Namespaced functions in notification templating

Grafana Alerting
,
1

Hi All,

Well I’ve been using Grafana for quite a bit now and i’m running into a problem while templating notifications. I’m currently using: Grafana v11.6.0

I’m attempting to use the Namespace functions to create a json based dict as is shown in the following example from the docs page:

{{ define "data.example" }}
{{- /* First, let's create some alert data as a JSON string */ -}}
{{ $jsonString := `{
  "service": {
    "name": "payment-api",
    "environment": "production",
    "thresholds": {
      "error_rate": 5,
      "latency_ms": 100
    }
  }
}` }}

{{- /* Parse the JSON string into an object we can work with */ -}}
{{ $config := $jsonString | data.JSON }}

{{- /* Create a new alert payload */ -}}
{{ $payload := coll.Dict
    "service" $config.service.name
    "environment" $config.service.environment
    "status" .Status
    "errorThreshold" $config.service.thresholds.error_rate
}}

{{- /* Output the payload in different JSON formats */ -}}
Compact JSON: {{ $payload | data.ToJSON }}

Pretty JSON with 2-space indent:
{{ $payload | data.ToJSONPretty "  " }}
{{ end }}

I’m doing so in the: “New notification template group” - Under the Contact points → notification templates tab → new notification template button. For the record: I am litterally copying the code above into the editor field. And checking whether the outocme is as expected in the preview window.

So, where am I at:

  1. I’m going at this step by step so first I start with the empty template:
{{ define "data.example" }} {{ end }}

In with which the parser / preview is fine.

  1. Second step is to add the first variable to see if this already gives an excpetion ( it doesn’t)
{{ define "data.example" }}
{{ $jsonString := `{
  "service": {
    "name": "payment-api",
    "environment": "production",
    "thresholds": {
      "error_rate": 5,
      "latency_ms": 100
    }
  }
}` }}
{{ end }}
  1. Adding a print statement to see If my variable is as expected in the preview:
{{ define "data.example" }}
{{ $jsonString := `{
  "service": {
    "name": "payment-api",
    "environment": "production",
    "thresholds": {
      "error_rate": 5,
      "latency_ms": 100
    }
  }
}` }}
{{print $jsonString}}
{{ end }}
  1. And now comes the issue (!) (It always take me a while to get to the point..) Whe I add the rule: {{ $config := $jsonString | data.JSON }}
    The preview windows shows the Error:
invalid_template
template: :13: function "data" not defined

The actual code I have in the editor box at this point is as follows:

{{ define "data.example" }}
{{ $jsonString := `{
  "service": {
    "name": "payment-api",
    "environment": "production",
    "thresholds": {
      "error_rate": 5,
      "latency_ms": 100
    }
  }
}` }}
{{print $jsonString}}
{{ $config := $jsonString | data.JSON }}
{{ end }}

So, the first two steps: A-OK, as soon as I attempt to pipe into the “namespaced function” data.JSON the preview fails and the template is invalid due to it not being able to find the the called function.
So i guess the question becomes: How can I access the namespaced function “data.JSON” ?

Sorry for the long read, Thanks in advance for the replies!

Cheers,

Jelger

2

That’s a doc link for latest Grafama version - atm 12.0.x

Check doc for your version 11.6 (note version in the url):

https://grafana.com/docs/grafana/v11.6/alerting/configure-notifications/template-notifications/reference/#namespaced-functions

That 11.6 doc doesn’t mention namespaced function => you are trying to use feature, which doesn’t exist in your Grafana version.