2. Become an InfluxDB
Pro in 20 minutes
Michael Hall
Community Manager, InfluxData

3. This short taste of InfluxDB University will help you
master the key areas where users commonly struggle
when getting started with InfluxDB.
Michael Hall
Community Manager, InfluxData
Michael Hall leads the Developer Relations team at
InfluxData and is an open source software developer,
community manager and technology evangelist. He has
extensive experience in developing desktop and
web-based software in a large variety of languages and
frameworks, and contributes to a number of open
source projects and communities.
Become an InfluxDB Pro in 20
Minutes

4. Agenda
1. Working with InfluxDB
2. Building a data schema for success
3. Introduction to the Flux language
4. Getting the most out of your data
5. Going to the cloud with Edge Data Replication

5. Interfaces to InfluxDB

6. Graphical User Interface (GUI)

7. Command Line Interface (CLI)

8. Client Libraries

9. Flux VS Code Extension

10. Data Schema

11. Schema Elements
Measurement Tags
Timestamp
Field
Tag Set
ticker=AAPL
Measurement
stock_price,
Field Set
price=177.03
Timestamp
1234567890000000

12. Data Cardinality
Cardinality = Measurements * Tag Values

13. Tips for Managing Cardinality
• Use measurement names that reflect categories of data
• Limit the number of measurements per bucket
• Use tags for data you’re going to regularly filter on
• Avoid duplicating data in tags
• Avoid unbounded tag values

14. Flux Language

15. Function-based Processing
from(bucket: "stocks")
|> range(start: -1h)
|> filter(fn: (r) => r["_measurement"] == "stock_price")
|> filter(fn: (r) => r["ticker"] == "AAPL")
|> filter(fn: (r) => r["market"] == "NASDAQ")
|> filter(fn: (r) => r["_field"] == "price")
|> mean()
• Everything is a function
• Work on a stream of tables
• Data processed step by step
• Aggregates run once per-table
• Last result is returned

16. Column-Oriented Data

17. Compared to InfluxQL

18. Orchestrate Multiple Queries

19. Enrich with Outside Data
import "sql"
companyInfo = sql.from(
driverName: "postgres",
dataSourceName: "postgresql://username:password@localhost:5432",
query: "SELECT * FROM stock_names"
)
stockPrices = from(bucket: "stocks")
|> range(start: -1h)
|> filter(fn: (r) => r._measurement == "stock_prices")
join(tables: {metric: stockPrices, info: companyInfo}, on: ["ticker"])

20. Pushdown Patterns
• Executes on the storage layer
• Avoids moving data into memory
• Example:
from(bucket: "stocks")
|> range(start: -1h)
|> filter(fn: (r) => r["_measurement"] == "stock_price")
|> filter(fn: (r) => r["ticker"] == "AAPL")
|> window(every: 1m)
|> max()

21. Tips for Mastering Flux
• Think in columns not rows
• Save queries in variables to use different aggregations
• Use the Data Explorer to play around
• Use multiple yield( ) calls to output multiple results
• Learn pushdowns: from( ) |> range( ) |> filter( ) |> aggregate( )

22. Transforming and Alerting

23. Background Tasks
• Written in Flux
• Executed by InfluxDB
• Tasks can:
• Read
• Transform
• Write
• Repond

24. Downsampling

25. Check Notification
Endpoint
Alerting

26. Tips for Better Results
• Stagger Task times with offsets to spread compute load
• Use tasks.lastSuccess( ) for resiliency
• Understand Check schedule vs Notification schedule
• Use offsets to avoid scheduling conflicts
• Only notify on escalations
• Write Tasks for more complex alerting needs

27. Edge Data Replication

28. InfluxDB on the Edge and the Cloud
Bucket Queue
Bucket Queue
Flux
Disk

29. How it Works
Durable Flexible
No complex code Data @ Edge & Cloud
Native Queueing
Automatic

30. 2-Step Setup
API CLI
/api/v2/remotes influx remote [create,delete,list,update]
/api/v2/replications influx replication [create,delete,list,update]

31. Tips for Edge Architectures
• Combine with Downsampling Tasks
• Enrich with Edge Metadata
• Stack Multiple Edge Layers

32. Further Learning

33. In this talk we’ll learn about some of the biggest
challenges beginner Flux users face. We’ll also learn
about resources and tools that developers can take
advantage of to become a Flux Pro.
Anais Dotis-Georgiou
Lead Developer Advocate
Anais Dotis-Georgiou is a developer advocate at
InfluxData with a passion for making data beautiful
using data analytics, AI, and machine learning. She
takes the data that she collects and does a mix of
research, exploration, and engineering to translate the
data into something of function, value, and beauty.
Becoming a Flux Pro

34. InfluxDB University offers free live and self-paced training on:
Scan to explore the
course catalog
influxdbu.com
• InfluxDB
• Telegraf
• Flux

35. Time to Awesome Online Book
Available for free at
awesome.influxdata.com

36. Resources
Get started: influxdata.com/cloud
Forums: community.influxdata.com
Slack: influxcommunity.slack.com
Book: awesome.influxdata.com
Docs: docs.influxdata.com
InfluxDB University: influxdata.com/university

37. T H A N K Y O U