Dashboard Query Warning: "metric might not be a counter"

Hello, I am using Telegraf agent, in a Docker container on a Linux host, to ingest SNMP metrics into a Prometheus service, which is also running as a Docker container. I’m running Grafana in a Docker container as well. Grafana and Prometheus containers are both running on the same host. The Telegraf container is running on a separate host, and uses the [[outputs.prometheus_client]] Telegraf output plugin to expose metrics to the Prometheus service.

I am querying metrics from Prometheus using a Grafana dashboard.

When I query certain SNMP Counter metrics, like IF-MIB::ifInErrors, and use the rate() function to display them properly, I get this warning:

I know for sure that these are actually counter metrics, because I am looking at the SNMP MIB data directly, and the metric values display properly when I use the rate() function on them.

My Telegraf configuration is fairly straightforward. I am just specifying some SNMP MIBs that I want to query on a wireless Access Point.

[[inputs.snmp]]
  agents = [
    "udp://192.168.0.5"
  ]
  version = 2
  community = "mystring"

  [[inputs.snmp.field]]
  oid = "SNMPv2-MIB::sysName.0"
  name = "source"
  is_tag = true

  [[inputs.snmp.field]]
  oid = "UDP-MIB::udpInDatagrams.0"
  name = "udpInDatagrams"

  [[inputs.snmp.field]]
  oid = "RFC1213-MIB::ipInDiscards.0"
  name = "ipInDiscards"

  [[inputs.snmp.table]]
  oid = "IF-MIB::ifTable"
  name = "interface"
  inherit_tags = ["source"]

    [[inputs.snmp.table.field]]
    oid = "IF-MIB::ifDescr"
    name = "InterfaceDescription"
    is_tag = true

    [[inputs.snmp.table.field]]
    oid = "IF-MIB::ifInOctets"
    name = "InboundOctets"

    [[inputs.snmp.table.field]]
    oid = "IF-MIB::ifOutOctets"
    name = "OutboundOctets"

    [[inputs.snmp.table.field]]
    oid = "IF-MIB::ifInUcastPkts"
    name = "InboundUnicastPackets"

    [[inputs.snmp.table.field]]
    oid = "IF-MIB::ifOutErrors"
    name = "OutboundErrors"

    [[inputs.snmp.table.field]]
    oid = "IF-MIB::ifInErrors"
    name = "InboundErrors"

Question: How can I hide or disable this Grafana warning, so it’s not nagging at me? Or what should I change in the Telegraf configuration to “properly” name the metrics, so it’s not nagging?

1 Like

Same issue here. It bother me to no end. I was wondering if there was a way to silence those warning specially when they are not legitimate. But we will have live with it.