About the course
Monitoring and observability are essential for understanding the health and performance of modern systems and applications. Prometheus and Grafana are leading open-source tools that form the backbone of many monitoring solutions, with Prometheus collecting and storing time-series metrics and Grafana providing powerful visualisation capabilities. This 2-day introductory workshop is specifically designed for individuals new to these technologies, providing a solid foundation in the core concepts and practical skills needed to get started with basic monitoring and visualisation.
The course begins by explaining the importance of monitoring and introducing the architecture and key components of both Prometheus and Grafana. Participants will gain hands-on experience with the fundamental steps of setting up and configuring a basic Prometheus server and getting started with collecting metrics from target systems using standard exporters like Node Exporter. You will also learn the basics of PromQL, the powerful query language used to select and work with metrics in Prometheus.
A key focus of this workshop is on getting data into Grafana and building your first dashboards. Participants will install and configure Grafana, connect it to a Prometheus data source, and learn how to build simple visualisations using PromQL queries to display key metrics from your monitored systems. By the end of this 2-day workshop, you will have the practical skills to install and configure Prometheus and Grafana for basic monitoring and create simple dashboards to visualise your system's performance.
Instructor-led online and in-house face-to-face options are available - as part of a wider customised training programme, or as a standalone workshop, on-site at your offices or at one of many flexible meeting spaces in the UK and around the World.
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- Explain the importance of monitoring and observability and the basic roles of Prometheus and Grafana.
- Understand the core architecture and key components of a basic Prometheus and Grafana setup.
- Install and perform basic configuration of a Prometheus server.
- Use a standard exporter (like Node Exporter) to collect metrics from a target and configure Prometheus to scrape them.
- Understand the Prometheus data model and metric types.
- Use fundamental PromQL to select, filter, and perform basic aggregation on time series data.
- Install and configure Grafana and add Prometheus as a data source.
- Build a basic Grafana dashboard with standard panels to visualise key metrics from Prometheus.
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This introductory 2-day workshop is designed for IT professionals, system administrators, DevOps engineers, developers, and anyone new to Prometheus and Grafana who needs to understand the fundamentals of monitoring and visualisation with these tools. It is ideal for:
Individuals with little or no prior experience with Prometheus or Grafana.
Those looking to understand the basic architecture and workflow of a Prometheus and Grafana monitoring solution.
Anyone needing to set up basic monitoring for systems using standard exporters.
Professionals who want to learn how to query metrics and build simple dashboards to get started with data visualisation.
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Participants should have:
Basic familiarity with Linux command-line environments for installation and configuration tasks.
A foundational understanding of general IT systems and monitoring concepts is helpful but not strictly required.
Familiarity with using Docker may be beneficial for setting up the lab environment, although alternative setup guidance may be provided.
No prior experience with Prometheus, Grafana, or other monitoring tools is necessary.
We can customise the training to match your team's experience and needs - with more time and coverage of fundamentals for new starters, or a tailored course if you are only focussing on either Prometheus or Grafana.
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This Prometheus & Grafana course is available for private / custom delivery for your team - as an in-house face-to-face workshop at your location of choice, or as online instructor-led training via MS Teams (or your own preferred platform).
Get in touch to find out how we can deliver tailored training which focuses on your project requirements and learning goals.
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Introduction to Monitoring, Observability, Prometheus & Grafana
Why is Monitoring and Observability Important?: Understanding the need for visibility into modern systems for performance, reliability, and debugging.
What Should I Be Monitoring?: Key metrics and signals to collect from systems and applications.
Introduction to Prometheus: Overview of Prometheus as a time-series monitoring and alerting toolkit, its origins, and core principles.
Prometheus Architecture Overview: High-level understanding of the main components (Prometheus server, exporters, Pushgateway, Alertmanager overview).
Introduction to Grafana: Overview of Grafana as a data visualisation tool and its purpose.
Key Concepts & Terminology: Defining core ideas like metrics, time series, labels, scraping (pull vs push).
Hands-On Lab: Exploring monitoring challenges, introductory discussion on metrics.
Getting Started with Prometheus & Basic Data Collection
Prerequisites & Environment Setup: Ensuring the necessary environment for installation and labs.
Installing & Configuring Prometheus: Steps to download, install, and configure the Prometheus server.
Understanding Basic Prometheus Configuration (prometheus.yml): Configuring global settings and initial scrape jobs.
Running Prometheus: Starting the Prometheus server and accessing its web UI.
Introduction to Exporters: Using dedicated agents to expose metrics.
Collecting Host-level Metrics: Installing and configuring Node Exporter to collect system metrics (CPU, memory, disk, network).
Configuring Prometheus to Scrape Exporters: Adding exporter targets to the prometheus.yml.
Hands-On Lab: Setting up Prometheus, configuring it to scrape Node Exporter, verifying metrics in the Prometheus web UI.
Prometheus Data Model & PromQL Fundamentals
Prometheus Data Model: Understanding metrics, labels (key-value pairs), and dimensionality.
Prometheus Metric Types: Understanding the four core types: Counter, Gauge, Histogram, and Summary (basic understanding).
Introduction to PromQL (Prometheus Query Language): Learning the syntax for selecting and aggregating time series data.
Basic Queries: Selecting time series using metric names and label matchers.
Range Selectors and Offset Modifiers (Basics): Querying data over time ranges and looking back in time.
PromQL Functions and Operators (Basics): Using simple mathematical functions and aggregation operators (sum, avg, etc.).
Hands-On Lab: Writing and executing basic PromQL queries in the Prometheus web UI, practicing label filtering, range selectors, and simple aggregation.
Getting Started with Grafana & Building Basic Dashboards
Prerequisites & Installing Grafana: Steps to install and run the Grafana server.
Tour of the Grafana UI: Navigating the web interface.
Adding Prometheus as a Data Source: Configuring Grafana to connect to your Prometheus server.
Dashboard Basics: Creating new dashboards and adding panels.
PromQL Queries in Grafana: Writing queries in the Grafana query editor.
Basic Visualisation Panel Types: Understanding and configuring common visualisations like Graphs, Stats, Gauges, and Tables.
Basic Panel Configuration & Formatting: Customising titles, basic appearance options.
Hands-On Lab: Installing and running Grafana, adding Prometheus as a data source, creating a basic dashboard with panels displaying key metrics from Node Exporter, basic panel formatting.
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Prometheus Official Documentation: The comprehensive source for information on installing, configuring, and using Prometheus, including PromQL. https://prometheus.io/docs/
Grafana Official Documentation: The main resource for learning how to install, configure, and use Grafana to build dashboards and visualisations. https://grafana.com/docs/
Prometheus Community Forum: Get help, ask questions, and connect with other Prometheus users and contributors. https://community.prometheus.io/
Grafana Community Forum: Find answers, share knowledge, and interact with the wider Grafana user and development community. https://community.grafana.com/
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