I started Tares with TARES_CATALOG for the demo but no sources appeared, why?

Tares skips the TARES_CATALOG import silently when your catalog is not empty, so restart on a fresh data directory to get the demo sources. Run TARES_CATALOG=catalog.demo.yaml tares up —data-dir ~/tares-demo. A good import logs the imported sources and triggers, and everything lands in the Default project.

How it works

The demo catalog is a file, catalog.demo.yaml, that wires up three correlated sources, a trigger over them and a built-in agent. When you start Tares with TARES_CATALOG pointing at that file, Tares imports it into your catalog.

The import runs only while your catalog is still empty. If you already created anything before the restart, for example a source you added in the console or on the other tab of the quickstart, the import is skipped. Tares does not print an error in that case, so the console simply shows your existing sources and none of the demo ones.

What a good import looks like:

• The startup log prints a line like imported catalog.demo.yaml into catalog (3 sources, 1 triggers).
• All imported sources and the trigger land in the Default project.
• If you do not see that log line, the import did not run.

The data directory is what holds your catalog. Pointing Tares at a new, empty data directory gives it an empty catalog, so the import runs again.

Set it up

1. Stop the running daemon with Ctrl-C.

2. Make sure you have the demo files. The demo stack is a small api-server, Prometheus and a traffic generator. Start it, and download the catalog if you do not have it yet:

curl -O https://raw.githubusercontent.com/glassflow/tares/main/demo/docker-compose.yml
docker compose up -d
curl -O https://raw.githubusercontent.com/glassflow/tares/main/demo/catalog.demo.yaml

3. Restart Tares with the catalog on a fresh data directory:

TARES_CATALOG=catalog.demo.yaml tares up --data-dir ~/tares-demo

4. Watch the startup log for the confirmation line: imported catalog.demo.yaml into catalog (3 sources, 1 triggers).

5. Open the console at http://localhost:8787. The three sources and the trigger are in the Default project.

6. Run the status check to confirm sources are configured and receiving:

tares status

7. Open Explore, pick the api-server entity, and watch metrics, logs and alerts merge into one timeline. To cause an incident and watch an agent diagnose it, continue with AI SRE.

If you run Tares in Docker, note that the demo’s logs source tails docker logs on your machine, which does not work from inside the Tares container. In that case pick Your own source in the console instead of relying on the demo catalog.

What you get

• Three correlated demo sources and one trigger, ready in the Default project without adding anything by hand.
• A log line that tells you the import worked and how many sources and triggers it brought in.
• One timeline for the api-server entity in Explore, with metrics, logs and alerts merged.
• A clean data directory at ~/tares-demo that keeps the demo separate from anything you created earlier.
• A built-in agent from the catalog that you can use in the next step of the quickstart.

When something else fits

• If you want to keep the sources you already created, do not use a fresh data directory. Add the demo sources yourself in the console, or let Sources → Discover propose sources from your running containers. The catalog only pre-wires the trigger and the agent.
• If you run Tares in Docker, choose Your own source instead of the demo catalog, since the demo logs source cannot read your host’s docker logs from inside the container.

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