collection_interval": 60,
        "resources": [
          "*"
        ]
      },
      "diskio": {
        "measurement": [
          "io_time"
        ],
        "metrics_collection_interval": 60,
        "resources": [
          "*"
        ]
      },
      "mem": {
        "measurement": [
          "mem_used_percent"
        ],
        "metrics_collection_interval": 60
      }
    }
  }
}
This configuration collects CPU, disk, disk I/O, and memory metrics for your EC2 instances.

1)  Specify the Region: Ensure that the CloudWatch agent is configured to send metrics to the correct AWS region. In your case, you've already configured it for the us-gov-west-1 region, so you don't need to change this.

2) Restart the CloudWatch Agent: After making changes to the configuration file, restart the CloudWatch Agent to apply the new configuration. You can typically do this with a command like:

sudo /opt/aws/amazon-cloudwatch-agent/bin/amazon-cloudwatch-agent-ctl -a fetch-config -m ec2 -c file:/opt/aws/amazon-cloudwatch-agent/etc/amazon-cloudwatch-agent.json -s
Replace /opt/aws/amazon-cloudwatch-agent/etc/amazon-cloudwatch-agent.json with the path to your actual configuration file if it's different.

After performing these steps, the CloudWatch Agent should start collecting EC2 metrics and sending them to the specified region. You can then view these metrics in the CloudWatch console.

My EC2 instance is in Commercial Regions. How should I configure the CloudWatch agent to collect metrics in the local region and upload logs to AWS GovCloud Regions?

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