WiFi Receiver

An OpenTelemetry Collector receiver that collects WiFi interface metrics using the netlink API on Linux systems.

Description

This receiver collects WiFi statistics from wireless network interfaces, including:

• Interface metrics: Operating frequency
• BSS (Basic Service Set) information: SSID, BSSID, connection mode
• Station statistics: Signal strength, bitrates, packet/byte counts, connection duration, and error metrics

Configuration

The receiver supports the following configuration:

receivers:
  wifi:
    collection_interval: 1m  # How often to scrape WiFi metrics (default: 1m)

Metrics

The receiver emits the following metrics:

Gauges

• wifi.interface.frequency (MHz): The current frequency a WiFi interface is operating at, in megahertz
• wifi.station.info (1): Labeled WiFi interface station information (with attributes: device, bssid, ssid, mode)
• wifi.station.inactive (s): Seconds since any wireless activity has occurred
• wifi.station.receive.bitrate (bps): Current WiFi receive bitrate
• wifi.station.transmit.bitrate (bps): Current WiFi transmit bitrate
• wifi.station.signal (dBm): Current WiFi signal strength

Sums (Monotonic Counters)

• wifi.station.connected.total (s): Total seconds a station has been connected
• wifi.station.receive.bytes (By): Total bytes received
• wifi.station.transmit.bytes (By): Total bytes transmitted
• wifi.station.transmit.retries (1): Total packet transmission retries
• wifi.station.transmit.failed (1): Total failed packet transmissions
• wifi.station.beacon.loss (1): Total beacon losses detected
• wifi.station.transmitted.packets (1): Total packets transmitted
• wifi.station.received.packets (1): Total packets received

Survey Gauges

• wifi.survey.noise (dBm): The noise level in decibel-milliwatts
• wifi.survey.in_use (1): Indicates if the channel is currently in use (1 for in use, 0 for not in use)

Survey Sums (Monotonic Counters)

• wifi.survey.channel.time (s): Total time the radio spent on the channel
• wifi.survey.channel.time.active (s): Total time the radio spent on the channel while it was active
• wifi.survey.channel.time.busy (s): Total time the radio spent on the channel while it was busy
• wifi.survey.channel.time.ext_busy (s): Total time the radio spent on the channel while it was busy with external traffic
• wifi.survey.channel.time.bss_rx (s): Total time the radio spent on the channel receiving data from a BSS
• wifi.survey.channel.time.rx (s): Total time the radio spent on the channel receiving data
• wifi.survey.channel.time.tx (s): Total time the radio spent on the channel transmitting data
• wifi.survey.channel.time.scan (s): Total time the radio spent on the channel while it was scanning

Attributes

Interface Metrics

• device: The network interface name (e.g., wlan0)

Station Metrics

• device: The network interface name (e.g., wlan0)
• mac_address: The MAC address of the station

BSS Info Metrics

• device: The network interface name (e.g., wlan0)
• bssid: The BSSID of the access point
• ssid: The SSID of the network
• mode: Connection mode - client, ad-hoc, or unknown

Survey Metrics

• device: The network interface name (e.g., wlan0)
• frequency_mhz: The frequency in megahertz

Requirements

• Linux operating system
• Access to netlink (usually requires running as root or with CAP_NET_ADMIN capability)
• WiFi network interface

Permissions

This receiver requires elevated permissions to access the netlink API. The collector process needs to either:

• Run as root, or
• Have the CAP_NET_ADMIN capability

Example Configuration

receivers:
  wifi:
    collection_interval: 30s

exporters:
  otlp:
    endpoint: localhost:4317

service:
  pipelines:
    metrics:
      receivers: [wifi]
      exporters: [otlp]

Implementation Notes

This receiver is inspired by the Prometheus node_exporter WiFi collector and uses the mdlayher/wifi package to interact with the Linux netlink API.