Elastic MySQL connector reference

The Elastic MySQL connector is a connector for MySQL data sources. This connector is written in Python using the Elastic connector framework.

View the source code for this connector (branch main, compatible with Elastic 9.0).

Important

As of Elastic 9.0, managed connectors on Elastic Cloud Hosted are no longer available. All connectors must be self-managed.

Self-managed connector

Availability and prerequisites

This connector is available as a self-managed managed connector in Elastic versions 8.5.0 and later. To use this connector as a self-managed connector, satisfy all self-managed connector requirements.

This connector has no additional prerequisites beyond the shared requirements, linked above.

Create a MySQL connector

Use the UI

To create a new MySQL connector:

In the Kibana UI, navigate to the Search → Content → Connectors page from the main menu, or use the global search field.
Follow the instructions to create a new MySQL self-managed connector.

Use the API

You can use the Elasticsearch Create connector API to create a new self-managed MySQL self-managed connector.

For example:

		 PUT _connector/my-mysql-connector {
  "index_name": "my-elasticsearch-index",
  "name": "Content synced from MySQL",
  "service_type": "mysql"
}

	

Note

The user needs the cluster privileges manage_api_key, manage_connector and write_connector_secrets to generate API keys programmatically.

To create an API key for the connector:

Run the following command, replacing values where indicated. Note the encoded return values from the response:

		 POST /_security/api_key {
  "name": "connector_name-connector-api-key",
  "role_descriptors": {
    "connector_name-connector-role": {
      "cluster": [
        "monitor",
        "manage_connector"
      ],
      "indices": [
        {
          "names": [
            "index_name",
            ".search-acl-filter-index_name",
            ".elastic-connectors*"
          ],
          "privileges": [
            "all"
          ],
          "allow_restricted_indices": false
        }
      ]
    }
  }
}

	

Update your config.yml file with the API key encoded value.

Refer to the Elasticsearch API documentation for details of all available Connector APIs.

Usage

To use this connector as a self-managed connector, see Self-managed connectors.

For additional operations, see Connectors UI in Kibana.

Compatibility

This connector is compatible with MySQL 5.6 and later.

The connector is also compatible with MariaDB databases compatible with the above.

The data source and your Elastic deployment must be able to communicate with each other over a network.

Configuration

Each time you create an index to be managed by this connector, you will create a new connector configuration. You will need some or all of the following information about the data source.

Host

The IP address or domain name of the MySQL host, excluding port. Examples:

192.158.1.38
localhost

Port

The port of the MySQL host. Examples:

3306
3307

Username

The MySQL username the connector will use.

The user must have access to the configured database. You may want to create a dedicated, read-only user for each connector.

Password

The MySQL password the connector will use.

Database

The MySQL database to sync. The database must be accessible using the configured username and password.

Examples:

products
orders

Tables

The tables in the configured database to sync. One or more table names, separated by commas. The tables must be accessible using the configured username and password.

Examples:

furniture, food, toys
laptops

Enable SSL

Whether SSL verification will be enabled. Default value is True.

SSL Certificate

Content of SSL certificate. If SSL is disabled, the SSL certificate value will be ignored.

Known issues

This connector has the following known issues:

Upgrading from a tech preview connector (8.7 or earlier) to 8.8 will cause the MySQL connector configuration to be invalid.

MySQL connectors prior to 8.8 can be missing some configuration fields that are required for the connector to run. If you would like to continue using your MySQL connector after upgrading from 8.7 or earlier, run the script below to fix your connector’s configuration. This will populate the configuration with the missing fields. The auxilliary information needed for the configuration will then be automatically added by by the self-managed connector.
```
 POST /.elastic-connectors/_update/connector_id {
  "doc" : {
    "configuration": {
      "tables": {
        "type": "list",
        "value": "*"
      },
      "ssl_enabled": {
        "type": "bool",
        "value": false
      },
      "ssl_ca": {
        "type": "str",
        "value": ""
      },
      "fetch_size": {
        "type": "int",
        "value": 50
      },
      "retry_count": {
        "type": "int",
        "value": 3
      }
    }
  }
}
```
Upgrading to 8.8 does not migrate MySQL sync rules.

After upgrading, you must re-create your sync rules.

See Known issues for any issues affecting all connectors.

Documents and syncs

The following describes the default syncing behavior for this connector. Use sync rules and ingest pipelines to customize syncing for specific indices.

All records in the MySQL database included in your connector configuration are extracted and transformed into documents in your Elasticsearch index.

For each row in your MySQL database table, the connector creates one Elasticsearch document.
For each column, the connector transforms the column into an Elasticsearch field.
Elasticsearch dynamically maps^ MySQL data types to Elasticsearch data types.
Tables with no primary key defined are skipped.
Field values that represent other records are replaced with the primary key for that record (composite primary keys are joined with _).

The Elasticsearch mapping is created when the first document is created.

Each sync is a "full" sync.

For each MySQL row discovered:

If it does not exist, the document is created in Elasticsearch.
If it already exists in Elasticsearch, the Elasticsearch document is replaced and the version is incremented.
If an existing Elasticsearch document no longer exists in the MySQL table, it is deleted from Elasticsearch.

Deployment using Docker

You can deploy the MySQL connector as a self-managed connector using Docker. Follow these instructions.

Download the sample configuration file. You can either download it manually or run the following command:

		curl https://raw.githubusercontent.com/elastic/connectors/main/config.yml.example --output ~/connectors-config/config.yml

	

Remember to update the --output argument value if your directory name is different, or you want to use a different config file name.

Update the configuration file with the following settings to match your environment:

elasticsearch.host
elasticsearch.api_key
connectors

If you’re running the connector service against a Dockerized version of Elasticsearch and Kibana, your config file will look like this:

		# When connecting to your cloud deployment you should edit the host value
elasticsearch.host: http://host.docker.internal:9200
elasticsearch.api_key: <ELASTICSEARCH_API_KEY>

connectors:
  -
    connector_id: <CONNECTOR_ID_FROM_KIBANA>
    service_type: mysql
    api_key: <CONNECTOR_API_KEY_FROM_KIBANA>1

	

Optional. If not provided, the connector will use the elasticsearch.api_key instead

Using the elasticsearch.api_key is the recommended authentication method. However, you can also use elasticsearch.username and elasticsearch.password to authenticate with your Elasticsearch instance.

Note: You can change other default configurations by simply uncommenting specific settings in the configuration file and modifying their values.

Run the Docker image with the Connector Service using the following command:

		docker run \
-v ~/connectors-config:/config \
--network "elastic" \
--tty \
--rm \
docker.elastic.co/integrations/elastic-connectors:9.0.0-beta1.0 \
/app/bin/elastic-ingest \
-c /config/config.yml

	

Refer to DOCKER.md in the elastic/connectors repo for more details.

Find all available Docker images in the official registry.

Tip

We also have a quickstart self-managed option using Docker Compose, so you can spin up all required services at once: Elasticsearch, Kibana, and the connectors service. Refer to this README in the elastic/connectors repo for more information.

Sync rules

The following sections describe Sync rules for this connector.

Basic sync rules are identical for all connectors and are available by default.

Advanced rules for MySQL can be used to pass arbitrary SQL statements to a MySQL instance.

Important

You need to specify the tables used in your custom query in the "tables" field.

For example:

		[
    {
        "tables": ["table1", "table2"],
        "query": "SELECT ... FROM ..."
    }
]

	

Warning

When using advanced rules, a query can bypass the configuration field tables. This will happen if the query specifies a table that doesn’t appear in the configuration. This can also happen if the configuration specifies * to fetch all tables while the advanced sync rule requests for only a subset of tables.

Troubleshooting

See Troubleshooting.

Security

See Security.