Chapter 8. Publishing Applications

In this chapter, we will cover how to publish our App on Splunkbase, the community for Splunk developers. We will discuss step by step the process, and any caveats that may arise. We will talk about Certified Applications, and what that means to you as an App developer. We will also start a discussion on communities, and why the community is important in the culture of Splunk, as well as around the globe.

Then, we will see some links and references to other commonly used Splunk resources, such as the Splunk Wiki, and the Splunk documentation (which you should already be familiar with). Finally, we will hit upon Splunk user groups,how to find a group, and what to expect.

Self-hosting your App

The first method of publishing an App is by doing it yourself. This can mean that you are storing the data, keeping the App under control, and generally excluding Splunkbase altogether. This is a good methodology, especially when you are trying to monetize your App on a per license approach. Splunkbase doesn't have a methodology for restricting downloads, other than for export reasons. Really, if you don't use Splunkbase, you can publish your App anywhere, and as long as people find it and download it, it is published. There are many different ways to share your App; these are just a few: Apache/IIS web server, Amazon S3, and Dropbox. It's a short list, not meant to be comprehensive, but just enough to give you ideas on where to publish and display your App.

Splunkbase

The primary location for hosted Apps is http://apps.splunk.com, more commonly known as Splunkbase. Splunkbase is a place for developers to publish their work under a set of various licenses and hosting options. Once you have packaged your App successfully, head over to http://apps.splunk.com/new and log in to your account. There will be an EULA and a privacy policy. Please read and accept both of them if you agree to the terms. The first step is to determine how you are hosting your content. There are two ways of doing this: Splunk-hosted content, and externally hosted content. The externally hosted option allows you to specify a URL for the end user. It contains the App and any other documentation you wish to include. This is what the option looks like:

The other option is to have it hosted by Splunkbase. This option will look like what is shown in the following screenshot:

If your browser supports it, you will have the option of a file picker, or drag and drop. Notice the requirements...

Community

Now that we have uploaded our App, we can truthfully say we have joined the Splunk community. And, as part of the Splunk community, we have certain responsibilities to foster the environment as an inviting place to explore, learn, and help others. We will now take a moment to orient those of you that haven't yet visited the community.

Answers

The answers site is a help forum that is open to the public. It is located at http://answers.splunk.com. The primary purpose is to get help from other forum members. The questions that are asked and the answers that are given are highly variable, but the amount of creativity is astounding. Most of these answers come from folks with a wealth of real-world knowledge, but some are answered by native Splunkers. No question is too small; the community is always willing to help.

dev.splunk.com

As the title indicates, http://dev.splunk.com is a site designed for App developers, and almost everything in this book can be found in the documentation there...

Summary

In this chapter, we went through the steps on how to publish an App on Splunkbase. We made sure that our packaging was correct and that the initial verification steps were met. You learned about Splunk App certification, and how it can be beneficial to users and developers alike. After that, you learned about some places within the Splunk community in which you can find help, ask questions, discuss Splunk in detail, or just hang out.

Now, you have reached the end of the book. We thank you for reading, and please, let us know how we did (instructions for feedback are given in the Preface). After completing this book, you now have the required knowledge and insight into the world of Splunk application development. Be on the lookout for new and interesting ways to integrate with Splunk, and visit http://dev.splunk.com for more features and code in the future. Allons-y!