Esql

ES|QL Query Skill

Query Elasticsearch via the Kibana ES|QL async search API. Run ES|QL queries directly against Kibana clusters without the user needing to copy-paste results.

Setup

Staging / Production — ,es-web CLI

The ,es-web CLI at /Users/meain/.local/bin/utils/,es-web handles Kibana ES|QL queries with automatic async polling, session management, and table output.

First-time setup for a cluster: the user provides a curl command from Kibana's network tab:

pbpaste | ,es-web init stg-us
pbpaste | ,es-web init prd-eu

Check configured clusters:

,es-web list

Session cookies expire after a few hours. If you get a 401/session expired error:

1. Look up the Kibana URL for the target cluster from the Confluence Speed Dial page (confluence page 405504500)
2. Open it with open <url> (with dangerouslyDisableSandbox: true)
3. Ask the user to copy a curl from the network tab and run ! pbpaste | ,es-web init <cluster>

How to query with ,es-web

# Simple: service + time window
,es-web -c stg-us -s earn -t 1h -n 20

# With additional WHERE clause
,es-web -c stg-us -s earn -t 1h -q 'message LIKE "*validation*"'

# Custom fields
,es-web -c stg-us -s earn -t 1h -f '@timestamp, message, labels.error'

# Raw ES|QL query
,es-web -c stg-us 'FROM logs-* | WHERE service.name == "earn" | STATS count = COUNT(*) BY labels.event_type | SORT count DESC | LIMIT 10'

# JSON output for further processing
,es-web -c stg-us -s earn -t 30m --json

# Debug: print generated query
,es-web -c stg-us -s earn -t 1h --debug

,es-web options

• -c — Cluster alias (e.g. stg-us, prd-eu)
• -s — service.name filter
• -t — Time window (e.g. 30m, 1h, 2d). Defaults to 4h if omitted (a warning is printed to stderr)
• -n — Max rows (default: 20)
• -q — Additional WHERE clause
• -f — Comma-separated fields for KEEP clause
• -i — Index pattern (default: logs-*)
• --json — Raw JSON output
• --debug — Print generated query to stderr

Important notes

• labels.status is a keyword field — compare with strings, not integers (e.g., labels.status >= "500")
• When no -f is specified, default fields are: @timestamp, service.name, message, labels.error, labels.error_message, labels.path, labels.status, trace.id
• For raw ES|QL queries, pass the full query as a positional argument — no default KEEP is added
• LIKE queries on message across many services can be slow — scope with service and tight time windows

Known service names

These are the service.name values for control-plane-backend services:

The nginx ingress controller logs under service.name == "nginx".

Common log fields

Standard fields

• @timestamp — event timestamp (ISO 8601)
• service.name — service identifier (see table above)
• service.environment — prod, prd, qa, dev
• message — log message text
• level — log level (info, warn, error)
• trace.id — distributed trace ID for correlating across services

Label fields (keyword/string type)

• labels.status — HTTP status code (string, not int)
• labels.path — request path
• labels.method — HTTP method
• labels.error / labels.error_message — error details
• labels.organization_id / labels.org_id — organization identifier
• labels.organization.id — alternative org ID field
• labels.workload_tenant.id — workload tenant identifier
• labels.user.id / labels.principal.id — user/principal identifiers
• labels.operation — operation being performed
• labels.handler — handler name
• labels.earn.event.type — EARN event type
• labels.earn.event.dedupe_key — EARN dedup key
• labels.scheduler.event.id — scheduler event ID
• labels.request.url — outgoing request URL
• labels.http.router.request_id — request ID

Numeric label fields

• numeric_labels.* — numeric values (latency, counts, etc.)

Overview labels (for filtering structured log categories)

These are set via clog.Label() and appear in a labels field:

• http_server_overview, dispatcher_overview, queue_dispatcher_overview
• earn_event_delivery, events_processor
• panic_recovery, panic_recovered
• azure_sdk_logging, secrets_handling
• deprecated_behavior_overview

Common query patterns

List services in a time window

FROM logs-*
| WHERE service.environment == "prod"
  AND @timestamp >= "2026-04-07T07:00:00.000Z"
  AND @timestamp <= "2026-04-07T08:00:00.000Z"
| STATS count = COUNT(*) BY service.name
| SORT count DESC
| LIMIT 30

Find 5xx errors from nginx

FROM logs-*
| WHERE service.name == "nginx"
  AND service.environment == "prod"
  AND labels.status >= "500"
| SORT @timestamp DESC
| LIMIT 20
| KEEP @timestamp, labels.status, labels.path, labels.method, message

Find errors for a specific service

FROM logs-*
| WHERE service.name == "earn"
  AND service.environment == "prod"
  AND level == "error"
  AND @timestamp >= "START"
  AND @timestamp <= "END"
| SORT @timestamp DESC
| LIMIT 30
| KEEP @timestamp, message, labels.error, labels.error_message, labels.operation, trace.id

Search by org/tenant ID across all services

FROM logs-*
| WHERE service.environment == "prod"
  AND @timestamp >= "START"
  AND @timestamp <= "END"
  AND (labels.organization_id == "ORG_ID" OR labels.org_id == "ORG_ID" OR labels.organization.id == "ORG_ID")
| SORT @timestamp DESC
| LIMIT 20
| KEEP @timestamp, service.name, message, labels.error, trace.id

Search by workload tenant ID

FROM logs-*
| WHERE service.environment == "prod"
  AND @timestamp >= "START"
  AND @timestamp <= "END"
  AND labels.workload_tenant.id == "TENANT_ID"
| SORT @timestamp DESC
| LIMIT 30
| KEEP @timestamp, service.name, message, labels.error, labels.operation

Trace a request across services

FROM logs-*
| WHERE trace.id == "TRACE_ID"
| SORT @timestamp ASC
| LIMIT 100
| KEEP @timestamp, service.name, level, message, labels.error, labels.status, labels.path

Check latency metrics

FROM logs-*
| WHERE service.name == "SERVICE"
  AND service.environment == "prod"
  AND message LIKE "*metric*latency*"
| SORT @timestamp DESC
| LIMIT 30
| KEEP @timestamp, message, numeric_labels.value_ms

Error rate by service (last hour)

FROM logs-*
| WHERE service.environment == "prod"
  AND @timestamp >= "START"
  AND @timestamp <= "END"
  AND level == "error"
| STATS error_count = COUNT(*) BY service.name
| SORT error_count DESC
| LIMIT 20

Find panics

FROM logs-*
| WHERE service.environment == "prod"
  AND @timestamp >= "START"
  AND @timestamp <= "END"
  AND (message LIKE "*panic*" OR labels.panic_recovered == "true" OR labels.panic_recovery == "true")
| SORT @timestamp DESC
| LIMIT 20
| KEEP @timestamp, service.name, message, labels.error, trace.id

Dev / Personal Environments — ,es CLI

The ,es CLI at /Users/meain/.local/bin/utils/,es provides a simpler way to query Elasticsearch, but it only works for the dev environment. Do not use it for staging or production.

Common queries

Search by trace ID:

,es -q 'trace.id:<TRACE_ID>' -n 50

Filter for errors:

,es -q 'trace.id:<TRACE_ID> AND event.type:error' -n 10

Broader service-level search (no trace ID):

,es -q 'service.name:<SERVICE_NAME> AND (level:error OR event.type:error)' -n 20

,es CLI options

• -q — Lucene query string
• -n — Number of results
• -f — Comma-separated fields to display
• -s — Sort field (e.g. @timestamp:desc)

Choosing the right approach

Cluster naming convention: <env>-<region>, e.g. stg-us, stg-eu, prd-us, prd-eu, prd-apac.

When no ,es-web session is configured for the target cluster:

1. Look up the Kibana URL on the Confluence Speed Dial page (confluence page 405504500), open <kibana-base-url>/app/discover#/ with open <url> (with dangerouslyDisableSandbox: true), then ask the user to copy a curl from the network tab and run ! pbpaste | ,es-web init <cluster>
2. If that's not possible, fall back to clipboard mode:
   • Copy the ES|QL query to the user's clipboard with pbcopy
   • Tell the user to open Kibana, run the query in Discover (ES|QL mode)
   • Have them copy the response JSON from the network tab

Investigation workflow tips

• Start broad, narrow down. First identify which services are involved, then drill into specific errors.
• nginx → upstream. nginx logs show external-facing status codes; upstream service logs show root cause.
• Use trace.id to correlate requests across services when available.
• Error details live in labels.error and labels.error_message.
• Field types matter: numeric_labels.* fields are numeric; labels.* fields are keywords (strings).
• Time windows: Default is 4h when -t is omitted. If a query times out, retry with a narrower window (e.g., 1h → 30m). For very broad searches (e.g., no service filter), start at 30m and expand only if needed.
• Overview labels (like http_server_overview, dispatcher_overview) are useful for filtering to structured log categories without needing to match on message text.