Trend graphing - How to enrich data visualisation

[fmrapid]

Most graphs today are composed of two input values. An X axis and a Y axis. The dot is the intersection of the two values.

The question is how to enrich this data to be more informative.

The key is transforming the simple dot into a function based on a third or more inputs.

This additional data can be represented in the following forms:

• Colour of the area below the dot. (See Tobi Oetiker's Smokeping)
• Colour of the dot.
• Colour of the line between two dots.
• Size of the dot. (See ZBXNEXT-522)
• Format of the dot (diamond, dot, square, star, etc.)

One of these concepts is used in the context of Maps in the wonderful patch ZBXNEXT-522. By making the size of the background image a function of the number of hosts that are behind each displayed icon.

Methods of displaying data

1. One method of displaying additionnal data that is available today, is graphing on the Y-Axis on the positive and negative so that two sets of values can be compared (Example, IN Octets MAX and AVG on the positive Y axis and OUT Octets MAX and AVG on the negative Y axis.)
   
2. Another method that is currently used by Zabbix is the vertical background that is filled in with a colour to specify if a trigger has fired.
   
3. Another method that is not currently used is making use of automatic confidence bands to show expected data value areas. This is used for anomaly detection in data. See Holt-Winter forecasting in RRDTool. Having zabbix pre-calculate this would be very useful instead of having to build it all by hand using computed values (eck. if it is even possible)

The point of this post is for developers to think beyond the dot.

I will be submitting a feature request for the colour of the dot and area under the dot to be colour differently to represent a new function or value.

Please post use cases where this functionality in the graphing engine would be beneficial.

Cheers,

fmrapid

[ericgearhart]

These features would enable Smoke ping-like graphs in Zabbix similar to Cacti's

I know I'm "necroing" a year old thread, but the biggest thing that would come from adding the features you described would be the possibility of porting Cacti's 'Advanced Ping' graphs to Zabbix.

These types of graphs honestly kick ass for diagnosing network latency and loss problems... notice in the following image the way the latency and loss are seamlessly represented.

Here's an example of Cacti's "smokeping look-alike" graphs: