You can configure the data source using either the data source interface in Grafana or using a configuration file.
This page explains how to set up and enable the data source capabilities using Grafana.
If you're using your own installation of Grafana, you can provision the Tempo data source using a YAML configuration file.
Depending upon your tracing environment, you may have more than one Tempo instance.
Grafana supports multiple Tempo data sources.
## Before you begin
To configure a Tempo data source, you need administrator rights to your Grafana instance and a Tempo instance configured to send tracing data to Grafana.
If you're provisioning a Tempo data source, then you also need administrative rights on the server hosting your Grafana instance.
Refer to [Provision the data source](#provision-the-data-source) for next steps.
## Add or modify a data source
You can use these procedures to configure a new Tempo data source or to edit an existing one.
You can't modify a provisioned data source using the Tempo data source settings in Grafana Cloud.
If you want to modify any capabilities of a provisioned data source, you can clone the provisioned data source and then edit the new data source in the Grafana UI.
Refer to [Clone a provisioned data source for Grafana Cloud](#clone-a-provisioned-data-source-for-grafana-cloud) for more information.
Follow these steps to set up a new Tempo data source:
1. Select **Connections** in the main menu.
1. Enter `Tempo` in the search bar.
1. Select **Tempo**.
1. Select **Add new data source** in the top-right corner of the page.
1. On the **Settings** tab, complete the **Name**, **Connection**, and **Authentication** sections.
- Use the **Name** field to specify the name used for the data source in panels, queries, and Explore. Toggle the **Default** switch for the data source to be pre-selected for new panels.
- Under **Connection**, enter the **URL** of the Tempo instance, for example, `https://example.com:4100`.
- Complete the [**Authentication** section](#authentication).
1. Optional: Configure other sections to add capabilities to your tracing data. Refer to the additional procedures for instructions.
Use Transport Layer Security (TLS) for an additional layer of security when working with Tempo.
For additional information on setting up TLS encryption with Tempo, refer to [Configure TLS communication](https://grafana.com/docs/tempo/<TEMPO_VERSION>/configuration/network/tls/) and [Tempo configuration](https://grafana.com/docs/tempo/<TEMPO_VERSION>/configuration/).
- For self-managed Tempo or GET instances: If your Tempo or GET instance is behind a load balancer or proxy that doesn't supporting gRPC or HTTP2, streaming may not work and should be deactivated.
1. Select the target data source from the drop-down list.
You can also click **Open advanced data source picker** to see more options, including adding a data source.
1. Set start and end time shift. As the logs timestamps may not exactly match the timestamps of the spans in the trace it may be necessary to widen or shift the time range to find the desired logs.
1. Optional: Select tags to map. These tags can be used in the custom query with `${__tags}` variable. This variable interpolates the mapped tags as list in an appropriate syntax for the data source. Only the tags that were present in the span are included; tags that aren't present are omitted You can also configure a new name for the tag. This is useful in cases where the tag has dots in the name and the target data source doesn't allow dots in labels. For example, you can remap `http.status` to `http_status`. If you don't map any tags here, you can still use any tag in the query, for example, `method="${__span.tags.method}"`. You can learn more about custom query variables [here](/docs/grafana/latest/datasources/tempo/configure-tempo-data-source/#custom-query-variables).
1. Skip **Filter by trace ID** and **Filter by span ID** settings as these cannot be used with a custom query.
1. Switch on **Use custom query**.
1. Specify a custom query to be used to query the logs. You can use various variables to make that query relevant for current span. The link will only be shown only if all the variables are interpolated with non-empty values to prevent creating an invalid query.
| **Span start time shift** | Shifts the start time for the logs query, based on the span's start time. You can use time units, such as `5s`, `1m`, `3h`. To extend the time to the past, use a negative value. Default: `0`. |
| **Span end time shift** | Shifts the end time for the logs query, based on the span's end time. You can use time units. Default: `0`. |
| **Tags** | Defines the tags to use in the logs query. Default: `cluster`, `hostname`, `namespace`, `pod`, `service.name`, `service.namespace`. You can change the tag name for example to remove dots from the name if they are not allowed in the target data source. For example, map `http.status` to `http_status`. |
| **Filter by trace ID** | Toggles whether to append the trace ID to the logs query. |
| **Filter by span ID** | Toggles whether to append the span ID to the logs query. |
| **Use custom query** | Toggles use of custom query with interpolation. |
| **Query** | Input to write custom query. Use variable interpolation to customize it with variables from span. |
The **Trace to metrics** setting configures the [trace to metrics feature](/blog/2022/08/18/new-in-grafana-9.1-trace-to-metrics-allows-users-to-navigate-from-a-trace-span-to-a-selected-data-source/) available when integrating Grafana with Tempo.
1. Optional: Change **Span start time shift** and **Span end time shift**. You can change one or both of these settings. The default start time shift is -2 minutes and 2 minutes for end time shift.
1. Optional: Choose any tags to use in the query. If left blank, the default values of `cluster`, `hostname`, `namespace`, `pod`, `service.name` and `service.namespace` are used.
The tags you configure must be present in the spans attributes or resources for a trace to metrics span link to appear. You can optionally configure a new name for the tag. This is useful for example if the tag has dots in the name and the target data source doesn't allow using dots in labels. In that case you can for example remap `service.name` to `service_name`.
To use custom queries, you need to configure the tags you’d like to include in the linked queries.
For each tag, the key is the span attribute name.
In cases where the attribute name would result in an invalid metrics query or doesn’t exactly match the desired label name, you can enter the label name as the second value.
For example, you could map the attribute `k8s.pod` to the label `pod`.
You can interpolate the configured tags using the `$__tags` keyword.
For example, when you configure the query `requests_total{$__tags}` with the tags `k8s.pod=pod` and `cluster`, it results in `requests_total{pod="nginx-554b9", cluster="us-east-1"}`.
The label values are dynamically inserted based on the span attributes’ values.
You can link to any metric you’d like, but metrics for span durations, counts, and errors filtered by service or span are a great starting point.
1. Select a metrics data source from the **Data source** drop-down.
1. Optional: Choose any tags to use in the query. If left blank, the default values of `cluster`, `hostname`, `namespace`, `pod`, `service.name` and `service.namespace` are used.
These tags can be used in the custom query with `${__tags}` variable. This variable interpolates the mapped tags as list in an appropriate syntax for the data source and will only include the tags that were present in the span omitting those that weren’t present. You can optionally configure a new name for the tag. This is useful in cases where the tag has dots in the name and the target data source doesn't allow using dots in labels. For example, you can remap `service.name` to `service_name` in such a case. If you don’t map any tags here, you can still use any tag in the query like this `method="${__span.tags.method}"`. You can learn more about custom query variables [here](/docs/grafana/latest/datasources/tempo/configure-tempo-data-source/#custom-query-variables).
1. Click **Add query** to add a custom query.
1. Specify a custom query to be used to query metrics data.
Each linked query consists of:
- **Link Label:** _(Optional)_ Descriptive label for the linked query.
- **Query:** The query ran when navigating from a trace to the metrics data source.
Interpolate tags using the `$__tags` keyword.
For example, when you configure the query `requests_total{$__tags}`with the tags `k8s.pod=pod` and `cluster`, the result looks like `requests_total{pod="nginx-554b9", cluster="us-east-1"}`.
| **Data source** | Defines the target data source. |
| **Span start time shift** | Shifts the start time for the metrics query, based on the span's start time. You can use time units, such as `5s`, `1m`, `3h`. To extend the time to the past, use a negative value. Default: `0`. |
| **Span end time shift** | Shifts the end time for the metrics query, based on the span's end time. You can use time units. Default: `0`. |
| **Tags** | Defines the tags used in linked queries. The key sets the span attribute name, and the optional value sets the corresponding metric label name. For example, you can map `k8s.pod` to `pod`. To interpolate these tags into queries, use the `$__tags` keyword. |
| **Link Label** | _(Optional)_ Descriptive label for the linked query. |
| **Query** | Input to write a custom query. Use variable interpolation to customize it with variables from span. |
| **\_\_tags** | This variable uses the tag mapping from the UI to create a label matcher string in the specific data source syntax. The variable only uses tags that are present in the span. The link is still created even if only one of those tags is present in the span. You can use this if all tags are not required for the query to be useful. |
| **\_\_span.spanId** | The ID of the span. |
| **\_\_span.traceId** | The ID of the trace. |
| **\_\_span.duration** | The duration of the span. |
| **\_\_span.name** | Name of the span. |
| **\_\_span.tags** | Namespace for the tags in the span. To access a specific tag named `version`, you would use `${__span.tags.version}`. In case the tag contains dot, you have to access it as `${__span.tags["http.status"]}`. |
| **\_\_trace.traceId** | The ID of the trace. |
| **\_\_trace.duration** | The duration of the trace. |
The **Tags time range** feature controls how tag and tag-value queries are executed by specifying the time window applied to these requests. You can select one of the following options to constrain your queries:
### Clone a provisioned data source for Grafana Cloud
If you have a data source that is provisioned by a configuration file in Grafana Cloud, you can clone that provisioned data source and then edit the new data source in the Grafana UI.
For example, let's say you want to edit the **Trace to log**s settings in your Tempo data source that is provisioned on Grafana Cloud.
You'd like to enable traceID and spanID but you can't because the data source is provisioned.
By cloning the data source, you'd be able to edit these capabilities.
To clone a provisioned data source, follow these steps:
1. Create a viewer [Cloud Access Policy token](https://grafana.com/docs/grafana-cloud/security-and-account-management/authentication-and-permissions/access-policies/) in the Grafana Cloud Portal, making sure it has read permissions at least for the data types you are trying to clone.
1. [Create a new data source](#add-a-new-data-source) of the same type you want to clone.
1. Copy all of the settings from the existing provisioned data source into the new data source while replacing the password with the API key you created.
The easiest way to do this is to open separate browser windows with the provisioned data source in one and the newly created data source in another.
Of course, after copying the HTTP and Auth section details, pasting the Cloud Access Policy token into the Password field, and changing any of the other options that you want, you can save and test the data source.
