[questions] GrafanaDashboard spec.envs & spec.plugins

[DrummyFloyd]

Environment:

• Grafana Operator Version: v5.18.0

Description:

I have two questions regarding the GrafanaDashboard CRD functionality:

1. Plugin Version Management

It seems impossible to use latest for plugins version, is it a wanted behaviour ?

plugins:
  - name: grafana-polystat-panel
    version: latest  # i need to pin version

NB:

seems to be doable upon the next release superior to v5.19.4
#2158

2. Environment Variable Substitution with grafanaCom Imports

Current Issue: Environment variable substitution via spec.envs appears to only work with jsonnet dashboards, but not with dashboards imported via grafanaCom.id.

Expected Behavior: Environment variables defined in spec.envs should be substituted in dashboards imported from grafana.com, similar to how they work in jsonnet dashboards.

Example:

The imported dashboard (ID: 10620) contains template variables that reference environment variables:

{
  "current": {
    "text": "${VAR_GITLAB_HOST}",
    "value": "${VAR_GITLAB_HOST}"
  },
  "hide": 2,
  "name": "GITLAB_HOST", 
  "query": "${VAR_GITLAB_HOST}",
  "skipUrlSync": true,
  "type": "constant"
}

My CRD configuration:

apiVersion: grafana.integreatly.org/v1beta1
kind: GrafanaDashboard
metadata:
  name: gitlab-ci-pipelines
spec:
  allowCrossNamespaceImport: true
  instanceSelector:
    matchLabels:
      grafana: home
  grafanaCom:
    id: 10620
  folder: Gitlab
  resyncPeriod: 10m
  plugins:
    - name: grafana-polystat-panel
      version: 2.1.15
  envs:
    - name: VAR_GITLAB_HOST
      value: https://gitlab.com
  datasources:
    - inputName: "DS_PROMETHEUS"
      datasourceName: "prometheus"

Current Result: The ${VAR_GITLAB_HOST} placeholders in the imported dashboard are not being replaced with the value from spec.envs.

Questions:

• Is spec.envs intended to work only with jsonnet dashboards?
• If not, is this a bug that environment variable substitution doesn't work with grafanaCom imports?
• Are there plans to extend environment variable substitution to grafanaCom and direct json dashboard definitions?

thank you for you hardwork

[DrummyFloyd]

seems to be doable upon the next release superior to v5.19.4
#2158
for the first question

[Baarsgaard]

Hi,
As you've already discovered, 1. will be possible in upon the release of v5.20.0
And .spec.envs is indeed only available in when using a jsonnet source for your dashboard json. (.spec.jsonnet and .spec.jsonnetLib)

It's worth noting that we're currently gathering feedback on deprecating the jsonnet features: #2171

You're welcome to open a feature request or leave a comment on the jsonnet deprecation notice as both are more visible to the maintainer team.