Manual Chapter : Configure traffic capturing for troubleshooting

Applies To:

  • BIG-IQ Centralized Management

    8.4.0, 8.3.0, 8.2.0, 8.1.0, 8.0.0

Updated Date: 07/07/2026

Configure traffic capturing for troubleshooting

Before you begin, you need to ensure that AVR is provisioned on your managed BIG-IP devices, and that Statistics Collection is enabled on your BIG-IQ per device (Devices > BIG-IP DEVICES > <DEVICE NAME> > STATISTICS COLLECTION). Enabling Statistics Collection ensures that traffic data from BIG-IP is logged on BIG-IQ.

To view log messages on an external server, you must configure a Remote Publisher. For more information about configuring a Remote Publisher, see the Managing Logs section of BIG-IQ Centralized Management: Local Traffic and Network Implementations on support.f5.com.

You can configure your HTTP analytics profile to capture traffic headers and additional transaction details. Once configured, you can review captured traffic, based upon specific transaction parameters and performance thresholds.

  1. Go to Configuration > LOCAL TRAFFIC > Profiles.

    This screen lists the profiles that are configured for the managed BIG-IP devices in your network.

  2. Select the HTTP Analytics profile you wish to edit.

    The analytics profile is a default profile for all HTTP Analytics management. If you are creating a new HTTP Analytics profile, make sure to select the Override All check box to change the settings inherited by the parent profile.

  3. For Captured Traffic Internal Logging, select Enable to manage the Capture Filter settings.

AS3 Attribute

capturedTrafficInternalLogging

 
Once you enable a traffic capturing, the Capture Filter area becomes available. This allows you to further configure which traffic you would like to capture.
  1. (Optional) To send captured traffic to an external server, enable Captured Traffic External Logging.

AS3 Attribute

capturedTrafficExternalLoggingTo specify Remote Publisher: externalLoggingPublisher

 
Once you enable this field, you can select a pre-configured server from the **Remote Publisher** field.

  1. From the Capture Request Details and Capture Response Details lists, select the options that indicate the part of the traffic to capture.

    Detail options for request and response capture:

    Entity Description
    None Specifies that the system does not capture request (or response) data.
    Headers Specifies that the system captures request (or response) header data only.
    Body Specifies that the system captures the body of requests (or responses) only.
    All Specifies that the system captures all request (or response) data, including header and body.
    Entity AS3 Attribute
    Capture Request Details requestCapturedParts
    Capture Response Details responseCapturedParts

  2. For DoS Activity, select the option that indicates which DoS traffic is captured.

    Option Description
    Any Specifies that the system captures any traffic regardless of DoS activity.
    Mitigated by Application DoS Specifies that the system only captures DoS traffic if it was mitigated.

AS3 Attribute

dosActivity
  1. For Protocols, specify whether the system captures Alltraffic, or traffic with HTTP, or HTTPS protocols.

AS3 Attribute

capturedProtocols

  1. For Qualified for JavaScript Injection, you can select Qualified only to specify that the system only captures traffic that qualifies for JavaScript injection, which includes the following conditions:

    • The HTTP content is not compressed
    • The HTTP content-type is text/html.
    • The HTTP content contains an HTML <head> tag

AS3 Attribute

capturedReadyForJsInjection

  1. Customize the dimension filters, according to your application needs, to capture the portion of traffic to that you need for troubleshooting.

    Tip: Dimension filters capture traffic according to defined aspects of the transaction’s configuration, or header/payload contents. By focusing in on the data and limiting the type of information that is captured, you can troubleshoot particular areas of an application more efficiently. For example, capture only requests or responses, specific status codes or methods, or headers containing a specific string.

Entity

Description

AS3 Attribute

Response Status Codes

Select Allto capture traffic, regardless of the HTTP status response code.Select Only to capture traffic with specific response status codes. To specify, add response status codes to the Selected Status Codes list from the Available Status Codes list.

responseCodes

HTTP Methods

Select Allto capture traffic, regardless of the HTTP request method.Select Only to capture traffic with requests that contain a specific HTTP method. To specify, add methods to the Selected Methods list from the Available Methods list.

methods

URL

Select All to capture traffic with requests for any URL.Select Starts With to only capture traffic with requests for URLs that start with a specific string.

Note: If you select this option, and leave the list blank, the system will not capture any traffic.

Select Does not start with to capture traffic with requests for URLs except for those that start with a specific string.

Note: You can add up to 10 different strings to the list. If the list is blank, the system will capture traffic with requests for any URL.

urlFilterTypeTo add URL prefixes: urlPathPrefixes

User Agent

Select All to capture traffic sent from any browser.Select Contains to only capture traffic sent from a browser that contains a specific string.

Note: You can add up to 10 different strings to the list. If the list is blank, the system will capture traffic sent from any browser.

userAgentTo add User Agent substringsuserAgentSubstrings

Client IP Address

Select All to capture traffic sent to, or from, any client IP address.Select Only to only capture traffic sent to or from a specific client IP address.

Note: You can add up to 10 different IP addresses to the list. If the list is blank, the system will capture traffic sent to, or from, any IP address.

clientIps

Request Containing String

Select All to capture all traffic.Select Search in filter captured traffic that includes a specific string contained in the request.

requestContentFilterSearchString

Response Containing String

Select All to capture all traffic.Select Search in filter captured traffic that includes a specific string contained in the response.

responseContentFilterSearchString
  1. Click Save & Close.

Your analytics profile is now configured for traffic capturing.You can assign this profile to your virtual servers, if they do not yet have an Analytics profile configured.