Widget Visualization in ObserveOps Dashboards
Visualization is the first step in creating a widget. The type you choose controls how your data appears on the dashboard — as a time-series chart, a table, a gauge, a map, or another format.
Select a visualization type from the widget creation screen to continue with querying and styling.
After selecting any visualization type, continue to Query the Widget Data and then Add Styling and Sorting Details.
Choosing the Right Visualization
| If you want to… | Use this visualization |
|---|---|
| Track a metric value over time | Chart |
| Compare metrics across monitors in a table | Grid |
| See which monitors have the highest or lowest value | Top N |
| Show a single metric on a relative scale | Gauge |
| Show a metric's distribution across monitors as a pie | Pie |
| Display a single computed metric value as a number | Query Value |
| Show metric values across monitors in a compact table | Numeric Grid |
| Visualize network flow volume between source and destination | Sankey |
| Identify monitors with active alerts by severity color | Heat Map |
| See live alerts as they arrive | Stream |
| View active alerts on the dashboard | Active Alert |
| See data distributed across a hierarchy by metric size | Tree Map |
| Map data flow by geography | Map |
| Detect unusual metric behavior automatically | Anomaly |
| Project future metric values based on trends | Forecast |
| View raw, unaggregated log events | Event History |
| Add a text label or section header to the dashboard | Free Text |
| Embed an external tool or dashboard | iFrame |
Graph
Graph visualizations display metric and performance data in various formats — time-series charts, ranked lists, tables, and gauges.
Chart
Select Chart to display metric values over time as a time-series graph.
Chart visualization plots one or more metric counters on a timeline. You can view trends, spikes, and drops over any configured time range.
Use-Case: Track disk latency for all ESXi monitors over the past 24 hours to identify which hosts have elevated latency before it affects workloads.
Top N
Select Top N to display a ranked list of monitors by the highest or lowest value of a metric.
Top N visualization shows which monitors are at the extremes of a metric — the top consumers, the slowest responders, or the most affected devices.
Use-Case: Identify the five servers consuming the most CPU to prioritize investigation.
Gauge
Select Gauge to display a single metric value on a relative scale.
Gauge visualization shows how close a value is to a critical threshold. You can configure threshold bands with colors to make the severity immediately visible.
Use-Case: Show the peak CPU utilization across all VMs in a datacenter and indicate visually whether it is within a safe, warning, or critical range.
Grid
Select Grid to display metric or availability data in a tabular format, grouped by a key value.
Grid visualization organizes data into columns and rows, making it easy to compare values across multiple monitors at a glance.
Use-Case: View the power state of all VMs across your ESXi hosts in a single table, grouped by ESXi host.
Pie
Select Pie to display how a metric value is distributed across monitors or groups as a pie chart.
Pie visualization shows proportional data, making it easy to see which monitors or groups account for the largest share of a given metric.
Use-Case: Show what percentage of total network traffic each department's servers contribute, so you can identify the highest consumers at a glance.
Query Value
Select Query Value to display a single computed metric value as a large number on the dashboard.
Query Value visualization runs your configured query and displays the result as one number. Use it for at-a-glance KPIs and status numbers on your dashboard.
Use-Case: Display the total number of currently down monitors as a single number that your NOC team can see immediately without drilling into any table.
Numeric Grid
Select Numeric Grid to display metric values across monitors in a compact tabular format.
Numeric Grid shows each monitor and its corresponding metric value in a space-efficient table, making it easy to scan large numbers of monitors quickly.
Use-Case: Display CPU utilization for all servers in a data center in one compact table, sorted by highest utilization.
Sankey
Select Sankey to visualize the flow of network traffic between sources and destinations.
Sankey diagrams represent data flow as arrows, where the width of each arrow corresponds to the volume of traffic. This makes it easy to identify the heaviest data flows and the protocols used.
Use-Case: View total flow volume in bytes between specific source and destination IP ranges, along with the communication protocol.
Sankey only supports the Flow Group as its data source.
Alert / Availability
Alert and availability visualizations give you a real-time view of your infrastructure's alert state and monitor health.
Heat Map
Select Heat Map to display monitors color-coded by their current highest-severity active alert.
Heat Map visualization gives you a quick visual overview of which monitors need attention. The color on each monitor represents the highest severity active alert firing for that monitor.
Heat Map only supports the Alert Group as its data source.
Stream
Select Stream to display a live feed of alerts in real time, with the newest alerts at the top.
Stream visualization shows all active alerts across your infrastructure as they fire. It updates continuously so you always see the latest events.
Use-Case: Monitor a live feed of all triggered alerts across your hybrid infrastructure during an incident to track new events as they arrive.
Active Alert
Select Active Alert to display a list of currently active alerts on your dashboard.
Active Alert visualization shows all alerts that are currently firing across your infrastructure, giving you a real-time view of your alert state.
Use-Case: Keep a persistent view of all unresolved alerts on your infrastructure dashboard so your team can track open issues without navigating away.
Map
Map visualizations represent data geographically or hierarchically.
Tree Map
Select Tree Map to visualize hierarchical data as nested rectangles sized by metric value.
Tree Map visualization shows relative proportions across a hierarchy. Larger rectangles represent higher metric values, making it easy to identify the heaviest consumers within nested groups.
Use-Case: See which applications within a business unit consume the most memory, with each rectangle sized proportionally to its memory usage.
Map
Select Map to visualize the geographic distribution of log and flow data.
Map visualization plots source and destination locations on a world map. You can see where data originates and where it is transmitted, based on cities or countries, depending on the data available in ingested logs and flows.
Use-Case: Track data transmission paths between cities or countries to identify unexpected international traffic patterns.
AI / ML
AI and ML visualizations use machine learning to surface anomalies and predict future metric trends automatically.
Anomaly
Select Anomaly to display metric data with ML-based anomaly detection overlaid on the time-series graph.
Anomaly visualization highlights data points that deviate significantly from expected behavior, helping you identify unusual patterns without manually setting thresholds.
Use-Case: Detect unexpected spikes in network traffic on a specific interface that fall outside the normal baseline for that time of day.
Forecast
Select Forecast to display projected metric values based on historical trends.
Forecast visualization extends the time-series graph into the future using ML-based prediction. Use it to anticipate resource exhaustion or capacity issues before they occur.
Use-Case: Project disk usage growth over the next 30 days to determine whether additional storage needs to be provisioned.
Event History
Select Event History to display raw, unaggregated log event data.
Event History shows individual log events as they occurred, without any aggregation. This gives you a precise count and context for specific events at specific times.
Use-Case: Investigate unauthorized access attempts by viewing each raw log entry with its exact timestamp, rather than an aggregated count.
Text and Inserts
Text and insert widgets add static content or external tools to your dashboard without connecting to a data source.
Free Text
Select Free Text to add a text label or section header to your dashboard.
Free Text widgets display static text you define. Use them to label sections of a dashboard, add context to a set of related widgets, or note important information.
iFrame
Select iFrame to embed external web content directly on your dashboard.
iFrame widgets load a URL inside the widget panel. You can embed Grafana dashboards, reports, custom web apps, or any other tool accessible by URL.
To enable iFrame widgets, add "cross.origin.embedder.policy.enabled": "No" to /motadata/motadata/config/motadata.json and restart the Motadata service. Use an HTTPS URL, or configure your browser to allow non-secure content.
Use-Case: Embed a Grafana dashboard inside ObserveOps so your team can view external analytics without switching between tools.