= Elasticsearch

Elasticsearch is the distributed, RESTful search and analytics engine at the
heart of the https://www.elastic.co/products[Elastic Stack]. You can use
Elasticsearch to store, search, and manage data for:

* Logs
* Metrics
* A search backend
* Application monitoring
* Endpoint security

\... and more!

To learn more about Elasticsearch's features and capabilities, see our
https://www.elastic.co/products/elasticsearch[product page].

[[get-started]]
== Get started

The simplest way to set up Elasticsearch is to create a managed deployment with
https://www.elastic.co/cloud/as-a-service[Elasticsearch Service on Elastic
Cloud].

If you prefer to install and manage Elasticsearch yourself, you can download
the latest version from 
https://www.elastic.co/downloads/elasticsearch[elastic.co/downloads/elasticsearch].

For more installation options, see the
https://www.elastic.co/guide/en/elasticsearch/reference/current/install-elasticsearch.html[Elasticsearch installation
documentation].

[[upgrade]]
== Upgrade

To upgrade from an earlier version of Elasticsearch, see the
https://www.elastic.co/guide/en/elasticsearch/reference/current/setup-upgrade.html[Elasticsearch upgrade
documentation].

[[build-source]]
== Build from source

Elasticsearch uses https://gradle.org[Gradle] for its build system.

To build a distribution for your local OS and print its output location upon
completion, run:
----
./gradlew localDistro
----

To build a distribution for another platform, run the related command:
----
./gradlew :distribution:archives:linux-tar:assemble
./gradlew :distribution:archives:darwin-tar:assemble
./gradlew :distribution:archives:windows-zip:assemble
----

To build distributions for all supported platforms, run:
----
./gradlew assemble
----

Distributions are output to `distributions/archives`.

To run the test suite, see xref:TESTING.asciidoc[TESTING].

[[docs]]
== Documentation

For the complete Elasticsearch documentation visit
https://www.elastic.co/guide/en/elasticsearch/reference/current/index.html[elastic.co].

For information about our documentation processes, see the
xref:docs/README.asciidoc[docs README].

[[contribute]]
== Contribute

For contribution guidelines, see xref:CONTRIBUTING.md[CONTRIBUTING]. 

[[questions]]
== Questions? Problems? Suggestions?

* To report a bug or request a feature, create a
https://github.com/elastic/elasticsearch/issues/new/choose[GitHub Issue]. Please
ensure someone else hasn't created an issue for the same topic.

* Need help using Elasticsearch? Reach out on the
https://discuss.elastic.co[Elastic Forum] or https://ela.st/slack[Slack]. A
fellow community member or Elastic engineer will be happy to help you out.