Redshift data source for Grafana

The Redshift data source plugin allows you to query and visualize Redshift data metrics from within Grafana.

This topic explains options, variables, querying, and other options specific to this data source. Refer to Add a data source for instructions on how to add a data source to Grafana.

Configure the data source in Grafana

To access data source settings, hover your mouse over the Configuration (gear) icon, then click Data Sources, and then click the AWS Redshift data source.

Name	Description
Name	The data source name. This is how you refer to the data source in panels and queries.
Default	Default data source means that it will be pre-selected for new panels.
Auth Provider	Specify the provider to get credentials.
Access Key ID	If Access & secret key is selected, specify the Access Key of the security credentials to use.
Secret Access Key	If Access & secret key is selected, specify the Secret Key of the security credentials to use.
Credentials Profile Name	Specify the name of the profile to use (if you use ~/.aws/credentials file), leave blank for default.
Assume Role Arn (optional)	Specify the ARN of the role to assume.
External ID (optional)	If you are assuming a role in another account, that has been created with an external ID, specify the external ID here.
Endpoint (optional)	Optionally, specify a custom endpoint for the service.
Default Region	Region in which the cluster is deployed.
Authentication	To authenticate with AWS Redshift you can use AWS temporary credentials or AWS Secrets Manager.
Managed Secret	When using AWS Secrets Manager, select the secret containing the credentials to access the database.
Cluster Identifier	Redshift Cluster to use (automatically set if using AWS Secrets Manager).
DB User	User of the database (automatically set if using AWS Secrets Manager).
Database	Name of the database within the cluster.

Authentication

For authentication options and configuration details, see AWS authentication topic.

IAM policies

Grafana needs permissions granted via IAM to be able to read Redshift metrics. You can attach these permissions to IAM roles and utilize Grafana's built-in support for assuming roles. Note that you will need to configure the required policy before adding the data source to Grafana. You can check some predefined policies by AWS here.

Here is a minimal policy example:

{
  "Version": "2012-10-17",
  "Statement": [
    {
      "Sid": "AllowReadingMetricsFromRedshift",
      "Effect": "Allow",
      "Action": [
        "redshift-data:ListTables",
        "redshift-data:DescribeTable",
        "redshift-data:GetStatementResult",
        "redshift-data:DescribeStatement",
        "redshift-data:ListSchemas",
        "redshift-data:ExecuteStatement",
        "redshift:GetClusterCredentials",
        "redshift:DescribeClusters",
        "secretsmanager:ListSecrets"
      ],
      "Resource": "*"
    },
    {
      "Sid": "AllowReadingRedshiftQuerySecrets",
      "Effect": "Allow",
      "Action": ["secretsmanager:GetSecretValue"],
      "Resource": "*",
      "Condition": {
        "Null": {
          "secretsmanager:ResourceTag/RedshiftQueryOwner": "false"
        }
      }
    }
  ]
}

Query Redshift data

The provided query editor is a standard SQL query editor. Grafana includes some macros to help with writing more complex timeseries queries.

Macros

Macro	Description	Output example
$__timeEpoch(column)	$__timeEpoch will be replaced by an expression to convert to a UNIX timestamp and rename the column to time	UNIX_TIMESTAMP(dateColumn) as "time"
$__timeFilter(column)	$__timeFilter creates a conditional that filters the data (using column) based on the time range of the panel	time BETWEEN '2017-07-18T11:15:52Z' AND '2017-07-18T11:15:52Z'
$__timeFrom()	$__timeFrom outputs the current starting time of the range of the panel with quotes	'2017-07-18T11:15:52Z'
$__timeTo()	$__timeTo outputs the current ending time of the range of the panel with quotes	'2017-07-18T11:15:52Z'
$__timeGroup(column, '1m')	$__timeGroup groups timestamps so that there is only 1 point for every period on the graph	floor(extract(epoch from time)/60)*60 AS "time"
$__schema	$__schema uses the selected schema	public
$__table	$__table outputs a table from the given $__schema (it uses the public schema by default)	sales
$__column	$__column outputs a column from the current $__table	date
$__unixEpochFilter(column)	$__unixEpochFilter be replaced by a time range filter using the specified column name with times represented as Unix timestamp	column >= 1624406400 AND column <= 1624410000
$__unixEpochGroup(column)	$__unixEpochGroup is the same as $__timeGroup but for times stored as Unix timestamp	floor(time/60)*60 AS "time"

Table Visualization

Most queries in Redshift will be best represented by a table visualization. Any query will display data in a table. If it can be queried, then it can be put in a table.

This example returns results for a table visualization:

SELECT {column_1}, {column_2} FROM {table};

Timeseries / Graph visualizations

For timeseries / graph visualizations, there are a few requirements:

• A column with a date or datetime type must be selected
• The date column must be in ascending order (using ORDER BY column ASC)
• A numeric column must also be selected

To make a more reasonable graph, be sure to use the $__timeFilter and $__timeGroup macros.

Example timeseries query:

SELECT
  avg(execution_time) AS average_execution_time,
  $__timeGroup(start_time, 'hour'),
  query_type
FROM
  account_usage.query_history
WHERE
  $__timeFilter(start_time)
group by
  query_type,start_time
order by
  start_time,query_type ASC;

Fill value

When data frames are formatted as time series, you can choose how missing values should be filled. This in turn affects how they are rendered: with connected or disconnected values. To configure this value, change the "Fill Value" in the query editor.

Inspecting the query

Because Grafana supports macros that Redshift does not, the fully rendered query, which can be copy/pasted directly into Redshift, is visible in the Query Inspector. To view the full interpolated query, click the Query Inspector button, and the full query will be visible under the "Query" tab.

Templates and variables

To add a new Redshift query variable, refer to Add a query variable. Use your Redshift data source as your data source for the following available queries:

Any value queried from a Redshift table can be used as a variable. Be sure to avoid selecting too many values, as this can cause performance issues.

After creating a variable, you can use it in your Redshift queries by using Variable syntax. For more information about variables, refer to Templates and variables.

Annotations

Annotations allow you to overlay rich event information on top of graphs. You can add annotations by clicking on panels or by adding annotation queries via the Dashboard menu / Annotations view.

Example query to automatically add annotations:

SELECT
  time as time,
  environment as tags,
  humidity as text
FROM
  $__table
WHERE
  $__timeFilter(time) and humidity > 95

The following table represents the values of the columns taken into account to render annotations:

Name	Description
time	The name of the date/time field. Could be a column with a native SQL date/time data type or epoch value.
timeend	Optional name of the end date/time field. Could be a column with a native SQL date/time data type or epoch value. (Grafana v6.6+)
text	Event description field.
tags	Optional field name to use for event tags as a comma separated string.

Provision Redshift data source

You can configure the Redshift data source using configuration files with Grafana's provisioning system. For more information, refer to the provisioning docs page.

Here are some provisioning examples.

Using AWS SDK (default)

apiVersion: 1
datasources:
  - name: Redshift
    type: redshift
    jsonData:
      authType: default
      defaultRegion: eu-west-2

Using credentials' profile name (non-default)

apiVersion: 1

datasources:
  - name: Redshift
    type: redshift
    jsonData:
      authType: credentials
      defaultRegion: eu-west-2
      profile: secondary

Using accessKey and secretKey

apiVersion: 1

datasources:
  - name: Redshift
    type: redshift
    jsonData:
      authType: keys
      defaultRegion: eu-west-2
    secureJsonData:
      accessKey: '<your access key>'
      secretKey: '<your secret key>'

Using AWS SDK Default and ARN of IAM Role to Assume

apiVersion: 1
datasources:
  - name: Redshift
    type: redshift
    jsonData:
      authType: default
      assumeRoleArn: arn:aws:iam::123456789012:root
      defaultRegion: eu-west-2

Preconfigured Redshift dashboards

Redshift data source ships with a pre-configured dashboard for some advanced monitoring parameters. This curated dashboard is based on similar dashboards in the AWS Labs repository for Redshift. Check it out for more details.

Follow these instructions for importing a dashboard in Grafana.

Imported dashboards can be found in Configuration > Data Sources > select your Redshift data source > select the Dashboards tab to see available pre-made dashboards.

Get the most out of the plugin

• Add Annotations.
• Configure and use Templates and variables.
• Add Transformations.
• Set up alerting; refer to Alerts overview.