Riak KV Configuration Reference

Riak has a riak.conf configuration file located in /etc if you are using a source install or in /etc/riak or /usr/local/etc if you used a binary install.

The riak.conf file is used to set a wide variety of attributes for the node, from the storage backend that the node will use to store data to the location of SSL-related files to sibling resolution parameters and beyond.

Note on upgrades to 2.0

If your cluster is currently running a version of Riak prior to 2.0 and you’d like to upgrade to version 2.0 or later, you may continue to use your old app.config and vm.args files. You may also use the newer riak.conf alongside them, but please be aware that any settings in app.config or vm.args will override settings in riak.conf.

The advanced.config file

For most Riak installations, the riak.conf file should be sufficient for configuration management. But some installations, particularly those upgrading from an earlier version of Riak to version 2.0 or later, may need to make use of an advanced.config file to control some settings available only in versions prior to 2.0. If this applies to your installation, please see the Advanced Configuration section below.

Node Metadata

Every Riak node has a name and a cookie used to facilitate inter-node communication. The following parameters enable you to customize the name and cookie.

Ring

Configurable parameters for your cluster’s ring.

Storage Backend

Riak enables you to choose from the following storage backends:

• Bitcask — configuration
• LevelDB — configuration
• Leveled — configuration
• Memory — configuration
• Multi — configuration

Directories

The directories in which Riak stores data, logs, dependencies, executables, and configuration files can be configured using the parameters below.

Each of these directory parameters can be used to construct values for other parameters by placing it within a $(...). Thus, platform_log_dir becomes $(platform_log_dir) and so on.

To give an example, you can select the directory used by Riak’s active anti-entropy system using the anti_entropy.data_dir parameter. When setting that parameter, you can specify an absolute directory, as below:

anti_entropy.data_dir = /path/to/anti_entropy

Or you can use the value of platform_data_dir:

anti_entropy.data_dir = $(platform_data_dir)/anti_entropy

Search

Configuration parameters for Riak KV Search. For a more detailed description of these parameters, check out Search Settings.

Riak Control

Riak Control is a web-based administrative console for inspecting and manipulating Riak clusters. The configurable parameters below enable you to turn the Riak Control subsystem on and off and to configure console authorization.

Runtime Health

Configurable parameters for interaction between Riak and the underlying operating system.

Default Bucket Properties

When configuring buckets using bucket types, the table below lists the bucket properties that are used when no bucket type is specified.

Object Settings

Configurable parameters for conflict resolution and dealing with sibling explosion.

Erlang VM

In the older configuration system, the Erlang VM in which Riak runs was configured using a vm.args file. In the new, riak.conf-based system, the Erlang VM can be configured using the parameters in the table below.

JavaScript MapReduce

Configurable parameters for Riak’s now-deprecated JavaScript MapReduce system.

Security

Configurable parameters for Riak KV Security.

Client Interfaces

Configurable parameters for clients connecting to Riak either through Riak’s Protocol Buffers or HTTP API.

Logging

Configurable parameters for lager, Riak’s logging system.

Active Anti-Entropy

Configurable parameters for Riak’s active anti-entropy subsystem.

TicTac Active Anti-Entropy

Intra-Cluster Handoff

Configurable parameters for intra-cluster, i.e. inter-node, handoff.

Riak Data Types

SNMP

Owing to lack of usage, SNMP support has been removed from Riak KV 2.9.0 and higher.

JMX

Owing to lack of usage, JMX support has also been removed from Riak KV 2.9.0 and higher.

Strong Consistency

Please Note:

Riak KV’s strong consistency is an experimental feature and may be removed from the product in the future. Strong consistency is not commercially supported or production-ready. Strong consistency is incompatible with Multi-Datacenter Replication, Riak Search, Bitcask Expiration, LevelDB Secondary Indexes, Riak Data Types and Commit Hooks. It suffers from known issues and we do not recommend its usage in any production environment.

Riak’s strong consistency feature has a variety of tunable parameters that allow you to enable and disable strong consistency, modify the behavior of leaders and followers, set various timeouts, and more. More detailed information from an operations perspective can be found in our documentation on managing strong consistency.

Strong consistency is disabled by default. The strong_consistency parameter enables you to turn it on. This setting is available in each node’s riak.conf file.

Unlike the strong_consistency setting, the settings listed below are available only in advanced.config, in the riak_ensemble section of that file. That section looks like this:

{riak_ensemble, [
    {parameter1, value},
    {parameter2, value},
    %% Other setting
  ]}

Further instructions on setting parameters in advanced.config can be found in the advanced configuration section below.

Using these settings properly demands a firm understanding of the basic architecture of Riak’s implementation of strong consistency. We highly recommend reading our documentation on the implementation details behind strong consistency before changing the defaults on these parameters.

Miscellaneous

Advanced Configuration

The advanced.config file takes the same format as the app.config file familiar to users of versions of Riak prior to 2.0. Here is an example:

[
  {riak_core,
    [
      {cluster_mgr, {"127.0.0.1", 8098 } },
      %% more riak_core configs
    ]},

  {riak_repl,
    [
      {data_root, "/var/db/riak/riak_repl/"},
      %% more riak_repl configs
    ]
  }
].

The following settings are available in the advanced.config file:

riak_repl settings

Most settings that are configurable through advanced.config are related to Riak’s riak_repl subsystem.

Upgrading Riak Search with advanced.config

If you are upgrading to Riak 2.x and wish to upgrade to the new [Riak Search][use ref search](codename Yokozuna), you will need to enable legacy Search while the upgrade is underway. You can add the following snippet to your advanced.config configuration to do so:

[
    %% Other configs

    {riak_search, [ {enabled, true} ]},
    {merge_index, [
        {data_root, "/var/lib/riak/merge_index"},
        {buffer_rollover_size, 1048576},
        {max_compact_segments, 20}
    ]},

    %% Other configs
].

Other settings

There are three non-riak_repl settings available in advanced.config.

Cluster Job Controls

The cluster.job switches control whether classes of jobs are enabled or disabled through the HTTP(S) and Protobuf interfaces. All jobs are enabled by default.