The right way to disable Grafana in Gitlab 16.3 Omnibus · Ponderings of an Andy

Introduction

I proceed to like my self hosted occasion of GitLab. I sit up for the twenty second of each month to drag down the
latest dot replace and luxuriate in the brand new options. As with every piece of software program, issues get deprecated and finally disabled over
time.

In 16.3 – launched in August 2023 – the model of Grafana bundled with the self hosted model of GitLab reached the
finish of it is depreciation window and was disabled. GitLab added a test to forestall an replace if it was nonetheless enabled.

Symptom

When performing an apt replace, GitLab 16.3 will error out if Grafana remains to be enabled in your occasion. The error seems to be like this:

Making ready to unpack .../gitlab-ee_16.3.0-ee.0_amd64.deb ...
* grafana[enable] has been deprecated since 16.0 and was eliminated in 16.3. The bundled Grafana is deprecated and no longer out there. We recommond following
https://docs.gitlab.com/ee/administration/monitoring/efficiency/grafana_configuration.html#deprecation.
Deprecations discovered. Please appropriate them and strive once more.

The Drawback

The documentation linked offers 4 steps to comply with

To change away from bundled Grafana to a more recent model of Grafana from Grafana Labs:

1. Arrange a model of Grafana from Grafana Labs.
2. Export the present dashboards from bundled Grafana.
3. Import the present dashboards within the new Grafana occasion.
4. Configure GitLab to make use of the brand new Grafana occasion.

I’ve eliminated the hyperlinks in steps 2 and three, as a result of they actually do not matter for this write up. Step 1 doesn’t have a hyperlink, so it is left as
and excercise to the person to put in Grafana of their atmosphere. Step 4, hyperlinks to a different article that gives a number of extra steps to comply with.

1. On the left sidebar, broaden the top-most chevron.
2. Choose Admin Space.
3. On the left sidebar, choose Settings > Metrics and profiling and broaden Metrics – Grafana.
4. Choose the Add a hyperlink to Grafana checkbox.
5. Configure the Grafana URL. Enter the complete URL of the Grafana occasion.
6. Choose Save adjustments.

And that is it. That is the set of directions offered by GitLab. Observe these, rerun your apt replace and you will run into the identical symptom.

Resolution

The lacking step is hinted at within the error message itself: grafana[enable] has been deprecated

This can be a setting within the GitLab configuration file. You will have to edit the config file and set the worth to false.

1. Edit /and many others/gitlab/gitlab.rb (or acceptable path)

2. Edit the grafana[enable] worth to be false. On my config this was on line 1689, however I like to recommend you seek for the string grafana to search out it.

   grafana['enable'] = false

3. Reconfigure GitLab by operating gitlab-ctl reconfigure. Let this run and it ought to finish with gitlab Reconfigured!

4. Now you can resume the apt replace that failed attributable to having Grafana enabled.

As soon as carried out, you’ll get the usual GitLab improve full message and you will be good to go.

Studying unsupported config worth grafana.

Replace: July 2024, GitLab 17.1

Within the GitLab 17.1 replace from June 2024, Grafana has been utterly eliminated. Should you nonetheless have grafana keys within the config file upon updating to 17.1, the improve will fail with

Mixlib::config::unknownconfigoptionerror: Studying unsupported config worth grafana.

The answer to that is to edit /and many others/gitlab/gitlab.rb and remark out (or take away totally) all strains that begin with grafana. As soon as that is carried out, save the file and try the improve once more. Like when it was initially deprecated, this step will finish with gitlab Reconfigured.