Panel editor

The panel editor is the full-screen page where you build one panel: you write its query, check the chart it draws, and set its title, units, colours and other options.

Use this page when you are adding a panel to a dashboard, or changing one that already exists, and want to know what each part of the editor does.

Open the editor

• A new panel: click New Panel on the dashboard, pick a panel type and click Add to …. See Add a panel.
• An existing panel: open the panel menu (⋮) and click Edit panel.
• From View mode: click Switch to Edit Mode. Any changes you made there come with you.

The editor has its own address, so you can bookmark it or send it to someone.

The editor at a glance

The page has a header across the top and three columns below it: your queries on the left, a live preview of the panel in the middle, and the panel settings on the right.

Header

1. Close (✕) takes you back to the dashboard. If you have unsaved changes, FuseScope asks first; see Save or discard.
2. Breadcrumb: where the panel lives, as dashboard › section › panel.
3. Unsaved Changes: appears as soon as you change anything, and goes away when you save or discard.
4. Time range, refresh and auto-refresh for the preview. Changing it here doesn’t change the dashboard’s time range.
5. Discard throws your changes away. It is greyed out while there is nothing to discard.
6. Switch to View Mode opens the panel full size on the dashboard, with your changes, but without saving them. It is only shown for panels that already exist.
7. Save changes saves the panel to the dashboard and takes you back to it.

Queries panel (left)

8. Queries and how many the panel has. The icon on its left folds the panel; see Make more room.
9. Query type: Builder, ClickHouse, PromQL or AI. See Query types.
10. A query card. Its header shows the query’s letter and what it reads, such as the metric name. See Query cards.
11. Run Query redraws the preview with your query. See Run the query.
12. Resize handle: drag it to make the Queries panel wider or narrower.

Preview (middle)

13. Preview: the panel exactly as it will look on the dashboard. The label on the right, such as Plotted with Query Builder, says which query type drew it.

Settings pane (right)

14. Title and Description of the panel. The description is shown when you hover the ⓘ next to the title on the dashboard.
15. Collapse all closes every settings section at once.
16. Fold the settings pane into a narrow rail.
17. Panel type, with Change to switch to another one. See Change the panel type.
18. A settings section. Click its name to open or close it. Closed sections show a short summary on the right, such as reqps · 2 decimals, so you can see the setting without opening it. See Panel settings.

Query types

The tabs at the top of the Queries panel choose how you write the query:

Tab	Use it to
Builder	Pick a source (metrics, logs or traces), a filter, an aggregation and a group by from lists. The best place to start. See Query builder.
ClickHouse	Write SQL against the ClickHouse tables yourself. See ClickHouse SQL and PromQL.
PromQL	Write a Prometheus query over metrics.
AI	The query builder set up for AI and LLM spans, the data behind AI Observability. It reads traces.

Each tab keeps its own query. The tab that is selected when you save is the one the panel uses. Switching tabs counts as a change, so Unsaved Changes appears.

Not every panel type takes every query type: a List panel, for example, only takes the builder on logs or traces. The type picker shows what each type accepts.

Query cards

On the Builder tab each query is a card, named with a letter: A, B, C… Only one card is open at a time, so the list stays short: click a closed card’s header to open it, and the open one closes.

The card header has:

• the arrow, to open or close the card;
• the eye, to hide the query: a hidden query still exists but is not drawn. Use it for a query that only feeds a formula;
• ⋯, with Clone (copy the query) and Delete. A panel’s only query can’t be deleted.

Inside the card, Source, Where (the filter) and Aggregation come first. Functions and Result are folded, with a summary next to them, such as None or legend. Open Result for Group By, Having, Order By, Limit and Legend format.

Below the cards, Add Query adds another query and Add Formula adds a formula that combines them, such as B / A * 100. On traces, Add Trace Matching finds traces whose spans match several queries. See Several queries and formulas.

Run the query

The preview does not redraw on every keystroke. When your query is ready:

• click Run Query at the bottom of the Queries panel, or
• press ⌘ + Enter (Ctrl + Enter on Windows and Linux).

The line next to the button says when the query last ran and how long it took, such as Last run 13:33:45 · 84 ms, or Not run yet. While a query runs, the button lets you cancel it.

Tip

Save changes saves the query as it is written, even if you haven’t run it. Run it first to check the chart.

Panel settings

The settings pane starts with Title and Description, then the display options in sections. Which sections you see depends on the panel type.

Section	What it sets
Visualization	Panel type; Time range: Global Time follows the dashboard, or pin the panel to its own range; Treat missing data as 0 (Time Series, Area Chart)
Formatting & Units	Unit and Decimal places; Column units for tables
Axes	Y axis soft min and max, and the Scale: Auto, Linear, Logarithmic or Symlog
Legend	Position, below or right of the chart; Series colors
Chart appearance	Line style, how points connect, area fill, Show points, and whether to connect or break the line on missing data
Buckets	Count, Width and Combine queries (Histogram)
Thresholds	A dashed line on charts, a colour for Number panels, or per-column colours for tables. The + on the section adds one
Context Links	Links on the panel, with a Label and a URL that can include variables as {{variable}}

Visualization starts open. Thresholds and Context Links start open when the panel already has some; the others start closed. At the bottom, Actions has Create alert, which starts an alert rule from the panel’s query. It isn’t offered for queries on the AI tab.

Change the panel type

Click Change next to Panel type. The Change panel type picker opens: the same tiles as the type picker, with the current type highlighted. Click a type to switch to it; the preview redraws straight away.

A type that can’t show your current query is greyed out; hover it for the reason, for example List doesn’t support metrics data. Change the query first, then the type.

Make more room

Both side panels fold away, so the preview can use the whole width.

• The Queries panel: click the icon left of Queries. It becomes a rail with:
  1. the button that unfolds it again;
  2. one letter per query and formula. Click a letter to unfold the panel with that query open;
  3. Run query (▷), so you can still run the query with the panel folded.
• The settings pane: click the icon right of Collapse all. It becomes a rail with: 4. the button that unfolds it again; 5. one icon per settings section. Hover an icon for its name, and click it to unfold the pane with only that section open.

FuseScope remembers the width of the Queries panel and which side panels are folded, in this browser, the next time you open the editor.

Save or discard

Any change, whether to a query, a setting, the title or the query tab, shows the Unsaved Changes badge in the header. Nothing reaches the dashboard until you save.

• Save changes saves the panel and takes you back to the dashboard, where the panel is scrolled into view. Panel saved confirms it.
• Discard asks Discard changes? first. Click Discard to throw your edits away and go back to the dashboard, or Keep editing to stay.
• Close (✕) does the same as Discard when there are unsaved changes, and simply closes the editor when there are none.
• Leaving the page another way, such as closing the browser tab, also warns you when there are unsaved changes.

On a locked dashboard, or if your role can’t edit it, Save changes is greyed out; hover it for the reason.

Add a panel

Click New Panel at the top of the dashboard, or Add panel in a section’s menu (⋮). The New panel picker opens on the right.

1. Search panel types narrows the tiles as you type.
2. Categories: All, Trends over time, Compare & rank, Distributions, Single values, Raw records and Documentation. Each shows how many types it has. Click one to see only those types.
3. Category headings group the tiles.
4. A tile: the type’s name and what it is for. Click it to select it.
5. Data chips: what the type can show. See What the chips mean.
6. New marks types that were added recently.
7. Add to … creates the panel and opens the panel editor. The button names where the panel goes.
8. The arrow next to it chooses another place.

What the chips mean

The chips on each tile tell you, before you pick, what data the type can draw and which query types it accepts:

Chip	Meaning
Metrics, logs & traces	The query builder can read any of the three
Logs & traces	The query builder can read logs or traces, not metrics
Metrics only	The query builder can only read metrics
PromQL	You can write the query in PromQL
ClickHouse	You can write the query in ClickHouse SQL
No PromQL	The type takes metrics, but only through the query builder, not PromQL
No query	The type shows no data, such as a Text panel

For example, Pie Chart shows Metrics, logs & traces, ClickHouse and No PromQL: build a metrics pie chart with the query builder, not with PromQL. Heatmap shows Metrics only, PromQL and ClickHouse.

Choose where the panel goes

On a dashboard with sections, the arrow next to the main button opens Add to section:

• Dashboard (root): the top level, outside any section;
• a section’s name, such as Golden signals;
• New section: type a name for a new section, created together with the panel.

The main button follows your choice: Add to Dashboard (root), Add to Golden signals, Add to new section. On a dashboard without sections it just reads Add panel. If you opened the picker from a section’s menu, that section is already chosen.

The new panel is not added to the dashboard until you click Save changes in the editor. If you discard, nothing is created.

Example: a first panel

1. Click New Panel, pick Time Series and click Add to Dashboard (root).
2. In the query card, set Source to Traces. The aggregation is count(), the number of spans.
3. Open Result, click Group By and pick service.name, to draw one line per service. In Legend format, enter {{service.name}}.
4. On the right, set Title to Spans per service.
5. Click Run Query. The preview shows one line per service.
6. Click Save changes.

Related

• Dashboards: the dashboard page, sections and the panel menu.
• Query builder: aggregations, group by and formulas.
• Dashboard variables: use $name in a panel’s query and title.
• Build your first dashboard: a step-by-step guide.