This is an original planning guide. It is not a vendor manual, an official standard, or legal advice. Example addresses use documentation ranges. Review every command before you paste it.
What this hour is for
The exporters and the dashboard generator draft a scrape config and a panel. They do not install Prometheus and they do not log into the device. SNMP version 3, or a community that is not a dictionary word, is the choice on the device page. The string is a secret.
One device. A dashboard that queries the world is not the lab. The scrape source is the address of the monitor, allowed on the device, not 0.0.0.0/0.
Write what one panel proves: an interface counter, a session count, or the reachability of the device. If the scrape fails, the failure is the result. Do not open SNMP on the WAN to make the panel green.
Grafana credentials stay in the store.
The change you can finish
Apply nothing during the writing of the note. When the lab window opens, it is one change on the device named in the ticket. Read the draft, then the device, then decide.
Rollback is the file or the revision you saved first. You do not invent a rollback after the only copy is gone.
- Name one device you administer.
- Draft the scrape.
- Remove any secret from the file you save in git.
- Limit the device to the monitor's address.
- Prove one counter.
- Do not open SNMP to the world.
Mistakes that outlive the command
Network Monitoring with Prometheus and Grafana goes wrong in a small set of ways. The list is here so the ticket can forbid them before the window.
- A community string in git.
- SNMP permitted from any source.
- A dashboard of devices you do not administer.
- WAN SNMP enabled for the demo.
- Credentials in the panel JSON.
Decisions to write down
One decision for Network Monitoring with Prometheus and Grafana: The device is yours. The secret is not in git. The source is the monitor. One counter is the proof. And the WAN stays closed.
Checks before you call it done
Confirm this before you call the change done: The device is named. The scrape file was redacted. The allow list is the monitor. One panel is named. And no WAN SNMP was added. If one of those fails, stop.
Before you leave the device
Network Monitoring with Prometheus and Grafana ends when the hostname on the device matches the hostname in the ticket. If it does not, you are on the wrong box. Stop. A command that succeeded on the wrong box is not progress.
The draft stays a draft until a person has read the names in it. A generator does not log into the device and does not know which interface is the uplink. You delete a line that names a device, a zone, or a prefix you did not write down.
0.0.0.0/0 is not kept because a sample included it. A source you can say is the source you keep. 192.0.2.0/24, 198.51.100.0/24, 203.0.113.0/24, and 2001:db8::/32 are documentation. They belong in the note. They are not prefixes you type onto a production device because they appeared in a draft.
prompt-for-this is a reminder that a secret is missing. It is not a password, a key, a community string, or a pre-shared key you save in the ticket or in git. The real secret stays in the store.
One change is the window. A VLAN and a routing protocol and a VPN do not share it. If two things move and the result is wrong, you will not know which one did it. The next feature waits for its own page.
If the same step fails twice, stop for the day. The failure is the result. Adding a forum command beside a half-applied config produces a device nobody can rebuild. Restore the copy you took first.
A second person reads the device name and the change aloud. If they cannot find them in the ticket, the note is not done. Silence is not agreement. Then leave the device alone.
This page is a planning guide. It is not a vendor manual, not an official standard, and not a permission to touch a network you do not administer. The pillar guide owns the wider design. This page owns one lab proof.
Tools for this guide
These tools run in the browser on this site. They do not log into your machines.
Related pillar guides
More in this cluster
The pillar for this page, and the next published pages filed with it.