Overview
Grafana is the dominant open-source observability dashboard – metrics + logs + traces visualisation. The Automize Grafana connector covers dashboards, alert rules, data sources, folders, annotations, and users.
- Regions: Grafana Cloud is regional (US, EU, AU). Self-hosted Grafana lives wherever you put it. Connector pins to one URL per connection.
- Plans: OSS (free, self-hosted), Grafana Cloud Free, Pro, Advanced, Enterprise – all expose the API. Some features (RBAC, audit) need Enterprise.
Setting up the connection
Auth type: Bearer Token.
- Grafana → Configuration → API keys → New API key.
- Pick role (Viewer, Editor, Admin) + expiration.
- Copy the token.
- In Automize, open Settings → Connectors → Grafana → Add connection. Paste Grafana base URL + token.
Find your credentials at https://grafana.com/orgs/_yours_/api-keys.
Rate limits
Grafana Cloud has per-stack limits – generous. Self-hosted Grafana has none built-in. Connector retries 429 with backoff.
Data model
Hierarchy:
Organization ─┬─ Folders ─── Dashboards (panels with queries)
├─ Data Sources (Prometheus, InfluxDB, Loki, etc.)
├─ Alert Rules
├─ Annotations (overlay events on graphs)
└─ Users + Teams
Dashboards keyed by UID (stable across renames) or numeric ID.Available operations
9 operations available. Click any row to jump to its detail.
| Operation | Category | What it does |
|---|---|---|
| Create Annotation | General | Create a dashboard annotation |
| Get Current User | General | Get current user profile |
| Get Dashboard | General | Get dashboard by UID |
| Get Data Source | General | Get data source by ID |
| List Alert Rules | General | List all alert rules |
| List Dashboards | General | Search/list dashboards |
| List Data Sources | General | List all data sources |
| List Folders | General | List dashboard folders |
| List Users | General | List all users (admin only) |
Operations
Create Annotation
Create a dashboard annotation
| Parameter | Required | Type | Description |
|---|---|---|---|
Dashboarduid dashboardUID | Yes | text | |
Panelid panelId | Yes | text | |
Time time | Yes | text | |
Timeend timeEnd | Yes | text | |
Tags tags | Yes | text | |
Text text | Yes | text |
Tips
- Overlay deploys, releases, incidents on graphs.
- dashboardUID + panelId (or omit panelId for global annotation) + time + timeEnd (Unix ms) + tags + text.
Get Current User
Get current user profile
No input parameters.
Tips
- Useful for validating the API key works.
Get Dashboard
Get dashboard by UID
| Parameter | Required | Type | Description |
|---|---|---|---|
Uid uid | Yes | text |
Tips
- uid (stable identifier). Returns full dashboard JSON incl. panels + queries + template variables.
Get Data Source
Get data source by ID
| Parameter | Required | Type | Description |
|---|---|---|---|
Datasource Id datasource_id | Yes | text |
Tips
- datasource_id. Returns connection config (URL, basic auth flag, but not secrets).
List Alert Rules
List all alert rules
No input parameters.
Tips
- Unified alerting (post Grafana 8) – alert rules live separately from dashboards.
List Dashboards
Search/list dashboards
No input parameters.
Tips
- query parameter: title substring search. type=dash-db / dash-folder.
- Returns dashboard summaries – use Get Dashboard for full JSON.
List Data Sources
List all data sources
No input parameters.
Tips
- Returns configured data sources (Prometheus, InfluxDB, Postgres, etc.).
List Folders
List dashboard folders
No input parameters.
Tips
- Folders organise dashboards. Useful for permission scoping.
List Users
List all users (admin only)
No input parameters.
Tips
- Admin only. Returns all users in the org.
FAQ
- Where do I get an API key in Grafana Cloud?
- grafana.com/orgs/<your-org>/api-keys. For self-hosted, Configuration → API keys.
- Service account vs API key?
- Service accounts (Grafana 9+) are the modern way – scoped roles, can have multiple tokens. API keys are legacy but still work. Use service accounts for new builds.
- Why is my dashboard query failing 401?
- API key lacks Editor/Admin role for write operations. Viewer can read but not modify dashboards/folders.