Defining Grafana Dashboards

Grafana dashboard are created via the Sauron Grafana endpoint, using the typical means provided by Grafana.

Manually Creating Grafana Dashboards

See the Grafana UI documentation.

Creating Grafana Dashboards via Grafana HTTP API

See the Grafana HTTP API documentation.

For example, creating a new dashboard:

curl -XPOST -i -u sauron:mypassword grafana.handu-phx.handu.developers.oracledx.com:443/api/dashboards/db \
 --data-binary @./dashboard.json -H "Content-Type: application/json"

where dashboard.json contains the dashboard definition. The best way to create your initial dashboard JSON is to define it manually within the UI, then export it. This is a little bit funky, but what you export from the UI must be placed within a "dashboard" element in your dashboard.json, like this:

{
  "dashboard": <json-content-exported-from-the-ui>
  "overwrite": true
}

Built-in Data sources

Your Sauron Grafana comes with a predefined data source called "Prometheus" that points to your Sauron's Prometheus backend(s).

Thanos support is coming soon, at which point the "Prometheus" data source will point to your Sauron's Thanos node. Thanos provides an HA and stable view of the metrics coming from your multiple Prometheus backends (which will each have very slightly different data). So routing this "Prometheus data source to Thanos provides your dashboards with a more consistent and fault-tolerant view of your metrics.

Built-in My Sauron Dashboards

Your Sauron's Grafana comes preconfigured with a set of built-in dashboards, under a folder named "My Sauron". These dashboards provide you with a view of the overall health of your Sauron's components, like OpenSearch, OpenSearch Dashboards, and Prometheus.