Grafana Technical Documentation - Concept - "Ten Minute Literacy"

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Grafana: The open observability platform | Grafana Labs

basic concept

Grafana is an open source measurement analysis and visualization suite, which is often used for real-time analysis and visualization of large amounts of data. The following are the basic concepts of Grafana:

1. Data Source: Grafana supports a variety of time series database data sources, provides different query methods for each data source, and can well support the characteristics of each data source.
2. Organization: Grafana supports a multi-organization architecture, which can provide services for multiple potentially untrusted organizations for a single Grafana instance. Each organization can have one or more data sources, and all dashboards are owned by a specific organization.
3. User (User): In Grafana, users and accounts are a concept, and users log in and perform operations through accounts.
4. Row: Row is the logical partitioner of Grafana in the dashboard interface, which is used to connect multiple panels together.
5. Panel: Panel is the most basic display unit of Grafana, used to display specific data and charts.
6. Query Editor: The query editor is a statement management tool. Each panel provides a query editor, and users can control the panel to display different charts by writing statements.
7. Dashboard: Dashboard is the most important display part in Grafana. Multiple panels can be arranged in rows to form a dashboard, so that users can better understand and analyze data.

Has the following characteristics

Grafana has the following features:

1. Flexible data visualization: Grafana provides fast and flexible client-side charts. The panel plug-in has a variety of ways to visualize indicators and logs. The official library contains a wealth of dashboard plug-ins, such as heat maps, line charts, charts, etc., enabling complex Data presentation is beautiful and elegant.
2. Support for multiple data sources: Grafana supports many different time series data storage backends, each data source has a specific query editor, and the query language and capabilities of each data source are significantly different. Data from multiple data sources can be combined into one dashboard, but each panel needs to be bound to a specific data source belonging to a specific organization.
3. Alerting and notification capabilities: Grafana can visually define alerting rules for the most important metrics and evaluate them continuously. Notifications are sent when the alarm state changes, and email notifications can be received.
4. Dynamic Dashboards: Create dynamic and reusable dashboards using template variables that appear as drop-down menus at the top of the dashboard.
5. Mixed data sources: mix different data sources in the same graph, data sources can be specified on a per-query basis, this even works with custom data sources.
6. Annotations and Filters: Annotations can be added to graphs from different data sources, and full event metadata and tags can be displayed by hovering over an event. At the same time, filters allow the dynamic creation of new key/value filters that will be automatically applied to all queries using that data source.

Learn important concepts of Grafana

The important concepts of learning Grafana include the following aspects:

1. Data Source: Learn which data sources Grafana supports and how to configure and use them.
2. Organization: Understand the concept of organization in Grafana, including how to create and manage organizations, and the relationship between organizations and dashboards.
3. Users and Permissions: Learn how to create users, assign permissions, and manage user authentication.
4. Rows and Panels: Learn how to create rows and panels in dashboards, and how to customize their appearance and behavior.
5. Query Editor: Learn how to use the Query Editor to query data sources and generate graphs, and how to optimize queries to improve performance and accuracy.
6. Dashboards: Learn how to create, manage, and share dashboards, and how to combine different panels to achieve specific business needs.
7. Data Visualization: Understand Grafana's data visualization principles, including how to choose the appropriate chart type, how to customize the chart style, and how to use Grafana's advanced visualization features.
8. Alerts and Notifications: Learn how to set up and configure alerts, and how to receive and handle alert notifications.
9. Dynamic Dashboards: Learn how to use template variables to create dynamic dashboards, and how to customize them for different data sources and query conditions.
10. Mixed Data Sources: Learn how to mix different data sources in the same dashboard, and how to deal with compatibility and differences between data sources.

By mastering these concepts, you can better understand and use Grafana to better analyze and visualize data, improve work efficiency and decision-making ability.

scenes to be used

Grafana is a widely used open source data visualization tool, suitable for a variety of scenarios, including but not limited to the following aspects:

1. Monitor user activity, transaction volume and other information.
2. Monitor real-time traffic.
3. Visualize data such as the number of users and revenue of the application.
4. Visualize the experimental results.
5. Industrial sensors, home automation, process control and other fields.

With Grafana, users can easily create custom dashboards that integrate data from different data sources into one visual interface to better understand and analyze data. Grafana also provides flexible alarm and notification functions to help users discover and solve problems in a timely manner. Therefore, Grafana is widely used in Internet infrastructure, application analysis, industrial automation and other fields, as well as other scenarios that require real-time data analysis and visualization.

Reason for use

There are many reasons to use Grafana, here are a few important ones:

1. Fast and flexible visualization effects: Grafana provides fast and flexible client-side charts, which can display data in various cool ways, allowing users to better understand and analyze data.
2. Support multiple data sources: Grafana supports various current mainstream databases, including MySQL, PostgreSQL, InfluxDB, etc., and can conveniently display the data in each database in the form of charts.
3. Rich plug-in ecology: Grafana has a rich plug-in ecology, which can connect more tools and teams through plug-ins to achieve more functions and customization.
4. Alarm system: Grafana provides an alarm system, which can create and manage all alarms in a simple UI, so as to realize timely discovery and centralized processing of problems.
5. Open source software: Grafana is open source software, which is convenient for secondary development and customization, and also makes the community active, with many open source contributions and improvements.
6. Perfect integration with other monitoring systems: Grafana can be perfectly integrated with mainstream monitoring systems such as zabbix, prometheus, open-falcon, etc. to realize data visualization.

In short, Grafana is a powerful, flexible, easy-to-extend, open source and free visualization tool, suitable for various scenarios that require real-time data analysis and visualization, and is a good helper for IT operation and maintenance personnel and data analysts.

Comparison of products of the same type

The following is a comparison of Grafana products of the same type:

1. Prometheus: Prometheus is a popular open source monitoring system, similar to Grafana, that can be used for real-time monitoring and data visualization. The difference between Prometheus and Grafana is that Prometheus emphasizes the monitoring and storage of time series data, while Grafana places more emphasis on data visualization and the creation of dashboards. Also, Prometheus' query language (PromQL) is different from Grafana's query language.
2. OpenShift: OpenShift is a cloud platform based on Docker containers developed by Red Hat. Similar to Grafana, OpenShift also provides real-time monitoring and data visualization functions. OpenShift's monitoring tools include Kibana and Prometheus, which enable system, application and network monitoring and visual analysis.
3. CloudCraft: CloudCraft is a cloud service visualization tool that helps users map, visualize and monitor cloud services. CloudCraft provides a block-based graphical interface, allowing users to drag and drop different components to create their own cloud architecture diagrams, and monitor the performance data of each component.
4. QlikView: QlikView is a business data visualization tool that can be used to create custom dashboards and reports. QlikView provides flexible data visualization and exploration capabilities that integrate data from different data sources in one view.

The following are the advantages, disadvantages and applicable scenarios of similar products of Grafana:

Prometheus: Pros:

• Emphasizes the monitoring and storage of time series data, and is suitable for system monitoring such as CPU, memory, and network.
• The Query Language (PromQL) is powerful and easy to use.
• The community is active and the documentation is complete. shortcoming:
• The query language is different from SQL and may need to be relearned.
• Additional components such as Pushgateway and Alertmanager are required to implement alerts and notifications. Applicable scenarios: Suitable for scenarios that need to monitor system, application, and network performance, especially scenarios that require real-time storage and query of time series data.

OpenShift: Pros:

• The cloud platform based on Docker container provides real-time monitoring and data visualization functions.
• Monitoring tools include Kibana and Prometheus, which can be integrated into existing monitoring systems.
• Provide a complete PaaS solution to support application development, deployment and management. shortcoming:
• Additional learning of OpenShift concepts and technologies is required. Applicable scenarios: Suitable for scenarios that require a cloud platform and a complete PaaS solution, especially those that need to integrate existing monitoring systems.

CloudCraft: Pros:

• Provide block and block graphical interface, which is convenient for users to create customized cloud architecture diagrams.
• Performance data for individual components can be monitored. shortcoming:
• Additional learning of CloudCraft concepts and technologies is required. Applicable scenarios: Applicable to scenarios where it is necessary to visualize cloud service design and monitor the performance data of each component.

QlikView: Pros:

• Provides business data visualization tools to create custom dashboards and reports.
• Data visualization and exploration are flexible and can integrate data from different data sources in one view. shortcoming:
• A commercial license is required. Applicable scenarios: It is suitable for scenarios that need to visualize a large amount of data, especially business scenarios that require custom dashboards and reports.

To sum up, which tool to choose depends on the specific needs and scenarios. If you need to monitor system, application and network performance, and need to store and query time series data in real time, you can choose Prometheus; if you need a cloud platform and a complete PaaS solution, you can choose OpenShift; if you need to visualize cloud service design and monitor the performance of each component For data, you can choose CloudCraft; if you need custom dashboards and reports that visualize large amounts of data, you can choose QlikView.

Version update comparison

Grafana is a widely used open source visualization platform, often used for monitoring and data analysis. The following is a feature comparison and functional comparison between Grafana 9.0 and Grafana 8.0:

Grafana 9.0：

1. Reconstruction of the alarm system: Grafana 9.0 has comprehensively upgraded and improved the alarm system, including new alarm rule types, finer-grained alarm control, and improved alarm notifications.
2. Visual Query Builder: A new visual query builder is provided for popular data sources such as Prometheus and Loki, which makes it easy to write and understand queries even for those unfamiliar with query languages.
3. Heatmap improvements: The new version of Grafana provides more powerful and fast heatmap visualizations, making it easier to understand and analyze large amounts of data.
4. Navigation menu improvements: The new navigation menu is easier to use, providing a more intuitive way to access dashboards and data.
5. Dashboard Search Improvements: Dashboard search has been enhanced to find specific dashboards faster.
6. Enhanced security and authentication functions: In Grafana 9.0, the security and authentication functions have been further enhanced, including stronger permission control and more detailed user management.
7. Performance and function upgrades: Grafana 9.0 has upgraded performance and functions, including faster loading speed, better data visualization and more powerful analysis capabilities.

Grafana 8.0：

1. New visualization panels: including status timeline, status history and histogram panels, these new panels make data visualization richer and more diverse.
2. Real-time streaming: By introducing the real-time streaming function, users can better process real-time data.
3. Reusable library panels: The introduction of library panels allows users to reuse existing panels, improving work efficiency.
4. Fine-grained access control: With fine-grained access control, enterprise customers can ensure that everyone in their organization has the appropriate level of access.
5. User Interface Improvements: The user interface has been improved to make the dashboard look clearer and easier to understand.
6. Data source query caching: Data source query caching was introduced in Grafana 8.0, which can significantly improve the loading speed of dashboards.
7. Better Startup and Loading Performance: Startup and loading performance has been significantly improved due to a significant reduction in initial download data.

Overall, both Grafana 9.0 and Grafana 8.0 have their own features and enhancements. Grafana 9.0 pays more attention to the improvement of the alarm system, the convenience of visual query, and the enhancement of security and authentication functions. Grafana 8.0 pays more attention to the improvement of visualization, the processing ability of real-time stream, and the improvement of access control and performance. Users can choose the appropriate version according to their needs.