Concepts

CloudWatch Dashboards allow you to create customizable views of the metrics and alarms for your AWS resources. You can create dashboards inside the CloudWatch console to display metrics about every AWS service you use and any custom metrics you create. Dashboards are highly useful for keeping an eye on resource utilization, application performance, and operational health.

Creating a New CloudWatch Dashboard

  1. Navigation: Sign in to the AWS Management Console and open the Amazon CloudWatch console. From the navigation pane, select ‘Dashboards’ and then click ‘Create Dashboard’.
  2. Naming: Enter a name for your dashboard and click ‘Create Dashboard’.
  3. Adding Widgets: Once you’ve created a dashboard, you can add different widgets. Click ‘Add widget’ to start. Widgets can be line charts, stacked area charts, numbers, or text, and they can display CloudWatch metrics, queries, or logs data.
  4. Configuring Widgets: Configure the widgets to display the metrics you are interested in. You can select a metric by searching or navigating through the ‘Metrics’ menu, or by using the metric’s unique identifier.
  5. Setting the Period: For each metric you can set the ‘Period’, which is the length of time represented by each data point on the chart.
  6. Save Dashboard: After adding widgets to your dashboard and configuring them according to your preferences, click ‘Save dashboard’.

Example Dashboard Configuration

Suppose you are monitoring an EC2 instance and want to create a dashboard that shows CPU Utilization, Disk Reads/Writes, and Network In/Out:

  1. Add a line chart widget for ‘EC2 > Per-Instance Metrics’.
  2. Choose ‘CPU Utilization’ metric.
  3. Set the period to ‘5 minutes’.
  4. Repeat the process for ‘Disk Reads/Writes’ and ‘Network In/Out’ metrics.
  5. Save the dashboard with the name ‘EC2 Monitoring’.

Best Practices for Dashboard Creation

When creating CloudWatch Dashboards, consider the following best practices:

  • Organize by Function: Group related metrics together in a single widget or adjacent widgets, such as all metrics related to EC2 instances in one widget.
  • Use Annotations: To highlight important events or thresholds on your graphs.
  • Automatic Refresh: Set your dashboard to auto-refresh at an appropriate interval to ensure you are looking at the most current data.
  • Alarm Visibility: Add widgets that show the status of alarms to get alerted when a metric crosses a threshold.

Sharing and Access Control

Dashboards can be shared with other team members or made public (view-only) with a shared link. You can control who has access to your dashboards by using AWS Identity and Access Management (IAM) policies.

To share a dashboard:

  1. Open the dashboard you want to share.
  2. Click on ‘Share dashboard’ and choose ‘Share with users in this account’ or ‘Share with other AWS accounts’.
  3. Configure the permissions as required.

Conclusion

CloudWatch Dashboards are a powerful tool in a SysOps Administrator’s toolkit, offering real-time monitoring capabilities for proactive management of AWS environments. With customizable dashboards, effective monitoring, and the ability to share insights with the team, you can maintain a high level of operational excellence. Remember to align your dashboard creation process with your monitoring goals and AWS best practices for maximal efficiency and clarity.

Answer the Questions in Comment Section

True or False: You can use CloudWatch dashboards to monitor resources and applications from multiple AWS regions in a single view.

  • A) True
  • B) False

Answer: A) True

Explanation: CloudWatch dashboards support monitoring resources and applications in multiple AWS regions from a single dashboard view.

Which AWS service integrates with CloudWatch to provide automated dashboards for AWS resources?

  • A) AWS Budgets
  • B) AWS Config
  • C) AWS X-Ray
  • D) AWS DMS

Answer: C) AWS X-Ray

Explanation: AWS X-Ray integrates with AWS CloudWatch to provide automated dashboards that help users analyze and debug distributed applications.

You can add which of the following types of graphs to CloudWatch dashboards? (Select TWO)

  • A) Stacked area
  • B) Pie charts
  • C) Line graphs
  • D) Histograms
  • E) Bar charts

Answer: A) Stacked area, C) Line graphs

Explanation: CloudWatch supports stacked area and line graphs among other types of visualizations, but it does not support pie charts, histograms, or bar charts.

True or False: To create a CloudWatch dashboard, you need to manually write JSON objects for each widget you want to include.

  • A) True
  • B) False

Answer: B) False

Explanation: Although you can manually write JSON objects for each widget, CloudWatch also provides a graphical interface that allows users to add widgets without writing JSON.

What is the maximum number of metrics that can be included in a single CloudWatch dashboard?

  • A) 50
  • B) 500
  • C) 5000
  • D) No limit

Answer: B) 500

Explanation: A single CloudWatch dashboard can include up to 500 metrics.

True or False: CloudWatch Alarm actions cannot be triggered based on the data from a CloudWatch Dashboard.

  • A) True
  • B) False

Answer: B) False

Explanation: CloudWatch Alarms can be set up to trigger based on metric thresholds, which can be viewed on CloudWatch Dashboards.

What is the default data retention period for metrics displayed in CloudWatch Dashboards?

  • A) 15 months
  • B) 5 years
  • C) Indefinite
  • D) Depends on the metric

Answer: A) 15 months

Explanation: CloudWatch retains metric data for a default of 15 months, allowing you to access historical data and perform analysis.

Is it possible to share a CloudWatch dashboard with users who do not have an AWS account?

  • A) Yes, by creating a public dashboard
  • B) Yes, by granting them IAM access
  • C) No, an AWS account is mandatory
  • D) No, unless they use AWS Organizations

Answer: A) Yes, by creating a public dashboard

Explanation: Public dashboards can be created in CloudWatch to share the dashboard with individuals who don’t have an AWS account.

True or False: You can change the time zone of the data displayed in a CloudWatch dashboard to match your local time zone.

  • A) True
  • B) False

Answer: A) True

Explanation: CloudWatch Dashboards allow you to adjust the time zone for the data displayed to match your local time or remain on UTC.

Which feature would you use to automate the creation of a CloudWatch Dashboard for different environments such as development, testing, and production?

  • A) AWS Auto Scaling
  • B) CloudFormation templates
  • C) AWS Lambda
  • D) AWS Config Rules

Answer: B) CloudFormation templates

Explanation: CloudFormation templates can be used to automate the provisioning and configuration of AWS resources, including CloudWatch Dashboards, across different environments.

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Yusuf Sanchez
6 months ago

This tutorial on creating CloudWatch dashboards was incredibly helpful for my SOA-C02 exam prep. Thanks!

Judith Villagómez
8 months ago

Awesome post! It cleared up a lot of the confusion I had with setting up metrics.

Cathriona Stone
7 months ago

Does anyone know if it’s possible to automate the creation of CloudWatch dashboards with AWS CLI?

Florence Harris
8 months ago

The visualization options in CloudWatch dashboards are great, but I find them somewhat limited compared to other tools like Grafana.

Reinhard Lembke
8 months ago

The best feature of CloudWatch dashboards is that they allow you to combine metrics from multiple AWS services into a single pane of glass.

Sedat Beckmann
8 months ago

I’m having issues with setting up alarms within the CloudWatch dashboard. Any advice?

Venceslau Aragão
8 months ago

Very informative blog, helped me a lot. Thanks!

Diocléia da Mata
7 months ago

Great write-up! Which metrics do you think are essential to monitor for a web application?

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