Plugins 〉Ask O11y

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Ask O11y

Overview
Installation
Change log
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Ask O11y - Agentic Observability for Grafana

Ask O11y brings an AI investigation agent directly into Grafana. It queries telemetry, calls MCP tools, builds evidence, gates risky actions, and turns live observability data into incident-ready answers.

Instead of jumping between dashboards, Explore, alert rules, runbooks, and service maps, operators can ask a question in plain language and get a traceable investigation with metrics, logs, traces, topology, approvals, and a final RCA report.

Ask O11y agent overview

Why Teams Use Ask O11y

Root cause analysis without tab switching: investigate alerts, regressions, and performance issues from one Grafana-native workspace.
Evidence-first AI answers: every run records tool calls, telemetry evidence, approval state, and final report context.
MCP-powered Grafana automation: use built-in Grafana MCP tools or connect external MCP servers for multi-org and custom tool setups.
Approval-gated writes: read-only investigations run quickly, while dashboard writes, annotations, destructive operations, and risky tools require explicit approval.
Service topology memory: Graphiti-backed service graph context helps the agent reason about dependencies and incident blast radius.
Grafana-aligned controls: RBAC, plugin settings, secure secrets, theme-safe UI, and backend resource handlers keep the agent inside Grafana's app-plugin model.

Product Tour

Live RCA Workspace

Ask O11y plans the investigation, gathers evidence in parallel, and keeps the operator in control when a write action needs approval.

Live RCA workspace with evidence and approval gate

MCP And Service Graph Settings

Admin settings are organized into Grafana-native tabs for general limits, agent runtime, MCP servers, service graph controls, and prompts.

MCP settings and service graph controls

Tool Selection Controls

Choose exactly which MCP tools the agent can call. Tool names stay scannable, risk is shown in its own column, and long tool descriptions live behind hover help.

MCP tool selection modal

Service Graph Context

The Service Graph tab shows Graphiti connection status, scan controls, backend-enforced graph limits, and the embedded service topology view used during RCA.

Service graph settings

Run Trace And Evidence History

Reopen past investigations with their plan, evidence references, approval events, final report, and operational metrics.

Run history and traceable evidence

What You Can Ask

"Investigate the checkout p95 latency alert and tell me if the last deploy is involved."
"Find error logs for the payment service and link the traces with the longest spans."
"Show CPU saturation by Kubernetes node for the last two hours."
"Create an incident annotation for this outage window."
"Map the checkout service dependencies and identify the most likely blast radius."
"Build a dashboard panel for the API SLO burn rate."

Core Capabilities

Agentic Investigation Loop

Ask O11y runs a planner, step executor, tool scheduler, evidence ledger, approval gate, and final-report synthesizer in the Go backend plugin. Runs stream progressively into the UI with plan, step, evidence, approval, and final-report events.

Grafana And MCP Tooling

Use the Grafana LLM app and MCP tool ecosystem to query Prometheus, Loki, Tempo, Pyroscope, dashboards, alerting, annotations, folders, RBAC metadata, and other Grafana resources. External MCP servers can be added for multi-org or specialized tools.

Safe Automation

Viewer, Editor, and Admin access is enforced through Grafana RBAC and Ask O11y's tool risk policy. Read-only tools can run automatically. Write, destructive, open-world, untrusted-server, and external-communication actions can require approval before execution.

Topology And Memory

Ask O11y can use Graphiti-backed topology and historical incident memory to enrich RCA. The service graph lives in plugin settings with scan controls, connection status, graph limits, and backend-enforced trimming for large graphs.

Conversations are saved with history, import, and sharing workflows. Investigation sessions can be reopened with their trace and evidence so teams can audit what the agent saw and decided.

Requirements

Ask O11y requires:

Grafana 12.3.0 or newer
Grafana LLM app installed and configured with an AI provider
Grafana MCP tools, either through the built-in Grafana MCP integration or an external mcp-grafana deployment
Grafana permissions for the users and service accounts that will run investigations or approve writes

For self-hosted Grafana deployments using managed service accounts, enable the relevant Grafana feature toggles:

environment:
  - GF_FEATURE_TOGGLES_ENABLE=externalServiceAccounts
  - GF_AUTH_MANAGED_SERVICE_ACCOUNTS_ENABLED=true

Grafana Cloud users generally do not need this self-hosted service-account configuration.

MCP Setup

Recommended: Built-In Grafana MCP

Open Administration -> Plugins and data -> Plugins -> Ask O11y -> Configuration.
Go to the MCP tab.
Enable Use Built-in Grafana MCP.
Open Manage tools to choose which Grafana tools the agent may use.
Save the MCP settings.

The built-in Grafana MCP path is best for simple single-org deployments.

Multi-Org Or Custom Tools: External MCP

Use an external mcp-grafana sidecar when you need multi-org behavior, explicit org headers, custom auth, or additional MCP servers.

Deploy mcp-grafana and point it at your Grafana instance.
Add the server in the MCP settings tab.
Choose streamable-http.
Add secure headers only through plugin settings.
Mark servers as trusted only when you control them.
Save and verify the health status.

Configuration Highlights

General: LLM token budget, kiosk mode, chat panel placement.
Agent Runtime: workflow version, approval policy, max parallel tool calls, eval capture.
MCP: built-in Grafana MCP, external servers, trusted-server controls, secure headers, tool selection.
Service Graph: Graphiti status, topology scan interval, graph build action, max node and edge limits.
Prompts: system, investigation, and performance prompt templates.

Unsaved changes are shown per settings tab so admins know exactly what still needs to be saved.

High Availability

Ask O11y supports Grafana OSS and does not require Grafana Enterprise for the chat workflow. For multiple Grafana replicas, configure Redis in the Ask O11y plugin provisioning:

apps:
  - type: consensys-asko11y-app
    org_id: 1
    jsonData:
      useBuiltInMCP: true
    secureJsonData:
      redisURL: redis://redis:6379/0

Redis shares sessions, detached agent runs, share metadata, rate limits, and approval coordination between replicas. If Redis is not configured, in-memory state is local to each Grafana process and users may intermittently see Agent detached request failed (404): session not found when load balancing sends related requests to different replicas.

Sticky sessions are an acceptable short-term mitigation, but Redis is the recommended production configuration. See deploy/helm/ in the repository for Grafana Helm chart examples and optional Graphiti MCP wiring.

Alert Investigation Links

Add Ask O11y investigation links to Grafana alert notifications for one-click RCA:

/a/consensys-asko11y-app?type=investigation&alertName={alertName}

Operators can jump from an alert to a guided investigation, then return to Grafana context such as dashboards, Explore, Alerting, and incident views.

Security And Operations

Secrets belong in secureJsonData, never in the browser.
Plugin settings use Grafana-managed configuration.
Grafana RBAC controls access to read, run, approve, write, memory, and settings actions.
Tool risk policy separates read-only, write, destructive, untrusted, and externally communicating tools.
Agent observability can be captured through run traces, tool errors, approval waits, and eval results.

Troubleshooting

See TROUBLESHOOTING.md for help with Grafana Cloud, self-hosted deployment, permissions, MCP connection issues, service accounts, and common plugin problems.

Support

GitHub Issues
GitHub Discussions
Security issues: use GitHub Security Advisory for private disclosure

License

MIT License. See LICENSE.

Install on Grafana Cloud

Plugins can be installed directly from within your Grafana instance or automated using the Cloud API or Terraform.

Learn more about plugin installation

For more information, visit the docs on plugin installation.

Changelog

All notable changes to the Ask O11y Grafana plugin will be documented in this file.

The format is based on Keep a Changelog, and this project adheres to Semantic Versioning.

0.2.36 (2026-06-09)

Bug Fixes

backend: add prompt guardrails (#144) (a6f0aaa)
feedback UX quick wins, run-plan cleanup, and topology improvements (#143) (61d5515)

0.2.34 (2026-06-03)

Bug Fixes

agent: remove legacy runtime mode and always emit structured agent events

0.2.32 (2026-06-01)

Bug Fixes

chat: collapse evidence details by default and complete run progress on terminal events

0.2.31 (2026-06-01)

Bug Fixes

agent: make approve-for-session tool grants session-scoped
chat: collapse run progress details behind an expandable progress bar

0.2.30 (2026-05-29)

Bug Fixes

agent: coordinate approval decisions through Redis across Grafana replicas
llm: add retry, auto fallback, and safe diagnostics for Grafana LLM 500s

0.2.29 (2026-05-29)

Features

agent: add approval-gated agent runtime, run traces, eval routes, model routing, and MCP risk classification
config: rework plugin settings into Grafana-native tabs with MCP, service graph, prompt, runtime, and unsaved-change controls
docs: refresh Marketplace README and screenshots with real dev-instance captures

0.2.28 (2026-05-21)

Features

chat: add model selection for chat runs (#141) (705ddcd)

0.2.27 (2026-05-18)

Bug Fixes

frontend: scope plugin styles and use theme font size (#139) (b8655f9)

0.2.26 (2026-05-13)

Bug Fixes

frontend: remove React 19 validator warnings (#136) (0b674fb)

0.2.25 (2026-05-13)

Bug Fixes

ui: address Grafana review feedback (#134) (0eca65d)

0.2.24 (2026-05-11)

Bug Fixes

address Grafana release blockers (#130) (d345ac9)

0.2.23 (2026-05-04)

Features

mcp: per-server tool selection UI (#129) (7a2a969)

0.2.22 (2026-04-21)

Features

backend: add graphiti knowledge graph integration (#119) (835c040)
backend: anti-hallucination safeguards and mcp transport retries (#122) (04b0f11)

Bug Fixes

backend: inject real datasource UIDs and discover list_datasources tool dynamically (#125) (bb0993c)
mcp: unblock streamable-http transport behind OAuth/CF gateways (#123) (b1ead68)

0.2.21 (2026-04-07)

Bug Fixes

use http client from grafana sdk everywhere (#115) (d35f851)

0.2.20 (2026-04-02)

Features

viz: more trace viz and fix todays new vuln (#113) (b806658)

0.2.19 (2026-04-01)

Features

viz: improve visualizations (#109) (fee8e28)

0.2.18 (2026-03-30)

Features

chat: tighten investigation and multi-turn agent prompts (#102) (f9fd9ab)

Bug Fixes

viz: resolve datasources by Grafana default and optional ds uid (#105) (34ef96d)

[Unreleased]

Fixed

viz: resolve Prometheus, Loki, and Tempo datasources like Grafana defaults (and optional ds UID on code fences) instead of hardcoded names (#104)

0.2.17 (2026-03-13)

Features

add attestation to artifact (#2) (99b0a07)
add custom loader with style (#17) (5b4abcc)
add Right Side Panel (#3) (9bbf7c7)
agent: server-side agentic loop with detached execution and E2E test consolidation (#46) (c5fbe29)
agent: use alert runbook annotation during investigation (#57) (3f1bc5d)
backend: move agent loop logic server-side with template system and PromptEditor UI (#53) (f50ff9a)
chat: add alert investigation mode for one-click RCA (#29) (a0f129e)
chat: add OTEL tracing and Tempo to the agent loop (#82) (4037b68)
config: store MCP server headers and Redis URL in secureJsonData (#86) (1038a49)
get ready for first release (#1) (bdd4c98)
store sessions in the backend (#6) (4825a8e)
use scene for split view (#15) (62a8f4b)

Bug Fixes

add orgID to share urls (#18) (b08a530)
allow plugin signing (a52542c)
allow signing (a6e75ad)
backend: address Grafana review feedback for Go code quality (#64) (57b42f1)
backend: fix unreliable session history in multi-replica Grafana deployments (#69) (876e939)
backend: make SA token fetch non-fatal and sanitize HTTP error messages (#90) (9c14ba6)
build: filter node_modules from Go manifest (#71) (881d928)
chat: add SSE idle timeout and allow new chat during generation (#62) (954437c)
chat: fix autoscroll not triggering after user scrolls up (#78) (4d4c618)
ci: add fast-pass for release-please PRs (49de748)
ci: add workflow_dispatch trigger (75c59b4)
ci: allow 'main' scope for release-please PRs (7aa127b)
ci: make release-please PRs mergeable by skipping CI for non-code changes (#35) (73b1bea)
ci: remove package.json from paths filter (05ab8b4)
config: enhance claude setup (7d76956)
deps: pin flatted to 3.3.3 to exclude Go files from manifest (#75) (c458ef4)
mcp: namespace mcp-tool-settings localStorage key with plugin ID (#83) (a1e8eef)
plugin: change per-request MCP log statements from Info to Debug (#84) (dd8f4a3)
release: use PAT for release-please and skip GitHub Release creation (#37) (fc6014a)
release: use simple tag format (v0.2.5 not ask-o11y-plugin-v0.2.5) (e84de65)
share banner and limit tabs (#19) (51b491d)
side panel disappearing after each new question (#16) (527287d)
side-panel: open panel when links appear after session load or hard refresh (#79) (fb4d87d)
ui: remove all console.* calls from shipped frontend code (#91) (61f59a1)
ui: replace hardcoded colors and fixed pixel widths with Grafana theme abstractions (#87) (5f64b38)
ui: resolve chat UX issues and frontend code quality (#66) (5ec62dc)
version (#28) (0f9b584)

Reverts

restore skip-github-release in release-please config (#73) (911b72f)

0.2.16 (2026-03-13)

Bug Fixes

allow plugin signing (a52542c)
allow signing (a6e75ad)

0.2.15 (2026-03-12)

Bug Fixes

backend: make SA token fetch non-fatal and sanitize HTTP error messages (#90) (9c14ba6)
ui: remove all console.* calls from shipped frontend code (#91) (61f59a1)

0.2.14 (2026-03-11)

Features

chat: add OTEL tracing and Tempo to the agent loop (#82) (4037b68)
config: store MCP server headers and Redis URL in secureJsonData (#86) (1038a49)

Bug Fixes

chat: add SSE idle timeout and allow new chat during generation (#62) (954437c)
mcp: namespace mcp-tool-settings localStorage key with plugin ID (#83) (a1e8eef)
plugin: change per-request MCP log statements from Info to Debug (#84) (dd8f4a3)
ui: replace hardcoded colors and fixed pixel widths with Grafana theme abstractions (#87) (5f64b38)

0.2.13 (2026-03-09)

Bug Fixes

chat: fix autoscroll not triggering after user scrolls up (#78) (4d4c618)
side-panel: open panel when links appear after session load or hard refresh (#79) (fb4d87d)

0.2.12 (2026-03-06)

Bug Fixes

deps: pin flatted to 3.3.3 to exclude Go files from manifest (#75) (c458ef4)

0.2.11 (2026-03-06)

Bug Fixes

build: filter node_modules from Go manifest (#71) (881d928)

Reverts

restore skip-github-release in release-please config (#73) (911b72f)

0.2.10 (2026-03-04)

Bug Fixes

backend: fix unreliable session history in multi-replica Grafana deployments (#69) (876e939)

0.2.9 (2026-03-03)

Features

agent: use alert runbook annotation during investigation (#57) (3f1bc5d)

Bug Fixes

backend: address Grafana review feedback for Go code quality (#64) (57b42f1)
ui: resolve chat UX issues and frontend code quality (#66) (5ec62dc)

0.2.8 (2026-02-18)

Features

backend: move agent loop logic server-side with template system and PromptEditor UI (#53) (f50ff9a)

0.2.7 (2026-02-14)

Features

agent: server-side agentic loop with detached execution and E2E test consolidation (#46) (c5fbe29)

Bug Fixes

config: enhance claude setup (7d76956)

0.2.6 (2026-02-06)

Features

add attestation to artifact (#2) (99b0a07)
add custom loader with style (#17) (5b4abcc)
add Right Side Panel (#3) (9bbf7c7)
chat: add alert investigation mode for one-click RCA (#29) (a0f129e)
get ready for first release (#1) (bdd4c98)
store sessions in the backend (#6) (4825a8e)
use scene for split view (#15) (62a8f4b)

Bug Fixes

add orgID to share urls (#18) (b08a530)
ci: add fast-pass for release-please PRs (49de748)
ci: add workflow_dispatch trigger (75c59b4)
ci: allow 'main' scope for release-please PRs (7aa127b)
ci: make release-please PRs mergeable by skipping CI for non-code changes (#35) (73b1bea)
ci: remove package.json from paths filter (05ab8b4)
release: use PAT for release-please and skip GitHub Release creation (#37) (fc6014a)
release: use simple tag format (v0.2.5 not ask-o11y-plugin-v0.2.5) (e84de65)
share banner and limit tabs (#19) (51b491d)
side panel disappearing after each new question (#16) (527287d)
version (#28) (0f9b584)

0.2.5 (2026-02-06)

Features

add attestation to artifact (#2) (99b0a07)
add custom loader with style (#17) (5b4abcc)
add Right Side Panel (#3) (9bbf7c7)
chat: add alert investigation mode for one-click RCA (#29) (a0f129e)
get ready for first release (#1) (bdd4c98)
store sessions in the backend (#6) (4825a8e)
use scene for split view (#15) (62a8f4b)

Bug Fixes

add orgID to share urls (#18) (b08a530)
ci: add fast-pass for release-please PRs (49de748)
ci: add workflow_dispatch trigger (75c59b4)
ci: allow 'main' scope for release-please PRs (7aa127b)
ci: make release-please PRs mergeable by skipping CI for non-code changes (#35) (73b1bea)
ci: remove package.json from paths filter (05ab8b4)
release: use simple tag format (v0.2.5 not ask-o11y-plugin-v0.2.5) (e84de65)
share banner and limit tabs (#19) (51b491d)
side panel disappearing after each new question (#16) (527287d)
version (#28) (0f9b584)

0.2.4 (2026-02-05)

Features

add attestation to artifact (#2) (99b0a07)
add custom loader with style (#17) (5b4abcc)
add Right Side Panel (#3) (9bbf7c7)
chat: add alert investigation mode for one-click RCA (#29) (a0f129e)
get ready for first release (#1) (bdd4c98)
store sessions in the backend (#6) (4825a8e)
use scene for split view (#15) (62a8f4b)

Bug Fixes

add orgID to share urls (#18) (b08a530)
ci: add fast-pass for release-please PRs (49de748)
ci: allow 'main' scope for release-please PRs (7aa127b)
share banner and limit tabs (#19) (51b491d)
side panel disappearing after each new question (#16) (527287d)
version (#28) (0f9b584)

0.1.0 - 2026-01-XX

Initial release of Ask O11y - AI-powered observability assistant for Grafana.

Added

Core Features

Natural Language Query Interface: Conversational AI assistant for querying metrics, logs, and traces
Real-time Streaming Responses: Live LLM responses with tool execution status updates
Interactive Visualizations: 8 chart types (time series, stats, gauge, table, pie, bar, heatmap, histogram)
On-the-fly Visualization Switching: Change chart types without re-running queries
Session Management: Persistent chat sessions with localStorage support
Quick Suggestions: Context-aware query suggestions based on Grafana environment

MCP Integration

Model Context Protocol Support: Integration with MCP servers for extensible tool capabilities
56+ Grafana Tools: Complete dashboard, datasource, alerting, and query management
Multiple Transport Types: Standard MCP, OpenAPI/REST, SSE streaming, HTTP streamable
Dynamic Tool Discovery: Automatic detection of available tools from configured MCP servers
Multi-server Aggregation: Proxy and aggregate tools from multiple MCP servers

Security & Access Control

Role-Based Access Control (RBAC): Admin/Editor full access (56 tools), Viewer read-only (45 tools)
Multi-tenant Organization Isolation: Secure data isolation per user, with sessions organized by organization
Grafana Permission Integration: Respects existing Grafana datasource permissions
Secure Credential Storage: Integration with Grafana's secure storage mechanisms

Visualization Features

Time Range Controls: Built-in time picker with common presets
Auto-refresh: Configurable intervals from 5 seconds to 1 hour
Query Export: Copy PromQL/LogQL/TraceQL queries to clipboard
Theme Support: Automatic light/dark theme integration
Expandable Charts: Full-screen chart analysis mode
Responsive Design: Mobile and desktop optimized layouts

Developer Experience

TypeScript: Strict type checking with comprehensive type definitions
React 18: Modern React with hooks and functional components
Tailwind CSS: Utility-first styling with Grafana theme integration
Go Backend: High-performance MCP proxy server
Comprehensive Testing: Unit tests (Jest), E2E tests (Playwright), Go tests
Hot Module Reload: Fast development workflow with webpack dev server

Data Source Support

Prometheus: PromQL query execution with metric visualization
Loki: LogQL query execution with log exploration
Tempo: TraceQL query execution with trace analysis
Generic Datasources: Query any Grafana datasource through natural language

Tool Categories

Datasource Operations: Query, list, test connectivity, health checks
Dashboard Management: Create, update, delete, search, star, snapshot
Alert Management: Configure alerts, silences, notification channels, contact points
Query Execution: Run queries with automatic visualization
Resource Discovery: Search and explore Grafana resources
Panel Operations: Manage dashboard panels and visualizations
Folder Management: Organize dashboards with folder operations
User Management: Query user information and permissions