This document describes how you can add helpful information to a dashboard, andhow you can group widgets on a dashboard. For example,you might want to add information about the dashboard,add links to relevant resources, or what to do in different situations.When a dashboard contains many widgets, you can improve theusability of the dashboard by grouping them.

For information about the Cloud Monitoring API, seeCreate and manage dashboards by API.

This feature is supported only for Google Cloud projects.ForApp Hubconfigurations, select the App Hub host project or management project.

Before you begin

Complete the following in the Google Cloud project where you want to create andmodify custom dashboards:

• To get the permissions that you need to create and modify custom dashboards by using the Google Cloud console, ask your administrator to grant you theMonitoring Editor (roles/monitoring.editor) IAM role on your project. For more information about granting roles, seeManage access to projects, folders, and organizations.

  You might also be able to get the required permissions throughcustom roles or otherpredefined roles.

  For more information about roles, seeControl access with Identity and Access Management.

• You can put up to 100 widgets on a dashboard.

Add text to a dashboard

The following screenshot illustrates a text widget:

The information in this section is for the Google Cloud console.For information about using the Cloud Monitoring API,seeDashboard with aText widget.

To add a text widget to a dashboard, do the following:

1. In the Google Cloud console, go to thedashboard Dashboards page:

   Go toDashboards

   If you use the search bar to find this page, then select the result whose subheading isMonitoring.

2. In the toolbar of the Google Cloud console,select your Google Cloud project. ForApp Hubconfigurations, select the App Hub host project or management project.
3. Select a dashboard or clickCreate dashboard.
4. In the toolbar, clickadd Add widget.
5. In theAdd widget dialog, go to theLayout section, and thenselectText.
6. Add a title.

7. In theContent pane, enter the text you want displayed.

   For formatting information, seeMarkdown syntax.

8. Options: Use the fields in theDisplay pane to customize your content.

   For example, you might want to configure thevisibility of the widget.

9. To apply your changes to the dashboard, in the toolbar,clickApply. To discard your changes, clickCancel.

10. To save your modified dashboard, in the toolbar, clickSave.

Markdown syntax

This section describes most of the Markdown syntax that is supported bythe text widget. HTML tags aren't supported.

• Headers

  A line starting with a hash,#, indicates a header.You can use multiple hash signs for different levels of headers.For example, for a top-level header use a single hash,# Header.For a second-level header, use two hashes,## Second-level header.

• Paragraphs

  To create a new paragraph, use a blank line.

• Emphasis

  • Italic: Use*italic* or_italic_.
  • Bold: Use**bold** or__bold__.
  • Bold and Italic: Use***bold and italic***.
  • Fixed font: Use backticks,`fixed font`.

• Links: Format as[link text](path).

  You can use any value for thelink text. The value forpath mustreference an HTML anchor in the dashboard or be a URL to an externalpage.

  • To link to another section in the dashboard. The anchor for a sectionis the section title, converted to lowercase with words separated bya hyphen. For example, For example, to link to a section withthe title "Charts using variables", set thepath to#charts-using-variables.

  • To link to an external resource, setpath to the URL. For example,to link toexample.com, setpath tohttps://example.com/.

• Lists: You can create ordered or unordered lists, and you can nest lists.

  • For ordered lists, prefix each list item with1.. When the text isrendered, the elements are numbered sequentially. For example:

    1. Ordered list item 11. Ordered list item 2

  • For unordered lists, prefix each list item with a plus(+),dash(-), or asterisk(*). For example:

    + Unordered list item 1+ Unordered list item 2

  • To nest lists, indent the nested list. For example:

    1.  Item 1    + Nested unordered-list item 1    + Nested unordered-list item 21.  Item 2    1. Nested ordered-list item 1    1. Nested ordered-list item 2

• Variables: Format as${VARIABLE_NAME}.

  The text widget renders only the value or values of the variable.For example, if you have a label-based variable where the key iszoneand the value isus-west1, then the text widget displaysus-west1.

  When the value of a variable is the wildcard(*), the text widgetdisplaysall.

  Unrecognized variables are displayed as written and aren't rendered.

• Escaping characters

  Some characters, like plus signs(+), are converted into list elements.If you want to display these types of characters literally, then use abackslash to escape the character,\+.

Organize dashboard widgets

Custom dashboards let you specify the position of the charts,alerting policies, and other widgets. However, you can improve theusability of a dashboard that has many widgets by creating sections in yourdashboard or by grouping widgets:

• To create indexed sections in your dashboard, use thesection-header widget. When you add this widget to your dashboard,a table of contents is created and a horizontal divider is added to thedashboard. The table of contents lets you navigate to a specific section ofthe dashboard. Each section widget contains an anchor. When you aretroubleshooting, you might want to share the section URL with a teammate.To copy the section URL, right-clicklinkLink to heading,and then selectCopy link address.

• To reduce the time to load a dashboard, use group widgets. Thereare three types of group widgets, collapsible, drop-down, and tab.Group widgets contain a collection of widgets,and they improve performance by using a lower priority data to retrieve forcollection members that aren't displayed. The collapsible group widgetdisplays every member of the collection when it is expanded,otherwise all members are hidden. In contrast, the drop-down group andtab group widgets display only one member of the collection.The difference between these widgets is whether you selectthe member to display by using a menu or a tab.

To use the widgets described in this section, your custom dashboard mustuse mosaic mode, which is the default layout. If you change the layout tothat of a grid, then these widgets aren't available.

For most widgets, you can configure theirvisibility. However, organizational widgetsare always visible.

The remainder of this section describes how to add and configure widgetsthat you can use to organize your dashboards. For information aboutmodifying these widgets, seeModify a widget's configuration.

Add a section-header widget

For information about using the Cloud Monitoring API to createa section-header widget, seeDashboard with aSectionHeader widget.

To add a section-header widget by using the Google Cloud console,do the following:

1. In the Google Cloud console, go to thedashboard Dashboards page:

   Go toDashboards

   If you use the search bar to find this page, then select the result whose subheading isMonitoring.

2. In the toolbar of the Google Cloud console,select your Google Cloud project. ForApp Hubconfigurations, select the App Hub host project or management project.
3. In theAdd widget dialog, go to theLayout section, and thenselectSection header widget.

4. On the widget, clickeditEdit section, and complete thedialog:

   • The value of theSection name field is displayed in the table ofcontents.
   • The value for theSubheading field is displayed on the dashboard.
   • If you select *Add a divider to the Table of Contents, thena horizontal line is added after the entry in the table of contents.

Add collapsible group widgets

For information about using the Cloud Monitoring API to createa collapsible group widget, seeDashboard with aCollapsibleGroup widget.

To add a collapsible group widget by using the Google Cloud console,do the following:

1. In the Google Cloud console, go to thedashboard Dashboards page:

   Go toDashboards

   If you use the search bar to find this page, then select the result whose subheading isMonitoring.

2. In the toolbar of the Google Cloud console,select your Google Cloud project. ForApp Hubconfigurations, select the App Hub host project or management project.
3. In theAdd widget dialog, go to theLayout section, and thenselectCollapsible Group.

4. To add a widget to the group, drag the widget to the group.

   After you add widgets to the group, you can use your pointer to resize andreposition those widgets.

5. To add a descriptive title to the group, place your pointer on the widgetto activate the toolbar, and then clickeditEdit group.

6. Optional: To force the group to be collapsed by default,place your pointer on the widget to activate the toolbar, and thenclickexpand_lessCollapse group.

   When a collapsible group widget is collapsed,Monitoring retrieves the data for the widgets in thegroup at a lower priority than for other widgets. As a result, yourdashboard loads more quickly.

Add drop-down group or tab group widgets

For information about using the Cloud Monitoring API to create these widgets,seeDashboard with aSingleViewGroup widget.

To add these widgets to a dashboard, do the following:

1. In the Google Cloud console, go to thedashboard Dashboards page:

   Go toDashboards

   If you use the search bar to find this page, then select the result whose subheading isMonitoring.

2. In the toolbar of the Google Cloud console,select your Google Cloud project. ForApp Hubconfigurations, select the App Hub host project or management project.
3. If necessary, create the widgets that you want to add to the group widget.

4. In theAdd widget dialog, go to theLayout section, and thenselectDropdown group orTab group.

   A widget of the selected type is added to your dashboard.

5. To add widgets like a line chart to a group widget, drag them intothe group widget or edit the group widget and perform an add operation.

   Note: Not all widget types can be added to a group widget.

   For example, to add widgets to a tab group widget by editing the group,do the following:

   1. In the toolbar of the widget, selectlistEdit tab group,and then selecteditEdit group.
   2. Optional: Enter a title for the group.

   3. ClickAdd widget, and then make a selection from theAdd widget menu.

      TheAdd widget menu lists the widgets that can be added to thegroup.

   4. Repeat the previous step for each widget that you want to add to thetab group widget.

   5. Use theexpand_moreLower andexpand_lessHigher buttons to order the widgets in thegroup widget.

   6. ClickApply.

   The dashboard is refreshed and only one of the widgets that were addedto the group widget is visible.The toolbar for the displayed widget lets you edit the displayedwidget or perform other actions.

6. To save your modified dashboard, in the toolbar, clickSave.

What's next

You can also add the following widgets to your custom dashboards:

• Charts, tables, and indicators
• Log entries
• Display incidents and charts for alerting policies

For information about exploring charted data and filtering your dashboards,see the following documents:

• Explore charted data
• Add temporary filters to a custom dashboard
• Create and manage variables and pinned filters