{"id":731,"date":"2022-12-11T21:19:42","date_gmt":"2022-12-11T20:19:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/patrick-nagel.net\/blog\/?p=731"},"modified":"2022-12-12T08:52:16","modified_gmt":"2022-12-12T07:52:16","slug":"influxdb-newcomers-impressions","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/patrick-nagel.net\/blog\/archives\/731","title":{"rendered":"InfluxDB newcomer’s impressions"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Three weeks ago I’ve decided to use InfluxDB for some Smart Home data. Here is a short article about my impressions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Getting it to run on my home server was pretty easy:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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$ docker run --rm --name influxdb -d -p 8086:8086 \\<\/span><\/span>\n  --volume \/data\/influxdb\/influxdb2:\/var\/lib\/influxdb2 \\<\/span><\/span>\n  --volume \/data\/influxdb\/config.yml:\/etc\/influxdb2\/config.yml \\<\/span><\/span>\n  influxdb<\/span><\/span><\/code><\/pre><\/div>\n\n\n\n
Of course I first had to figure out these arguments, and how to get that config.yml, but it’s all rather well-documented here<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Once it was running, I started feeding in data from a Python script. That was also really easy, with the guided example directly from the InfluxDB web GUI. I’ve added the necessary code into a script that I already had running every minute  – the relevant portions are:<\/p>\n\n\n
Python code to publish data points into InfluxDB<\/span><\/summary>
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import<\/span> influxdb_client<\/span><\/span>\nfrom<\/span> influxdb_client <\/span>import<\/span> InfluxDBClient<\/span>,<\/span> Point<\/span>,<\/span> WritePrecision<\/span><\/span>\nfrom<\/span> influxdb_client<\/span>.<\/span>client<\/span>.<\/span>write_api <\/span>import<\/span> SYNCHRONOUS<\/span><\/span>\nimport<\/span> traceback<\/span>,<\/span> urllib3<\/span><\/span>\n<\/span>\ninfluxdb_token <\/span>=<\/span> os<\/span>.<\/span>getenv<\/span>(<\/span>'<\/span>InfluxDB_token<\/span>'<\/span>,<\/span> <\/span>''<\/span>)<\/span><\/span>\ninfluxdb_org <\/span>=<\/span> os<\/span>.<\/span>getenv<\/span>(<\/span>'<\/span>InfluxDB_org<\/span>'<\/span>,<\/span> <\/span>''<\/span>)<\/span><\/span>\ninfluxdb_url <\/span>=<\/span> os<\/span>.<\/span>getenv<\/span>(<\/span>'<\/span>InfluxDB_URL<\/span>'<\/span>,<\/span> <\/span>'<\/span>http:\/\/localhost:8086<\/span>'<\/span>)<\/span><\/span>\nlogger_version <\/span>=<\/span> <\/span>"<\/span>1<\/span>"<\/span><\/span>\n<\/span>\n# 'device' is populated by the PyViCare library that accesses<\/span><\/span>\n# my heating system's API - something for another blog post ;)<\/span><\/span>\nt <\/span>=<\/span> device<\/span>.<\/span>asFuelCell<\/span>()<\/span><\/span>\n<\/span>\ninfo <\/span>=<\/span> <\/span>{<\/span><\/span>\n    <\/span>"<\/span>FuelCellPowerProductionCurrent<\/span>"<\/span>:<\/span> <\/span>float<\/span>(<\/span>t<\/span>.<\/span>getFuelCellPowerProductionCurrent<\/span>()),<\/span><\/span>\n    <\/span>"<\/span>FuelCellPowerPurchaseCurrent<\/span>"<\/span>:<\/span> <\/span>float<\/span>(<\/span>t<\/span>.<\/span>getFuelCellPowerPurchaseCurrent<\/span>()),<\/span><\/span>\n    <\/span>"<\/span>FuelCellPowerSoldCurrent<\/span>"<\/span>:<\/span> <\/span>float<\/span>(<\/span>t<\/span>.<\/span>getFuelCellPowerSoldCurrent<\/span>()),<\/span><\/span>\n    <\/span>"<\/span>HotWaterStorageTemperatureBottom<\/span>"<\/span>:<\/span> <\/span>float<\/span>(<\/span>t<\/span>.<\/span>getHotWaterStorageTemperatureBottom<\/span>()),<\/span><\/span>\n    <\/span>"<\/span>HotWaterStorageTemperatureTop<\/span>"<\/span>:<\/span> <\/span>float<\/span>(<\/span>t<\/span>.<\/span>getHotWaterStorageTemperatureTop<\/span>())<\/span><\/span>\n}<\/span><\/span>\n<\/span>\nclient <\/span>=<\/span> influxdb_client<\/span>.<\/span>InfluxDBClient<\/span>(<\/span>url<\/span>=<\/span>influxdb_url<\/span>,<\/span> <\/span>token<\/span>=<\/span>influxdb_token<\/span>,<\/span> <\/span>org<\/span>=<\/span>influxdb_org<\/span>)<\/span><\/span>\nbucket<\/span>=<\/span>"<\/span>smarthome<\/span>"<\/span><\/span>\nwrite_api <\/span>=<\/span> client<\/span>.<\/span>write_api<\/span>(<\/span>write_options<\/span>=<\/span>SYNCHRONOUS<\/span>)<\/span><\/span>\n<\/span>\nfor<\/span> field <\/span>in<\/span> info<\/span>:<\/span><\/span>\n    point <\/span>=<\/span> <\/span>(<\/span><\/span>\n    <\/span>Point<\/span>(<\/span>"<\/span>heating<\/span>"<\/span>)<\/span><\/span>\n    <\/span>.<\/span>tag<\/span>(<\/span>"<\/span>logger_version<\/span>"<\/span>,<\/span> logger_version<\/span>)<\/span><\/span>\n    <\/span>.<\/span>field<\/span>(<\/span>field<\/span>,<\/span> info<\/span>[<\/span>field<\/span>])<\/span><\/span>\n    <\/span>)<\/span><\/span>\n    <\/span>try<\/span>:<\/span><\/span>\n        write_api<\/span>.<\/span>write<\/span>(<\/span>bucket<\/span>=<\/span>bucket<\/span>,<\/span> <\/span>org<\/span>=<\/span>influxdb_org<\/span>,<\/span> <\/span>record<\/span>=<\/span>point<\/span>)<\/span><\/span>\n        <\/span>print<\/span>(<\/span>'<\/span>- <\/span>'<\/span> <\/span>+<\/span> field<\/span>)<\/span><\/span>\n    <\/span>except<\/span> urllib3<\/span>.<\/span>exceptions<\/span>.<\/span>NewConnectionError <\/span>as<\/span> e<\/span>:<\/span><\/span>\n        <\/span>print<\/span>(<\/span>'<\/span>\\n<\/span>WARNING: InfluxDB seems to be down:<\/span>'<\/span>)<\/span><\/span>\n        <\/span>print<\/span>(<\/span>''<\/span>.<\/span>join<\/span>(<\/span>traceback<\/span>.<\/span>format_exception<\/span>(<\/span>None<\/span>,<\/span> e<\/span>,<\/span> e<\/span>.<\/span>__traceback__<\/span>)))<\/span><\/span>\n        <\/span>break<\/span><\/span>\n    <\/span>except<\/span> <\/span>Exception<\/span> <\/span>as<\/span> e<\/span>:<\/span><\/span>\n        <\/span>print<\/span>(<\/span>'<\/span>\\n<\/span>WARNING: Could not submit <\/span>'<\/span> <\/span>+<\/span> field <\/span>+<\/span> <\/span>'<\/span> to InfluxDB:<\/span>'<\/span>)<\/span><\/span>\n        <\/span>print<\/span>(<\/span>''<\/span>.<\/span>join<\/span>(<\/span>traceback<\/span>.<\/span>format_exception<\/span>(<\/span>None<\/span>,<\/span> e<\/span>,<\/span> e<\/span>.<\/span>__traceback__<\/span>)))<\/span><\/span>\n        <\/span>pass<\/span><\/span><\/code><\/pre><\/div>\n\n<\/div><\/details><\/div>\n\n\n
Et voil\u00e0, my first queries with Data Explorer within InfluxDB returned results:<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\"\"<\/a>
Using InfluxDB’s Data Explorer<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
After a bit of customizing and then saving the query on a dashboard, I have very beautiful graphs of the data, and so far it has been running very stable and reliably.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
However there are two things that started to bother me, namely:<\/p>\n\n\n\n