Managed Service for Prometheus:Import data from open-source Prometheus through remote write

How it works

1. Your self-managed Prometheus server scrapes targets and stores metrics locally.

2. The remote_write section in prometheus.yml sends a copy of every scraped sample to the Managed Service for Prometheus endpoint over HTTP.

3. Managed Service for Prometheus ingests the data. You can then query it through dashboards in the built-in console.

The remote write endpoint does not support HTTP/2.

Prerequisites

Before you begin, make sure that you have:

• A Managed Service for Prometheus instance. See the Create a Prometheus instance section of the Manage Prometheus instances topic

• An AccessKey pair (AccessKey ID and AccessKey secret) for an Alibaba Cloud account or a RAM user with the required permissions. See Obtain an AccessKey pair

• Open-source Prometheus installed on a server that can reach the remote write endpoint. See Prometheus downloads

Quick start

Add the following remote_write block to your existing prometheus.yml and restart Prometheus:

remote_write:
  - url: "<remote-write-url>"
    basic_auth:
      username: "<accesskey-id>"
      password: "<accesskey-secret>"

For the full setup, follow the steps below.

Grant permissions to a RAM user (optional)

Skip this step if you use an Alibaba Cloud account AccessKey pair. If you use a Resource Access Management (RAM) user AccessKey pair instead, grant the RAM user full permissions on Application Real-Time Monitoring Service (ARMS) first.

1. Log on to the RAM console with an Alibaba Cloud account or as a RAM administrator.

2. In the left-side navigation pane, choose Permissions > Grants.

3. On the Permission page, click Grant Permission.

4. In the panel that appears, configure the following parameters:

   The AliyunARMSFullAccess policy grants full permissions on ARMS, including the ability to view, modify, and delete all instances managed in ARMS.

   Parameter	Description
   Resource Scope	Select a scope based on your requirements
   Principal	Select the RAM user
   Policy	Select AliyunARMSFullAccess

5. Click Grant permissions, then click Close.

Get the remote write URL

1. Log on to the Managed Service for Prometheus console.

2. In the left-side navigation pane, click Instances.

3. In the top navigation bar, select the region where your Prometheus instance resides. Find your instance and click Settings in the Actions column.

4. On the Settings tab, copy the remote write URL for importing data over the Internet or internal network.

   URL type	When to use
   Internet URL	Your self-managed Prometheus server is outside the Alibaba Cloud network
   Internal network URL	Your self-managed Prometheus server runs on an Alibaba Cloud ECS instance

   

Configure remote write in Prometheus

Add a remote_write section to your prometheus.yml file:

remote_write:
  - url: "<remote-write-url>"
    basic_auth:
      username: "<accesskey-id>"
      password: "<accesskey-secret>"

Replace the following placeholders with your actual values:

After you save the file, restart Prometheus to apply the configuration.

The basic_auth credentials are required for both Internet and internal network remote write URLs.

global:
  scrape_interval: 15s
  evaluation_interval: 15s

scrape_configs:
  - job_name: "prometheus"
    static_configs:
      - targets: ["localhost:9090"]

remote_write:
  - url: "<remote-write-url>"
    basic_auth:
      username: "<accesskey-id>"
      password: "<accesskey-secret>"

Verify the data import

After Prometheus restarts with the new configuration, verify that data is flowing to the managed instance:

1. Log on to the Managed Service for Prometheus console.

2. In the left-side navigation pane, click Instances.

3. Select the region of your instance, then click the instance name.

4. In the left-side navigation pane, click Dashboards. Open a dashboard and confirm that metrics from your self-managed Prometheus appear.

   It may take a few minutes for the first batch of metrics to appear after you restart Prometheus.

Production recommendations

remote_write:
  - url: "<remote-write-url>"
    basic_auth:
      username: "<accesskey-id>"
      password: "<accesskey-secret>"
    queue_config:
      max_samples_per_send: 1000
      max_shards: 200
      capacity: 2500

Troubleshooting

Related topics

• Use the remote read URL to query Managed Service for Prometheus data