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Grafana Tutorial: A Detailed Guide to Your

First Dashboard
February 24, 2021
by SentinelOne

So what can we do to improve database performance?

Grafana helps you identify and tackle performance issues by giving you the tools you need to analyze and monitor your database. Not only

does it help solve problems, but it also aids you in becoming proactive with your maintenance by using alerts. Grafana is open source,
compatible with a wide range of databases, and has a thriving community.

This Grafana tutorial will cover the installation, con guration, and creation of your rst dashboard using Grafana to monitor a MySQL
database.

What Is Grafana?
Grafana is a database analysis and monitoring tool. It allows you to create dashboard visualizations of key metrics that are important to
you. Grafana has a thriving community of enthusiasts who share reusable dashboards.

Grafana supports a huge number of data sources. And, since the application is open source, you can be sure that the moment a new data
source has been released, someone out there is adding support for it. The most common use case of Grafana is displaying time series data,
such as memory or CPU over time, alongside the current usage data.

You can host Grafana yourself, use the managed service in AWS or get the creators to host it for you. Grafana runs as a process on your

computer or server, and you access the interface through your browser. Your dashboard can display your data as single numbers, graphs,
charts, or even a heat map. Below is an example dashboard set up through the Grafana web interface:

Installing Grafana Locally

The instructions for installation depend on where you plan to run Grafana. I normally run applications like this locally to get a feel for how it
works before deploying remotely. Grafana provides comprehensive instructions for wherever you want to deploy it.

If the installation was a success, then Grafana should be available through your web browser by default on http://localhost:3000, and your
screen should look like the image below. The default username is admin and the default password is also admin. You will be asked to

change your password after logging in.

Configuring Your DataSource

Con guring your data source is the rst step to setting up your Grafana dashboard. Your data source could be a database or a collection of

logs. Grafana supports pretty much every data source you can think of, from traditional databases like MySQL to log aggregation platforms
like AWS Cloudwatch.

Now we’ll walk through con guring Grafana to connect to your MySQL database. For my example, I’ve created a database named CD with a
table called Artist to simulate a database behind a music library app.

Your rst step is to add a Grafana user to your database. In your MySQL database, run the following in the database administrator role to
add a read-only user named grafanaReader to your database CD for the table Artist:

CREATE USER 'grafanaReader' IDENTIFIED BY 'password';

GRANT SELECT ON CD.Artist TO 'grafanaReader';

To add a link from your database to Grafana, switch back to the Grafana interface.

The rst option on the display is Create your rst datasource. Complete the web form with your connection details. I’m using a local
MySQL database running on localhost on port 3306 for the database CD and with the user we made previously, grafanaReader. It’s safe to

leave the rest of the elds as default. Hit save and test. If everything is con gured correctly, you should see a green box with the message

Database Connection OK.

Create Your First Dashboard

Now that your database is connected, you are ready to create your rst dashboard! I’m going to create a dashboard showing stats about the

CD database we connected in the previous section.

Dashboards are made from panels of information organized into rows. I’m creating a dashboard from one datasource, but you can use
different data from different sources in the same dashboard.

Panels represent a visual representation of a query. Each panel can show the same or different data using a visualization that is the easiest

for you to process. The rst panel will show the total number of Artists in our CD database.

Single Stat Panel

To show a single number, we use the single stat panel. Switch back to Grafana again. You now have the option create your rst dashboard.

Choose this option, then select Add new panel.

Select your database from the Query drop-down menu and choose to format this query as a table in the format as drop-down. Select the
Edit SQL link and paste the following SQL:

SELECT ArtistIdFROM Artist

This assumes you have a table called Artist and a column named ArtistId. You can change the names of the column and the table to t your

data. Your Query page should look like the screenshot below:

On the right hand side on the panel tab expand the Visualization menu and choose the stat icon. This will immediately give you a preview
of your panel showing the sum of records in your table.

Finally, click the settings icon to give the panel a meaningful name, such as Total Artists. You have now created your rst panel! You also

now have a dashboard with a single panel. Something like the view below:

At the top right of the screen, you can select how often the database will be queried to get up-to-date information. Set it to 5s to refresh the
box every 5 seconds. You can now change the data in your database and see the update on the screen!

Easily Share Your Grafana Dashboard with Others

A feature that makes Grafana really popular is the ability to easily share dashboards with others. To export your dashboard, select the cog
icon at the top right of your dashboard. The tool tip will read Dashboard Settings. Select JSON Model from the left navigation menu and

you can see your dashboard as JSON. Sharing your dashboard is as simple as saving this le and passing it to someone else to load into

their instance. Below shows how my dashboard looks as JSON.

Make Impressive Dashboards with Help from Scalyr

Having a dashboard with the number of records in your database is useful–but not very impressive. I normally start my dashboards using
existing logs. If you don’t already have a central place to store the logs from different parts of your application, try Scalyr with your Grafana

dashboard now. You can add Scalyr as a data source to your dashboard using an open source plugin. With the plugin you can view log based

metrics in Grafana, then click straight through to the Scalyr site to view your logs in more detail. The dashboard below shows an example of
the impressive dashboards you can make with Scalyr.

Grafana Can Display All Your Data in Whatever Format Works Best
Grafana is an open source database analysis and monitoring tool that is easy to install on any operating system. It’s accessed through a

browser, so it can be deployed to your favorite hosting company and can then be accessed by your whole team.

You can display all your data (even from multiple sources) in whatever format works best for you. There is a wide selection of visualizations
built in and accessible through the community. You can customize your panels with color and transparency—whatever makes sense for your

visual. You can even make your own visualization plugins if you want something a little more speci c to your use case.

In this Grafana tutorial, you learned how to set up your rst dashboard. There is loads more to learn, and I highly recommend joining the

community to share your creations. You can learn some of the best practices and learn from the experts who have been creating these
visuals for years.

Grafana is not just for when you have performance issues. You can proactively set up alerts to notify you when a value reaches a threshold
to keep one step ahead of your performance issues. The dashboard looks so good that you’ll soon be putting monitors with all your

dashboards up all over the of ce. It can become an obsession!

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