# How to set multiple hosts in elasticsearch-output via environment variable?

**URL:** <https://discuss.elastic.co/t/how-to-set-multiple-hosts-in-elasticsearch-output-via-environment-variable/214802>\
**Category:** Logstash\
**Created:** [January 13, 2020, 10:47am UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/how-to-set-multiple-hosts-in-elasticsearch-output-via-environment-variable/214802 "2020-01-13T10:47:48Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 2\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![asp](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/9fc348/32.png) [@asp](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/asp)\
**Post date:** [January 13, 2020, 10:47am UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/how-to-set-multiple-hosts-in-elasticsearch-output-via-environment-variable/214802/1 "2020-01-13T10:47:48Z")

</div>

Hi,

I am trying to configure elasticsearch hosts via environment variable to be used in elasticsearch-output plugin. I want to set them as **array** for loadbalancing in the **multi node** cluster without the need for an external loadbalancer.

Here is my try:

```
output
{
        elasticsearch
        {
               
                hosts => [${ES_HOSTS}]
                ssl => "${USE_ES_SSL}"
                cacert => "${ES_CA_CERT_PATH}"
                ssl_certificate_verification => "${USE_ES_OUTPUT_SSL_CERT_VERIFICATION}"

                # credentials are fetched from envrionment or logstash-keystore

                user => "${LOGSTASH_USER}"
                password => "${LOGSTASH_PASSWORD}"

                index => "%{[@metadata][indexName]}"
        }
}

```

I've tried to set ES\_HOSTS the following ways:

```
export ES_HOSTS='"https://server1:9200"'
echo $ES_HOSTS
"https://server1:9200"

export ES_HOSTS='\"https://server1:9200\"'
echo $ES_HOSTS
\"https://server1:9200\"

export ES_HOSTS='\""https://server1:9200"\"'
echo $ES_HOSTS
\""https://server1:9200"\"

export ES_HOSTS='""https://server1:9200""'
echo $ES_HOSTS
""https://server1:9200""

```

But I always get this error when I test the configuration with logtash's -t option:

```
[FATAL] 2020-01-13 11:39:25.118 [LogStash::Runner] runner - The given configuration is invalid. Reason: Expected one of #, ", ', -, [, {,] at line 16, column 15 (byte 239) after output
{
        elasticsearch
        {
                hosts => [
[ERROR] 2020-01-13 11:39:25.126 [LogStash::Runner] Logstash - java.lang.IllegalStateException: Logstash stopped processing because of an error: (SystemExit) exit

```

If that one is working for one server, then I want to be able to set something like this:  
`"https://server1:9200","https://server2:9200","https://server3:9200"`

And if there is an external loadbalancer available, then I can just set it to the loadbalancer's "LB\_IP:LB:PORT". So I would be flexible and more independent from the runtime environment without needing to change the pipeline between different environments.

Thanks, Andreas

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![system](https://us1.discourse-cdn.com/elastic/original/3X/1/a/1ac57faf039f6b580b3f104ef42a2a89e41014de.png) [@system](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/system)\
**Post date:** [February 10, 2020, 10:47am UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/how-to-set-multiple-hosts-in-elasticsearch-output-via-environment-variable/214802/2 "2020-02-10T10:47:52Z")

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