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Using Grafana

Grafana is commonly used with CGSE to visualize telemetry data stored in InfluxDB or QuestDB.

This page focuses on day-to-day usage: connecting Grafana to a supported backend, creating dashboards, and understanding the data you are plotting.

For stack installation and server configuration, see Monitoring Stack Setup.

For developer details on telemetry data structure, see Monitoring and Telemetry in CGSE.

Connect Grafana to a Metrics Backend

After your metrics backend and Grafana are running, open Grafana in your browser: http://localhost:3000.

In the left menu, select Connections and add a new InfluxDB connection.

Use the following settings:

  • Name: Any descriptive name, for example influxdb3-ariel.
  • Query language: SQL.
  • HTTP > URL: http://127.0.0.1:8181.
  • Auth: Enable only Basic auth.
  • InfluxDB Details > Database: The target InfluxDB database.
  • InfluxDB Details > Token: Your InfluxDB token (starts with apiv3_).
  • InfluxDB Details: Enable Insecure Connection.

In the left menu, select Connections and add a new PostgreSQL connection (QuestDB is exposed via PostgreSQL wire protocol).

Use the following settings:

  • Name: Any descriptive name, for example questdb-ariel.
  • Host URL: 127.0.0.1:8812.
  • Database: qdb (or your configured CGSE_QUESTDB_DATABASE).
  • Username: admin (or your configured CGSE_QUESTDB_USER).
  • Password: quest (or your configured CGSE_QUESTDB_PASSWORD).
  • TLS/SSL Mode: disable unless you configured TLS.

Click Save and test to verify that Grafana can reach the database.

If the connection test fails, first verify the host, credentials, and database settings.

Create a Basic Dashboard

  1. Open Dashboards in the left menu.
  2. Create a new dashboard and add a panel.
  3. In the panel query, select your InfluxDB data source.
  4. Select the table that matches the process storage mnemonic.
  5. Select the metrics you want to plot.
  6. Add time in Data Operations so Grafana recognizes the timestamp column.
  1. Open Dashboards in the left menu.
  2. Create a new dashboard and add a panel.
  3. In the panel query, select your PostgreSQL (QuestDB) data source.
  4. Build a SQL query for the target table (for example, SELECT time, temperature FROM "daq6510" ORDER BY time).
  5. Ensure the query returns a time column and one or more numeric value columns.
  6. Set panel visualization options as needed (time-series panel works best for telemetry).

In CGSE, the table name usually matches the storage mnemonic of the process that produced the telemetry.

Example of the query configuration:

grafana-queries.png

Troubleshooting Basics

  • No data visible: verify the selected database and table name.
  • Empty graph: verify that time is included in the query operations.
  • Auth errors: verify token/credentials and data source settings.
  • Unexpected table names: check the process storage mnemonic used by the corresponding CGSE component.