CoreOS

The Middleware Infrastructure Agent collects telemetry from Fedora CoreOS nodes. Its container-based deployment is managed by systemd through Butane configuration, keeping monitoring setup in the host provisioning workflow.

The Agent runs as a container managed by a systemd service defined through your Fedora CoreOS Butane configuration.

Prerequisites#

Before installing the Infrastructure Agent on Fedora CoreOS, make sure you have:

Butane — Required to convert human-readable Butane configuration files into machine-readable Ignition configurations.
A running Fedora CoreOS node — The node must have Docker available to run the Middleware Infrastructure Agent.

Installation#

1 Create the Butane configuration#

Add the mw-agent.service systemd unit to your existing Butane configuration.

The service starts and manages the Middleware Infrastructure Agent container on the Fedora CoreOS node.

1variant: fcos
2version: 1.5.0
3systemd:
4 units:
5   - name: mw-agent.service
6     enabled: true
7     contents: |
8       [Unit]
9       Description=Middleware Agent
10       After=docker.service
11       [Service]
12       Environment="MW_API_KEY=<MW_API_KEY>"
13       Environment="MW_TARGET=https://<MW_UID>.middleware.io:443"
14       ExecStart=/usr/bin/docker run \
15         --name mw-agent \
16         --privileged \
17         -e MW_API_KEY \
18         -e MW_TARGET \
19         ghcr.io/middleware-labs/mw-host-agent:master
20       Restart=always
21       [Install]
22       WantedBy=multi-user.target

Replace <MW_API_KEY> and <MW_UID> with your actual values.

2 Generate the Ignition configuration#

Convert the Butane configuration into an Ignition configuration.

1butane your-configuration.bn > ignition.ign

This generates the ignition.ign file.

Use the contents of ignition.ign when provisioning your Fedora CoreOS node. The configuration creates the required systemd service and starts the Middleware Infrastructure Agent during node initialization.

3 Add host tags (optional)#

To associate custom tags with the host, set the MW_HOST_TAGS environment variable in the Agent configuration along with your Middleware API key. Specify multiple tags as comma-separated key=value pairs.

1MW_HOST_TAGS=key1:value1,key2:value2,... MW_API_KEY="<MW_API_KEY>"

After the host starts reporting data, verify the configured tags in the Middleware UI:

Infrastructure → [Your Host] → System Information

4 Verify the installation#

After provisioning the Fedora CoreOS node, verify that the Middleware Agent container was created and check its status.

Run:

1docker ps -a --filter ancestor=ghcr.io/middleware-labs/mw-host-agent:master

Check the command output:

Up — The Agent container is running and the installation was successful.
Exited — The Agent container was created but is no longer running. Check the container logs and exit code to determine whether additional troubleshooting is required.
Blank output — The Agent container was not created. Review the Butane/Ignition configuration and provisioning process.

Manage the agent (Commands)#

Middleware agent runs as a systemd service in Linux based systems, usually on Linux systems, the Middleware Agent runs as a systemd service. The service definition is typically located under:

1/usr/lib/systemd/system/

Use the following commands to start, stop, restart, and check the status of the Middleware Agent.

Action	Command
Start Agent	`sudo systemctl start mw-agent.service`
Stop Agent	`sudo systemctl stop mw-agent.service`
Restart Agent	`sudo systemctl restart mw-agent.service`
Check service status	`sudo systemctl status mw-agent.service`
View service logs	`sudo journalctl -u mw-agent.service --no-pager`
Verify Docker container	`docker ps -a --filter ancestor=ghcr.io/middleware-labs/mw-host-agent:master`

Verify data collection#

After installing the Agent, allow a few moments for the host to start reporting telemetry.

Go to Infrastructure Monitoring → Hosts and verify that your Linux host appears and is reporting metrics.

After data collection starts, you can:

View host metrics in Infrastructure Monitoring.
View collected host logs in Log Monitoring.
Create alerts for collected metrics.
Create custom dashboards to visualize Linux host metrics.

Uninstall#

If you need to remove the Middleware.io Infra Agent from your Fedora CoreOS host, follow these steps:

1 Stop & disable the service:#

1sudo systemctl stop mw-agent.service
2sudo systemctl disable mw-agent.service

2 Remove the systemd unit:#

1sudo rm /etc/systemd/system/mw-agent.service
2sudo systemctl daemon-reload

3 Remove the Docker container:#

1docker rm -f mw-agent

4 (Optional) Remove the agent image:#

1docker rmi ghcr.io/middleware-labs/mw-host-agent:master

5 Clean up Ignition/Butane configs:#

Remove the mw-agent.service snippet from your .bn/.ign files before reprovisioning.

Troubleshooting#

Data is not coming after agent installation ?

It may take a few moments for telemetry to appear after a new Agent installation. First, go to Infrastructure Monitoring → Hosts and check whether the host is reporting data.

If the host does not appear or data is not being collected, check the following:

Check network connectivity. Verify that the host can establish an outbound HTTPS connection to: https://<YOUR_UID>.middleware.io:443

Check for multiple Agents. Make sure only one Middleware Infrastructure Agent is running on the host.

Check Agent logs. Review the Agent log file for errors: /var/log/mw-agent/mw-agent.log You can also inspect the service logs using journalctl.

Check proxy configuration. If the host is behind a corporate proxy, verify that the required HTTP_PROXY and HTTPS_PROXY environment variables are configured correctly and that the proxy allows connections to Middleware.

Check permissions. Make sure the installation and Agent management commands are run with sufficient privileges. Use sudo where required.

If you’re still unsure about the issue , you may reach out to Middleware support team via chatbot (which you are seeing at right bottom corner of this page) or email at [email protected].

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