Dashboard created in General folder, ignoring folder name in dashboardProviders

[tringuyen-yw]

Using Grafana helm chart version 6.13.2, which is an upstream dependency from kube-prometheus-stack.

I would like to import some dashboards created in a configmap (created in the same namespace as the kube-prometheus-stack

apiVersion: v1
kind: ConfigMap
metadata:
  name: cm-strimzi-dashboards
  labels:
    app: strimzi
    grafana_dashboard: "1"
  annotations:
    k8s-sidecar-target-directory: "/tmp/dashboards/strimzi"
data:
  strimzi-kafka.json: |-
    { 
       json code of the Grafana dashboard
    }
  dashboard2.json: |-
    {
       json code
    }

Customize my-helm-values.yaml. Please note: here the helm values is written for Grafana helm chart. For kube-prometheus-stack helm chart, I have to nest the content under the root element grafana:

sidecar:
  dashboards:
    enabled: true
    label: grafana_dashboard
    folder: /tmp/dashboards

dashboardProviders:
  strimzi-provider.yaml:
    apiVersion: 1
    providers:
      - name: 'strimzi'
        orgId: 1
        folder: 'KAFKA'
        type: file
        disableDeletion: false
        editable: true
        options:
          path: /tmp/dashboards/strimzi

Then deploy by

helm install my-grafana grafana -n monitoring -f my-helm-values.yaml

What happenned?

• The dashboards *.json files are correctly saved in /tmp/dashboards/strimzi. The strimzi-provider.yaml correctly created in /etc/grafana/provisioning/dashboards.
• Grafana UI show the dashboard folder KAFKA is created but has zero dashboards.
• The dashboards which are supposed to be in the KAFKA folder are visible in the General folder.

What is the expected results

Would prefer the custom dashboards specified in the configmap to be created in the custom dashboard folder as specified in the dashboardProviders.providers helm value.

[joey-enfield]

I had the same issue. In my values.yaml I added

  sidecar:
    dashboards:
      label: grafana_dashboard
      folderAnnotation: grafana_folder
      provider:
        foldersFromFilesStructure: true

Then i can add

apiVersion: v1
kind: ConfigMap
metadata:
  name: blackbox-dashboard
  namespace: monitoring
  labels:
     grafana_dashboard: "1"
  annotations:
     grafana_folder: "common"

[tringuyen-yw]

@joeyenfield-verint That's cool thanks. Just to clarify.

Q1. is grafana_folder: "common" the name of the dashboard folder in the Grafana UI? Q2. For the dashboards in common folder, What is the physical path where the *.json files are stored? Q3. Can you confirm you don't define any dashboardProviders value for the Grafana helm value?

[tringuyen-yw]

@joeyenfield-verint fantastic your solution works perfectly. Answering my own question hopefully to help future readers

Q1. is grafana_folder: "WhateverNameYouWant" the name of the dashboard folder in the Grafana UI? Q2. For the dashboards in common folder, What is the physical path where the *.json files are stored?

Yes, the grafana-sc-dashboard sidecar container will process the ConfigMap. It will store all the dashboards defined in the ConfigMap in a Grafana dashboard folder named in the value of the grafana_folder label key. There is no need to create that folder in advance. The Grafana helm values bebome much simpler! In the example below, the sidecar will create a subdir named WhateverNameYouWant (configured in ConfigMap) within the dashboard dir /tmp/dashboards (configured in sidecar.dashboards.folder). The*.json` of the dashboards defined in the ConfigMap are stored in this subdir.

In the Grafana UI, the dashboards in /tmp/dashboards/WhateverNameYouWant are provisioned in the dashboard folder named WhateverNameYouWant (instead of the General dashboard folder).

sidecar:
  dashboards:
    enabled: true
    label: grafana_dashboard
    folder: /tmp/dashboards
    folderAnnotation: grafana_folder

    provider:
      allowUiUpdates: true
      foldersFromFilesStructure: true

Q3. Can you confirm you don't define any dashboardProviders value for the Grafana helm value?

Confirmed. There is no need. the Grafan helm values I use above doesn't have dashboardProviders. For completeness, here is my updated ConfigMap which just mirror the solution you suggested. The important point is the annotation k8s-sidecar-target-directory is replaced by grafana_folder label.

apiVersion: v1
kind: ConfigMap
metadata:
  name: cm-strimzi-dashboards
  labels:
    app: strimzi
    grafana_dashboard: "1"
  annotations:
    grafana_folder: "WhateverNameYouWant"
data:
  dashboard1.json: |-
    { 
       json code of the Grafana dashboard
    }
  dashboard2.json: |-
    {
       json code
    }

Overall the comments in grafana/values.yaml are confusing (or outdated). So far I am unclear as why there are two different ways to provision dashboard in custom folders. One of those (using dashboardProviders and k8s-sidecar-target-directory annotation) is clearly buggy.

[zakkg3]

And for completeness, make helm (parent / umbrella chart for grafana) iterate and create a configmap per dashboard...

{{ if .Values.dashboardsConfigmap.enable }}
{{ $root := . }}
{{- range $path, $_ := .Files.Glob "dashboards/cluster-monitoring/**.json" }}
---
apiVersion: v1
kind: ConfigMap
metadata:
  labels:
    grafana_dashboard: "1"
  annotations:
    grafana_folder: "Cluster"
  name: {{ base $path }}
data:
  {{ base $path }}:
{{ $root.Files.Get $path | toJson | indent 4 }}
{{ end }}
{{ end }}

and the indentation for "providers" is under sidecar.dashboard:

sidecar:
  dashboards:
  ...
    provider:

[diegocejasprieto]

I have a similar problem but in my case the dashboards are created in their corresponding folders, and everytime I make a change in the json files/configmap and re-deploy my changes are applied correctly, but the dashboards are moved to the "General" folder until I manually restart the pod.

Anyone knows how to make changes to the provisioned dashboards WITHOUT restarting the Grafana pod every time?