Managing dashboards through the console

Dashboards are one way for you to view and analyze metric data. The Cloud Console provides predefined dashboards that require no setup or configuration. You can also define custom dashboards. With custom dashboards, you have control over the dashboard content. You decide what you want to display, and if you want to use line charts, heatmaps, or other plot types, such as a gauge. This page describes how to view predefined dashboards and how to create and manage custom dashboards.

Listing all dashboards

To list all of your dashboards, do the following:

  1. In the Cloud Console, select Monitoring or click the following button:

    Go to Monitoring

  2. In the Monitoring navigation panel, click Dashboards.

Predefined dashboards

Predefined dashboards have one of the following types:

  • Google Cloud Platform: These are for Google Cloud services.
  • Applications: These are for third-party applications such as Cassandra and nginx.
  • Amazon Web Services: These are for AWS services.

You can modify the chart configuration and the display period for predefined dashboards. For more information, see Configuring dashboards.

You cannot delete a predefined dashboard, and you cannot modify what is displayed on a predefined dashboard.

Listing predefined dashboards

To list only your predefined dashboards, you add filters to the filter bar.

For example, to list all dashboards for Google Cloud services and all dashboards for applications, do the following:

  1. In the Dashboards Overview page, click Filter Dashboards and then select Type.

  2. Click Filter Dashboards and select OR.

    By default, when you add multiple filters they are joined with a logical-AND. In this case, the goal is to list all dashboards that belong to one of two categories, so the filters need to be joined with a logical-OR.

  3. Add the filter Type: Applications.

    Display the application or Google Cloud dashboards.

Viewing a G​C​E instance dashboard

To view the dashboard for a specific G​C​E instance, do the following:

  1. In the Monitoring navigation panel, click Dashboards.

  2. In the filter bar , click the text Filter Dashboards, select Type and then select Google Cloud Platform.

    Display the dashboards filtered by type.

  3. In the resulting list, click VM Instances.

    The VM Instances page list your VM instances. From this list, you can view details about each instance, such as the instance name, and access a detailed dashboard for an instance.

  4. To view the dashboard for a specific G​C​E instance, click on the instance name.

Viewing a G​K​E dashboard

To view the dashboards for your G​K​E instances that have the Cloud Operations for GKE enabled, do the following:

  1. In the Monitoring navigation panel, click Dashboards.
  2. In the filter bar , click the text Filter Dashboards, select Type and then select Google Cloud Platform.
  3. In the resulting list, click GKE.

Custom dashboards

You can create custom dashboards to display data that is of interest to you. This section describes how to manage your custom dashboards. For details on the dashboard controls, see Configuring dashboards.

Selecting the dashboard editor

To create and edit dashboards, you can use the Dashboard Editor or the Legacy Dashboard Editor:

  • Dashboard Editor: With this editor you can create and edit charts, as well as create and edit scorecards, gauges, and text boxes. If you set the layout to mosaic, then you can control the size and position of each dashboard widget. If you set the layout to grid, then all widgets are displayed in a grid pattern.

    When you add a widget to a dashboard, you have multiple configuration options:

    • You can quickly configure the widget with Basic mode.
    • You have access to all widget configuration fields with Advanced mode.
    • You can use Monitoring Query Language (MQL) with MQL mode.

  • Legacy Dashboard Editor: The editor has the same interface as Metrics Explorer. You can create and edit charts, and you can view, but not edit, gauges, scorecards, and text boxes. With this editor, widgets are displayed in a grid pattern and you can view, but not modify, dashboards with a mosaic layout.

The dashboard toolbar displays your editor. To change your editor, click the button that displays your editor and make a selection from the options.

Creating a custom dashboard

Dashboard editor

To create a dashboard, follow these steps:

  1. In the Dashboards Overview page, click Create dashboard.

    The following screenshot shows a newly created dashboard with the Dashboard editor enabled:

    Example of a new dashboard.

    As illustrated, when you create a dashboard, the dashboard toolbar is displayed, editing is enabled, the dashboard title is set to Untitled dashboard, the layout is set to Mosaic, and a Chart library is shown.

  2. Ensure Dashboard Editor is displayed in the dashboard toolbar.

  3. (Optional) Replace the default dashboard title, which starts with Untitled Dashboard, with a descriptive name.

  4. Add a widget to the dashboard by clicking it or by dragging it from the Chart library to the graph area. A preconfigured widget of the selected type is displayed.

    Select the widget to resize it or to change the pre-selected values. You cannot change a widget's type. For example, you cannot convert a line chart to a stacked bar chart. For details on configuring a widget, see Creating and managing charts.

    The following example illustrates a Line chart:

    Example of a newly line chart.

    You must add at least 1 widget to the dashboard.

  5. (Optional) In the dashboard toolbar, click Add chart to activate the Chart library and then repeat the previous steps for each widget that you want to add to the dashboard.

Legacy dashboard editor

To create a dashboard, follow these steps:

  1. In the Dashboards Overview page, click Create dashboard.

  2. Ensure Legacy Dashboard Editor is displayed in the dashboard toolbar.

  3. (Optional) Enter a descriptive title for the dashboard and click Confirm. The default dashboard title is Untitled dashboard.

  4. To change the title after the dashboard is created, locate the dashboard on the Dashboard Overview page, click Edit and enter a name. To save the changes, click Confirm.

  5. Click Add Chart

  6. Complete the chart configuration. For details on this step, see Creating and managing charts and then click Save.

  7. Repeat the previous 2 steps for each chart that you want to add to the dashboard.

Viewing custom dashboards

To view a specific dashboard, do the following:

  1. In the Cloud Console, select Monitoring or use the following button:

    Go to Monitoring

  2. In the Monitoring navigation panel, click Dashboards.

  3. Select the dashboard name. You can restrict the list to only custom dashboards by adding the filter Type: Custom.

For information on changing the content of a dashboard, see Creating and managing dashboard widgets.

Deleting a custom dashboard

To delete a custom dashboard, do the following:

  1. In the Cloud Console, select Monitoring or use the following button:

    Go to Monitoring

  2. In the Monitoring navigation panel, click Dashboards.

  3. Begin the delete action by finding the dashboard you want to delete and then click Delete .

  4. Click Delete in the confirmation dialog.

Copying a custom dashboard

To copy, or duplicate a dashboard, do the following:

  1. Begin the copy action by choosing one approach:
    • In the Dashboards Overview page, identify the dashboard to copy, and then click the Copy icon.
    • In the dashboard, select Dashboard settings and then select Copy dashboard.
  2. Click Copy in the confirmation dialog.

Configuring dashboards

To set the default configuration for every chart on a dashboard, use the dashboard toolbar. To override the dashboard settings for a specific chart, use that chart's toolbar. For more detail, see Using the chart toolbar.

The dashboard toolbar displays the dashboard name and a series of controls. This section describes those controls.

  • Reset Zoom

    Removes your time interval and range of value selections. For more information, see Changing the graph resolution.

  • Settings

    Dashboard editor

    Defines the default configuration for all charts. The settings include the following options:

    • Show all legends.
    • Hide chart legends.
    • X-Ray Mode: Show each graph line in white on a black background.
    • Color Mode: Show each graph line with a unique color on a white background.
    • Statistics Mode: Display statistical information.

    Legacy dashboard editor

    Defines the default configuration for all charts. The settings include the following options:

    • Show all legends.
    • Hide chart legends.
    • X-Ray Mode: Show each graph line in white on a black background.
    • Color Mode: Show each graph line with a unique color on a white background.
    • Statistics Mode: Display statistical information.
    • Edit dashboard name.
    • Copy dashboard. Create a duplicate dashboard with the same title as the original, but prefixed by Copy of.
    • Delete dashboard.
    • Define the row and column layout of the dashboard content.

  • Fullscreen

    Displays the dashboard full screen.

  • Auto Refresh

    Disables or enables the redrawing of all the widgets on a dashboard when new data is available. Auto refresh is automatically disabled by certain analysis features. For example, if you modify the graph resolution, auto refresh is disabled.

  • Time-range selectors

    Sets the display period for all charts on the dashboard. When you select a display period, all charts are redrawn. However, the auto refresh state is not changed. For more information, see Setting the display period.

  • Adding content to a dashboard

    Dashboard editor

    To add a widget, such as a chart or gauge, to a dashboard, do the following:

    1. Ensure that the dashboard toolbar displays Dashboard Editor and that the Edit toggle is in the on position. The Edit toggle is displayed when you have editing permission on the Workspace.
    2. If the Chart library isn't visible, then click Add chart.

    3. Click or drag a widget from the Chart library to the graph area. A preconfigured widget of the selected type is displayed.

    4. Configure the widget by using its configuration pane.

    Legacy dashboard editor

    To add a chart to a dashboard, do the following:

    1. Click Add chart to open the new-chart dialog.

    2. The Add chart button is displayed if you have editing permissions for the Workspace.

  • Clone chart

    Dashboard editor

    To copy a custom-dashboard widget and save the copy to a custom dashboard, do the following:

    1. Ensure the dashboard is editable.
    2. Select the widget you want to copy.
    3. Click Clone chart, complete the dialog, and then click Clone.

    To copy a predefined-dashboard widget and save the copy to a custom dashboard, do the following:

    1. In the widget toolbar, select More and then select Copy or Add to custom dashboard.
    2. Complete the dialog and then click Copy.

    Not all widgets support the copy operation.

    Legacy dashboard editor

    To copy a dashboard widget and save the copy to a custom dashboard, do the following:

    1. In the widget toolbar, select More and then select Copy or Add to custom dashboard.
    2. Complete the dialog and then click Copy.

    Not all widgets support the copy operation.

  • Mosaic and Grid toggle

    Dashboard editor

    When a dashboard is editable you can configure the widgets and modify the layout of the widgets on the dashboard. By default, the Mosaic layout is selected. With this configuration, you can resize and reposition widgets.

    To convert a mosaic style dashboard to a grid style, where all widgets have the same dimension, click Grid.

    To convert a grid style dashboard to mosaic style, click Mosaic.

    Legacy dashboard editor

    See Settings for options to configure the row and column layout of the charts.

  • Undo and Redo buttons

    Dashboard editor

    Click Undo to undo your previous change.

    Click Redo to reapply your previous change.

    Legacy dashboard editor

    These buttons aren't available for this editor.

  • Filter

    Each dashboard page contains a Filter bar that can be used to temporarily change the displayed data. For example, to only show data for a specific instance, you can add one or more filters. Filters apply only to your current view. If you navigate to a different window, the filter configuration is discarded. Filters added to a dashboard are joined by a logical AND.

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