5 min read
Azure Managed Grafana: Visualization for Cloud Observability
Grafana has become the de facto standard for observability dashboards. Azure now offers Azure Managed Grafana, providing a fully managed Grafana instance integrated with Azure services. Let’s explore how to set it up and create effective dashboards.
Why Managed Grafana?
Self-hosting Grafana requires:
- Infrastructure management
- Authentication configuration
- Plugin management
- High availability setup
- Security patching
Azure Managed Grafana handles all of this while integrating natively with Azure AD and Azure Monitor.
Creating a Managed Grafana Instance
# Create Managed Grafana instance
az grafana create \
--name my-grafana \
--resource-group my-rg \
--location eastus \
--sku-tier Standard
# Get Grafana endpoint
az grafana show \
--name my-grafana \
--resource-group my-rg \
--query properties.endpoint
# Assign yourself Grafana Admin role
GRAFANA_ID=$(az grafana show --name my-grafana --resource-group my-rg --query id -o tsv)
USER_ID=$(az ad signed-in-user show --query id -o tsv)
az role assignment create \
--assignee $USER_ID \
--role "Grafana Admin" \
--scope $GRAFANA_IDConfiguring Data Sources
Azure Monitor
Azure Monitor is pre-configured, but you can customize it:
# Grant Grafana access to subscription metrics
GRAFANA_IDENTITY=$(az grafana show \
--name my-grafana \
--resource-group my-rg \
--query identity.principalId -o tsv)
az role assignment create \
--assignee $GRAFANA_IDENTITY \
--role "Monitoring Reader" \
--scope /subscriptions/<subscription-id>Azure Data Explorer
{
"name": "Azure Data Explorer",
"type": "grafana-azure-data-explorer-datasource",
"access": "proxy",
"jsonData": {
"clusterUrl": "https://mycluster.eastus.kusto.windows.net",
"tenantId": "<tenant-id>",
"clientId": "<client-id>",
"defaultDatabase": "mydb"
},
"secureJsonData": {
"clientSecret": "<client-secret>"
}
}Prometheus
{
"name": "Prometheus",
"type": "prometheus",
"access": "proxy",
"url": "http://prometheus-server.monitoring.svc.cluster.local:80",
"jsonData": {
"httpMethod": "POST",
"timeInterval": "15s"
}
}Creating Dashboards via API
Use Terraform or API to create dashboards as code:
import requests
import json
grafana_url = "https://my-grafana-xxxx.grafana.azure.com"
api_key = "your-api-key" # Create via Grafana UI
headers = {
"Authorization": f"Bearer {api_key}",
"Content-Type": "application/json"
}
dashboard = {
"dashboard": {
"id": None,
"uid": "azure-vms-overview",
"title": "Azure VMs Overview",
"tags": ["azure", "infrastructure"],
"timezone": "browser",
"schemaVersion": 30,
"version": 0,
"refresh": "30s",
"panels": [
{
"id": 1,
"title": "CPU Percentage by VM",
"type": "timeseries",
"gridPos": {"h": 8, "w": 12, "x": 0, "y": 0},
"datasource": "Azure Monitor",
"targets": [
{
"refId": "A",
"queryType": "Azure Monitor",
"azureMonitor": {
"resourceGroup": "$resourceGroup",
"resourceName": "$vmName",
"metricNamespace": "Microsoft.Compute/virtualMachines",
"metricName": "Percentage CPU",
"aggregation": "Average",
"timeGrain": "auto"
}
}
]
},
{
"id": 2,
"title": "Available Memory",
"type": "gauge",
"gridPos": {"h": 8, "w": 6, "x": 12, "y": 0},
"datasource": "Azure Monitor",
"options": {
"showThresholdLabels": False,
"showThresholdMarkers": True
},
"fieldConfig": {
"defaults": {
"thresholds": {
"mode": "percentage",
"steps": [
{"color": "red", "value": None},
{"color": "orange", "value": 20},
{"color": "green", "value": 40}
]
},
"unit": "bytes",
"min": 0
}
},
"targets": [
{
"refId": "A",
"azureMonitor": {
"resourceGroup": "$resourceGroup",
"resourceName": "$vmName",
"metricNamespace": "Microsoft.Compute/virtualMachines",
"metricName": "Available Memory Bytes",
"aggregation": "Average"
}
}
]
}
],
"templating": {
"list": [
{
"name": "resourceGroup",
"type": "query",
"datasource": "Azure Monitor",
"query": "ResourceGroups()",
"refresh": 1
},
{
"name": "vmName",
"type": "query",
"datasource": "Azure Monitor",
"query": "ResourceNames($resourceGroup, Microsoft.Compute/virtualMachines)",
"refresh": 1
}
]
}
},
"folderId": 0,
"overwrite": True
}
response = requests.post(
f"{grafana_url}/api/dashboards/db",
headers=headers,
json=dashboard
)
print(response.json())Log Analytics Queries
Query Azure Log Analytics from Grafana:
// Panel query for Application Insights requests
requests
| where timestamp > ago(1h)
| summarize count() by bin(timestamp, 5m), resultCode
| order by timestamp asc// Error rate panel
requests
| where timestamp > ago(1h)
| summarize
total = count(),
errors = countif(success == false)
by bin(timestamp, 5m)
| extend error_rate = errors * 100.0 / total
| project timestamp, error_rateAlerting
Configure alerts in Grafana:
alert_rule = {
"name": "High CPU Alert",
"interval": "1m",
"rules": [
{
"grafana_alert": {
"condition": "B",
"data": [
{
"refId": "A",
"datasourceUid": "azure-monitor-uid",
"model": {
"azureMonitor": {
"aggregation": "Average",
"metricName": "Percentage CPU",
"metricNamespace": "Microsoft.Compute/virtualMachines",
"resourceGroup": "production",
"resourceName": "web-server"
}
}
},
{
"refId": "B",
"datasourceUid": "__expr__",
"model": {
"conditions": [
{
"evaluator": {
"params": [80],
"type": "gt"
},
"operator": {"type": "and"},
"query": {"params": ["A"]},
"reducer": {"params": [], "type": "avg"},
"type": "query"
}
],
"type": "classic_conditions"
}
}
],
"exec_err_state": "Error",
"no_data_state": "NoData",
"title": "High CPU on Web Server"
}
}
]
}Dashboard Best Practices
Use Variables for Flexibility
{
"templating": {
"list": [
{
"name": "subscription",
"type": "query",
"query": "Subscriptions()",
"multi": false
},
{
"name": "resourceGroup",
"type": "query",
"query": "ResourceGroups($subscription)",
"multi": true
},
{
"name": "timeRange",
"type": "interval",
"options": [
{"text": "1h", "value": "1h"},
{"text": "6h", "value": "6h"},
{"text": "24h", "value": "24h"},
{"text": "7d", "value": "7d"}
]
}
]
}
}Organize with Rows
{
"panels": [
{
"type": "row",
"title": "CPU Metrics",
"collapsed": false,
"gridPos": {"h": 1, "w": 24, "x": 0, "y": 0}
},
{
"id": 1,
"title": "CPU Usage",
"gridPos": {"h": 8, "w": 12, "x": 0, "y": 1}
},
{
"type": "row",
"title": "Memory Metrics",
"collapsed": true,
"gridPos": {"h": 1, "w": 24, "x": 0, "y": 9},
"panels": [
{
"id": 2,
"title": "Memory Usage",
"gridPos": {"h": 8, "w": 12, "x": 0, "y": 10}
}
]
}
]
}Sharing and Embedding
Public Snapshots
# Create a snapshot
snapshot = {
"dashboard": dashboard_json,
"expires": 86400 # 24 hours
}
response = requests.post(
f"{grafana_url}/api/snapshots",
headers=headers,
json=snapshot
)
print(f"Snapshot URL: {response.json()['url']}")Embedding Panels
<!-- Embed a single panel in external application -->
<iframe
src="https://my-grafana.grafana.azure.com/d-solo/azure-vms-overview/azure-vms?orgId=1&panelId=1&from=now-1h&to=now"
width="800"
height="400"
frameborder="0">
</iframe>Terraform Configuration
resource "azurerm_dashboard_grafana" "main" {
name = "my-grafana"
resource_group_name = azurerm_resource_group.main.name
location = azurerm_resource_group.main.location
sku = "Standard"
zone_redundancy_enabled = true
api_key_enabled = true
deterministic_outbound_ip_enabled = true
identity {
type = "SystemAssigned"
}
azure_monitor_workspace_integrations {
resource_id = azurerm_monitor_workspace.main.id
}
tags = {
environment = "production"
}
}
resource "azurerm_role_assignment" "grafana_monitoring" {
scope = data.azurerm_subscription.current.id
role_definition_name = "Monitoring Reader"
principal_id = azurerm_dashboard_grafana.main.identity[0].principal_id
}