Azure Managed Grafana Simplifies Azure Service Monitoring and Visualization

Azure Managed Grafana is a game-changer for anyone responsible for monitoring and visualizing Azure service performance. It simplifies the process by integrating directly with Azure services, eliminating the need for manual configuration.

With Azure Managed Grafana, you can create custom dashboards in minutes, not hours. This is because it comes with a set of pre-built templates and integrations with popular Azure services.

This means you can quickly visualize key metrics and performance indicators for your Azure services, without having to write a single line of code.

To get started with Azure Managed Grafana, you'll need an Azure account and an active subscription, which you can create for free.

You'll also need to make sure you have the right role to create an instance, which is at least a resource group Contributor.

To access an instance, you'll need a role that's at least a resource group Owner.

If you don't meet this requirement, you can ask a User Access Administrator, subscription Owner or resource group Owner to grant you a Grafana Admin, Grafana Editor or Grafana Viewer role on the instance.

You can set up Azure Managed Grafana in the Azure portal, or you can download and install Grafana in your local environment for a local server.

To create an Azure Managed Grafana workspace, use this quickstart guide to follow the steps.

Here's a summary of the roles you'll need:

Azure Managed Grafana offers two plans: Essential (Preview) and Standard. The Essential plan is limited to 1 workspace per subscription.

The Standard plan, on the other hand, provides unlimited workspaces per subscription. This is a significant advantage for larger organizations or teams.

One of the key differences between the two plans is the number of dashboards allowed. The Essential plan is capped at 20 dashboards, while the Standard plan offers unlimited dashboards.

Data sources are also limited in the Essential plan, with only 5 allowed. In contrast, the Standard plan provides unlimited data sources.

Hosting resources are another area where the two plans differ. The Essential plan uses on-demand hosting resources, whereas the Standard plan offers dedicated hosting resources.

Plugins are also more comprehensive in the Standard plan, which includes Azure, open-source, and optionally Grafana Enterprise plugins. The Essential plan only includes Azure plugins.

Alerts, email, and reporting are not supported in the Essential plan, but are available in the Standard plan. Private networking is also not supported in the Essential plan, but is available in the Standard plan with private link and managed private endpoint.

Deterministic outbound IP and zone redundancy are not supported in the Essential plan, but are available in the Standard plan. The Standard plan also comes with a 99.9% availability SLA, which is not available in the Essential plan.

Azure Managed Grafana supports many popular data sources, including Azure Monitor, AWS CloudWatch, and Elasticsearch, among others. You can add these data sources to your instance by following the steps outlined in the documentation.

To add a data source, you can use the Azure CLI command `az grafana data-source create` or follow the in-app instructions. If you're using an instance that isn't Azure Managed Grafana, you'll need to set up an Azure Monitor data source by selecting "Add data source" and choosing the Azure Monitor data source.

The data sources supported in each Azure Managed Grafana plan are listed in the table below:

Configuring a data source plug-in in Azure Managed Grafana is a straightforward process. By default, the Azure Monitor data source plug-in is preconfigured with a managed identity that can query and visualize monitoring data from all resources in the subscription where the Grafana workspace was deployed.

To expand the resources that can be viewed by your Azure Managed Grafana workspace, you can configure additional permissions to assign the included managed identity the Monitoring Reader role on other subscriptions or resources.

If you're using an instance that isn't Azure Managed Grafana, you have to set up an Azure Monitor data source. To do this, select Add data source, filter by the name Azure, and select the Azure Monitor data source.

You can choose between managed identity or app registration for authentication. If you're hosting Grafana on your own Azure Virtual Machines or Azure App Service instance with managed identity enabled, you can use this approach for authentication.

However, if your Grafana instance isn't hosted on Azure or doesn't have managed identity enabled, you'll need to use app registration with an Azure service principal to set up authentication.

Here are the steps to add an Azure Monitor data source:

1. Select Add data source, filter by the name Azure, and select the Azure Monitor data source.

2. Pick a name for the data source and choose between managed identity or app registration for authentication.

By following these steps, you can configure an Azure Monitor data source plug-in and expand the resources that can be viewed by your Azure Managed Grafana workspace.

Variables are a powerful tool to make your queries more dynamic and responsive to user input. To create a new variable, select the dashboard's Settings button in the top right area, and then select Variables, followed by New.

On the variable page, you'll need to define the data source and query to run to get the list of values. This will allow you to use a dropdown in your UI to select the values you want to use in your query.

You can configure a variable to list all available Solution values, for example. This means your charts will respond accordingly as you select different values from the dropdown.

To add a Kubernetes cluster, you'll need to start by logging into Microsoft Azure. From the Azure Services list, select Kubernetes Services or search for Kubernetes Services in the search bar.

Select the cluster you want to monitor, and from the left navigation panel, choose Monitoring->Insights. If Insights haven't been configured before, select Configure to set up the necessary settings.

To integrate an Azure Managed Grafana Workspace to a Microsoft Azure Kubernetes cluster for monitoring, follow these steps:

By following these steps, you'll be able to successfully add a Kubernetes cluster and start monitoring its performance.