Advanced Usage

Master the advanced features of the Minimal Status Panel to create sophisticated monitoring dashboards.

🏷️ Service Renaming and Custom Names

Transform cryptic URLs and instance names into user-friendly display names.

Basic Service Renaming

Use the Custom Service Names field in panel options:

{
  "https://google.com": "Google Search",
  "https://api.github.com": "GitHub API",
  "https://my-internal-api-server-01.company.com:8080/health": "Internal API",
  "10.0.1.100": "Database Server",
  "monitoring.company.com": "Monitoring Stack"
}

Advanced Naming Strategies

Strategy 1: Environment-based naming

{
  "https://api-prod.company.com": "API (Production)",
  "https://api-staging.company.com": "API (Staging)",
  "https://api-dev.company.com": "API (Development)"
}

Strategy 2: Service-type grouping

{
  "https://app.company.com": "Web App",
  "https://api.company.com": "REST API",
  "https://cdn.company.com": "CDN",
  "https://auth.company.com": "Authentication"
}

Strategy 3: Business-friendly names

{
  "https://checkout.shop.com": "Checkout System",
  "https://payments.shop.com": "Payment Gateway",
  "https://inventory.shop.com": "Inventory Management",
  "https://notifications.shop.com": "Email Service"
}

Dynamic Naming Tips

  1. Keep it concise: 15-25 characters work best for most display modes
  2. Use consistent patterns: “Service (Environment)” or “Team - Service”
  3. Avoid special characters: Stick to alphanumeric and basic punctuation
  4. Consider your audience: Technical names for ops teams, business names for executives

🔍 Advanced Prometheus Queries

Multi-metric queries for richer data

Complete monitoring setup

# Query multiple metrics at once
{__name__=~"probe_success|probe_duration_seconds|probe_http_status_code|probe_ssl_earliest_cert_expiry"}

Service-specific filtering

# Monitor only critical services
probe_success{priority="critical"}

# Monitor by team ownership
probe_success{team=~"platform|infrastructure"}

# Monitor by service type
probe_success{type=~"api|web|database"}

Environment-based monitoring

# Production services only
probe_success{environment="production"}

# Multi-environment view
probe_success{environment=~"production|staging"}

# Exclude development environments
probe_success{environment!="development"}

Custom metric integration

Using custom health check endpoints

# If you have custom health metrics
up{job="my-service"} or probe_success{job="blackbox"}

Combining different probe types

# HTTP, TCP, and ICMP monitoring
probe_success{module=~"http_2xx|tcp_connect|icmp"}

📊 Multiple Panel Strategies

Strategy 1: Environment Separation

Create separate panels for different environments:

Production Panel

Staging Panel

Strategy 2: Service Type Grouping

Critical Services Panel

Infrastructure Panel

Applications Panel

Strategy 3: Team-based Monitoring

# Platform team services
probe_success{team="platform"}

# Frontend team services
probe_success{team="frontend"}

# Backend team services
probe_success{team="backend"}

🎯 Use Case Examples

Executive Dashboard

Perfect for management overview displays.

Configuration:

Query:

probe_success{customer_facing="true"}

Operations Center

Detailed monitoring for technical teams.

Configuration:

Query:

probe_success{environment="production"}

Public Status Page

Customer-facing status information.

Configuration:

Example Custom Names:

{
  "https://api.company.com": "API Service",
  "https://app.company.com": "Web Application",
  "https://payments.company.com": "Payment System",
  "https://auth.company.com": "User Authentication"
}

Status Wall Display

Large screen displays in offices or NOCs.

Configuration:

🔧 Integration Patterns

With Grafana Alerting

Create alerts that complement your status panels:

  1. Alert on service down 
    probe_success == 0
  2. Alert on slow response times 
    probe_duration_seconds > 5
  3. Alert on certificate expiry 
    (probe_ssl_earliest_cert_expiry - time()) / 86400 < 30

With Grafana Variables

Use dashboard variables for dynamic filtering:

  1. Create environment variable
    • Name: environment
    • Type: Query
    • Query: label_values(probe_success, environment)
  2. Use in panel query 
    probe_success{environment="$environment"}

With Grafana Annotations

Add context to your status panels:

  1. Deployment annotations: Mark when deployments occur
  2. Maintenance annotations: Show planned maintenance windows
  3. Incident annotations: Track incident resolution

📱 Mobile and Responsive Considerations

Mobile-optimized configurations

Phone Screens:

Tablet Screens:

Touch-friendly settings

⚡ Performance Optimization

Query optimization

  1. Limit time range for better performance
  2. Use specific label selectors instead of broad queries
  3. Limit metrics to only what you need

Panel optimization

  1. Reduce Max Items for faster rendering
  2. Increase refresh interval for less frequent updates
  3. Use appropriate display modes for your data volume

Dashboard optimization

  1. Group related panels on the same row
  2. Use consistent time ranges across panels
  3. Consider panel caching for heavily loaded dashboards

🎨 Custom Styling (Advanced)

While the plugin adapts to Grafana themes automatically, you can create custom CSS for specific needs:

Dashboard-level customizations

Add custom CSS through dashboard settings or custom themes.

Organization-level branding

Use Grafana’s custom styling features to match your brand colors.

🔒 Security Considerations

Sensitive information handling

  1. Avoid exposing internal URLs in public dashboards
  2. Use custom names to obscure internal infrastructure details
  3. Consider separate dashboards for internal vs external views

Access control

  1. Use Grafana’s RBAC to control panel access
  2. Create different dashboards for different security levels
  3. Consider data source permissions for sensitive metrics

📈 Monitoring Best Practices

Service selection

  1. Monitor user-facing services first
  2. Include critical dependencies (databases, auth services)
  3. Add internal services that affect user experience

Alert integration

  1. Complement panels with alerts, don’t replace them
  2. Use different thresholds for alerts vs visual indicators
  3. Consider alert fatigue when setting up notifications

Documentation

  1. Document your naming conventions
  2. Maintain service inventory with panel configurations
  3. Create runbooks linked to your status panels

Ready to see all the visual options? Check out Display Modes or explore the API Reference for technical details!