Use environment variables with the Reporting CLI

Instead of providing values on the command line, you can set them as environment variables. For a list of the options that have a corresponding environment variable, see Reporting CLI options.

Set environment variables in either of the following ways:

Export them in your shell, for example, export OPENSEARCH_FROM=reports@example.com.
Save them in a file named .env in the directory from which you run the Reporting CLI. The Reporting CLI reads the .env file only from the current directory.

In a .env file, use the NAME=VALUE format, one variable per line. Lines that start with # are comments. To include characters such as #, ', or ! in a value, enclose the value in double quotation marks. The quotation marks are not included in the value.

When the same value is set in more than one place, the Reporting CLI uses the following order of precedence:

Command line options
Environment variables exported in the shell
Variables in the .env file

For example, if the .env file sets OPENSEARCH_FILENAME=test and you run the command with the --filename report option, the report is saved as report.pdf.

Example: Requesting a report using a .env file

The following .env file specifies the URL, the report file name, and the credentials:

OPENSEARCH_URL="<dashboards-url>"
OPENSEARCH_FILENAME=daily-traffic
OPENSEARCH_USERNAME=<username>
OPENSEARCH_PASSWORD=<password>

To request a PNG report using the values in the .env file, run the following command from the directory that contains the file:

opensearch-reporting-cli --format png --auth basic

The report is saved to the current directory as daily-traffic.png.

Sending a report by email using SMTP

To send a report by email using SMTP, set the following variables in your .env file:

OPENSEARCH_TRANSPORT=smtp
OPENSEARCH_SMTP_HOST=<smtp-host>
OPENSEARCH_SMTP_PORT=<smtp-port>
OPENSEARCH_SMTP_SECURE=true
OPENSEARCH_SMTP_USERNAME=<smtp-username>
OPENSEARCH_SMTP_PASSWORD=<smtp-password>
OPENSEARCH_FROM=<sender-email>
OPENSEARCH_TO=<recipient-email>

Then run the following command:

opensearch-reporting-cli --url '<dashboards-url>'

If your SMTP server does not require authentication, omit OPENSEARCH_SMTP_USERNAME and OPENSEARCH_SMTP_PASSWORD.

Using Amazon SES to request an email with a report attachment

To use Amazon SES as the email transport, the following prerequisites apply:

The sender’s email address must be verified by Amazon SES.
The Reporting CLI reads AWS credentials and the AWS Region from your AWS configuration. To configure them using the AWS Command Line Interface (AWS CLI), see Quick configuration with aws configure in the AWS Command Line Interface user guide.

The AWS credentials must grant the ses:SendRawEmail permission:

{
  "Statement": [
    {
      "Effect": "Allow",
      "Action": "ses:SendRawEmail",
      "Resource": "*"
    }
  ]
}

The following command requests an email with the report attached:

opensearch-reporting-cli --url '<dashboards-url>' --transport ses --from <sender-email> --to <recipient-email>

Alternatively, set OPENSEARCH_TRANSPORT, OPENSEARCH_FROM, and OPENSEARCH_TO in your .env file and provide only the URL:

opensearch-reporting-cli --url '<dashboards-url>'

Customizing the email

To change the email subject and body, use the --subject and --note options or the OPENSEARCH_EMAIL_SUBJECT and OPENSEARCH_EMAIL_NOTE variables. To change the email layout, edit the src/views/index.hbs template in the Reporting CLI installation directory.