Best way to index a vertical file

using the below example:

--vertfile.txt
id|10331
name|apple
date|green
DOC
id|10332
name|banana
date|yellow
DOC
id|10331
name|apple
date|green

What's the best way to ingest a vertical file?

Ingest Node with custom pipeline or logstash with some fancy filter?

To use Ingest Node, you at least need some json document that you send via the REST api, so you need to at least convert your file to json. I don't know logstash well enough to come up with a multi-line filter for this thing, better ask in the Logstash Forum about that. Why not use one of the script language clients like the perl client, the php client or the python client to do the file parsing and sent the resulting docs to ES?

So the ingest node only accepts JSON?
Yes the script clients are solid choices and perhaps the most straight forward option.

Ill check the log stash boards like you said.