Monitoring CPU & Memory Using Glances & Grafana

This page describes the steps for setting up a Grafana dashboard to monitor system CPU & Memory over time, using data collected from Glances.

Set up Glances Grafana Dashboard

Install and start InfluxDB

InfluxDB is used to store timeseries data exported from Glances.

brew install influxdb
influxd

Go to http://localhost:8086 and do the following via the InfluxDB UI:

• Create a bucket and name it glances
• Create an API token

Install and start Glances

pip3 install glances==3.2.7
pip3 install bottle
pip3 install influxdb-client

Note: I was getting a TypeError on latest version of glances (3.3.1), and installing 3.2.7 fixed the issue.

Create a glances config file (MacOS example below). For config file paths on other operating systems, see documentation.

# Create directory
mkdir "$HOME/Library/Application Support/glances"

# Create config file
cat > "$HOME/Library/Application Support/glances/glances.conf" << EOF
[influxdb2]
host=localhost
port=8086
protocol=http
org=<enter your org name>
bucket=glances
token=TsAfocp8ynW3idpvavB4l3ld6h9KzTPvhLobv2qpBeCk4VO3Gqk-EqLNilmyRaWIscbdcbmxjvyqbH_d20m5cA==
EOF

Start Glances and export to InfluxDB:

glances -t 5 --export influxdb2

Install and start Grafana

brew install grafana
brew services start grafana

Go to http://localhost:3000 to view the Grafana UI, and do the following:

1. Add Data Source: go to configuration and add a InfluxDB data source, and enter the following:
   • HTTP URL: http://localhost:8086
   • InfluxDB Details / Organization
   • InfluxDB Details / Token
   • then click [Save & Test]
2. Import this dashboard by ID: 2387

Shutting down the services

glances and influxd can be stopped by sending the SIGINT signal to terminal (Ctrl + C)

To stop Grafana:

brew services stop grafana

Reference: https://grafana.com/grafana/dashboards/2387-glances-for-flux/