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Set up your Docker development environment

The create-plugin tool includes a development environment featuring Docker. It allows you to start an instance of the Grafana application for plugin developers against which you can code.

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It's not necessary to sign a plugin during development. The Docker development environment that is scaffolded with @grafana/create-plugin will load the plugin without a signature. This is because it is configured by default to run in development mode.

Why use the Docker environment​

Docker simplifies the process of creating, deploying, and running applications. It lets you create consistent and isolated environments for your plugin. This makes it easy to manage dependencies and ensures that your plugin runs the same way across different machines.

The create-plugin tool configures the Docker container with the necessary variables to allow easy access to Grafana and load plugins without signing them. The plugin tool also adds a live reload feature that triggers browser refreshes when you make frontend code changes, and automatically reloads the plugin binary when you change backend code.

The Docker environment also lets you attach a debugger to the plugin backend code, making the development process easier.

Get started with Docker​

To start your plugin development project, run the following commands in the order listed:

  1. Install dependencies: npm install installs frontend dependencies.
  2. Build frontend: npm run dev builds and watches the plugin frontend code.
  3. Build backend: mage -v build:linux builds the plugin backend code. Rerun this command every time you edit your backend files.
  4. Start server: npm run server starts a Grafana development server running on http://localhost:3000.

Configure the Grafana version​

To test a plugin across different versions of Grafana, set an environment variable. Use GRAFANA_VERSION to set the Grafana version:

GRAFANA_VERSION=10.0.0 npm run server

Configure the Grafana image​

The default Docker image in the plugin tool is grafana-enterprise. To override this image, alter the docker-compose.yaml by changing the grafana_image build argument:

docker-compose.yaml
version: '3.7'

services:
  grafana:
    extends:
      file: .config/docker-compose-base.yaml
      service: grafana
    build:
      args:
        grafana_version: ${GRAFANA_VERSION:-9.1.2}
        grafana_image: ${GRAFANA_IMAGE:-grafana}

This example assigns the environment variable GRAFANA_IMAGE to the build arg grafana_image with a default value of grafana. This gives you the option to set the value when running docker compose commands.

Debugging a plugin's backend​

If you're developing a plugin with a backend part, run npm run server with DEVELOPMENT=true. The Docker Compose file exposes port 2345 for debugging, from a headless delve instance that runs inside the Docker environment.

You can attach a debugger client to this port to debug your backend code. For example, in VS Code, add a launch.json configuration:

launch.json
{
  "version": "0.2.0",
  "configurations": [
    {
      "name": "Attach to plugin backend in docker",
      "type": "go",
      "request": "attach",
      "mode": "remote",
      "port": 2345,
      "host": "127.0.0.1",
      "showLog": true,
      "trace": "log",
      "logOutput": "rpc",
      "substitutePath": [
        {
          "from": "${workspaceFolder}",
          "to": "/root/<YOUR_PLUGIN_ID>"
        }
      ]
    }
  ]
}