YAML configuration

Each configuration YAML file contains a list of configurations to be deployed.

A basic configuration YAML file looks like this:

1configs:
2- id: test-dashboard
3  type:
4    api: dashboard
5  config:
6    name: Test Dashboard
7    template: dashboard.json
8    parameters:
9      owner: Test User

As you can see, the top-level element is configs. Its value is a list of configurations. Each configuration requires the following fields: id, type, and config.

It's also possible to override values from config on the environment and environment-group level. For this, there exist the optional groupOverrides and environmentOverrides fields.

ID

The id field identifies a config within the configurations. It has to be unique for the same configType and project. So it's possible to have, for example, two dashboards with the same id in two different projects. Note that the field is only local to the Dynatrace Monaco CLI. It has nothing to do with the ID provided by the Dynatrace API. One important use case for this id is when using reference parameters.

Type

The type field defines the type of the Dynatrace configuration.

A type can be one of the supported Configuration types.

Type - API

An API type can be defined as:

1type:
2    api: dashboard

or in shorthand form as:

1type: dashboard

See the list of supported configuration types for all possible api values.

Type - Settings

Settings are defined by their schema, scope, and an optional schemaVersion.

A settings type can be defined as:

1type:
2    settings:
3      schema: builtin:tags.auto-tagging
4      scope: environment

The schema and schemaVersion are simply defined as text.

Scope parameter

The scope is a parameter and can be defined as either a value, reference, or environment parameter.

In the sample above, it's defined as a shorthand value parameter with the value of environment, creating a setting in the scope of the entire Dynatrace environment.

Because many settings are made in the scope of a Dynatrace entity, referencing another configuration's ID is a useful way of configuring entities after they've been created via the Dynatrace Monaco CLI.

In the sample below, a web application is configured, and then settings for this application are made.

1configs:
2- id: MyApp
3  type:
4    api: application-web
5  config:
6    name: My Sample Web Application
7    template: application.json
8- id: MyApp_RUMSettings
9  type:
10    settings:
11      schema: builtin:rum.web.enablement
12      scope:
13        type: reference
14        configType: application-web
15        configId: MyApp
16        property: id
17  config:
18    name: MyApp_RUMSettings
19    template: rum-settings.json

As you can see, the scope of the rum.web.enablement setting is a reference to the web application.

Type - Automation

Dynatrace Monaco CLI version 2.6.0+

An automation type can be defined as:

1type:
2  automation:
3    resource: workflow # or business-calendar, or scheduling-rule

Indicate the desired automation resource using the resource field. Keep in mind that each resource requires distinct OAuth permissions.

This example config.yaml file includes an automation configuration for workflow creation:

1type:
2  automation:
3    resource: workflow
4  config:
5  name: 'My first workflow managed by the Dynatrace Monaco CLI'
6  template: workflow.json

The API supports a query parameter called adminAccess that can be used to fetch all workflow resources on a given tenant, not only those bound to the user that was used to create the OAuth client.

To use this feature, the OAuth client needs to have the scope automation:workflows:admin configured.

By default, the Dynatrace Monaco CLI will try to use this flag when accessing the API. If it fails, the operation will be repeated without the flag, but you will only be able to access the workflows created by your own user.

Type - Bucket

Dynatrace Monaco CLI version 2.9.0+

A Bucket type can be defined as:

1type: bucket

Config

The config field offers the following fields:

Name

For API type

For configurations of type API, the name is used to identify configurations in a Dynatrace environment and ensure that they are updated when they already exist.

For this, the name needs to be used in the JSON template to fill the specific name property of the configuration. Usually, this is also just name, but for some configurations, this may differ; see the special cases described for JSON templates and refer to the API documentation if in doubt.

When downloading, names are automatically extracted and placed in the YAML for you.

When referencing the name in a JSON template, it needs to be used as is, with no additional text or characters around it.

The name property in JSON should always be used like this:

1"{{ .name }}"

If you encounter issues with configurations not being created several times instead of updated, check to make sure that your reference to the name does not contain any accidental spaces or other characters that make what is sent to Dynatrace in the JSON different from the name defined in the YAML.

For other configuration types

The name property isn't used to identify Dynatrace objects. Instead, the configuration's coordinate (a combination of project, type, and configuration ID) or originObjectId (if present) is used.

The name property can still be used and, for some types, is automatically extracted when downloading.

Skip

The skip field makes it possible to omit (skip) deployment of a certain configuration. If skip is set to true, the Dynatrace Monaco CLI will not deploy the configuration.

The skip field behaves like a parameter and can be defined as either a value or environment parameter. Usually, it's defined directly as a shorthand value as can be seen in several examples.

It's often useful in combination with environment overrides, where you want to deploy a configuration to one environment but exclude it from another.

Parameters

Parameters are used to provide values in configuration templates. They are defined as YAML objects with a type entry. This type then further decides how the parameter object is interpreted. One important property of parameters is that they are lazy: the value of a parameter is only evaluated if it's referenced by a configuration that is going to be deployed.

The following parameter types are available:

Value

The value parameter is the simplest form of a parameter. Besides the type property, it also requires the value property. You can define whatever you like as the value, even nested maps. This value is then accessible in the template file.

Because value parameters are the most common parameter type, there is a special short-form syntax to define them: you can simply provide the value if your parameter is neither an array nor a map.

For example:

1parameters:
2  threshold: 15
3  complexThreshold:
4    type: value
5    value:
6      amount: 15
7      unit: sec

In the template of this config, you could then access the threshold parameter via {{ .threshold }}. To access, for example, the amount of the complexThreshold, you could use {{ .complexThreshold.amount }}.

Environment

Parameters of type environment allow you to reference an environment variable. The name of the environment variable to reference is defined via a name property.

Example:

1parameters:
2  owner:
3    type: environment
4    name: OWNER
5    default: "-"
6  target:
7    type: environment
8    name: TARGET

In the above example:

Reference

Because it's often necessary to reference a property of another configuration, the Dynatrace Monaco CLI offers a special reference parameter that allows one configuration to depend on almost any parameter of another configuration.

To use the reference type parameter, provide the following required fields:

In the example below, the value of mz_id will be the Dynatrace object ID of the configuration of type management-zone with ID management-zone-config from the project-1 project:

1parameters:
2  mz_id:
3    type: reference
4    project: project-1
5    configType: management-zone # or builtin:management-zones if referencing "settings" type configurations
6    configId: management-zone-config
7    property: id

The Dynatrace Monaco CLI will make sure that the deployment of configuration is ordered and that the dependent config is deployed first.

If you configure a cycle of dependencies, the deployment will fail with an error.

Short notation

Because reference parameters are one of the most common parameter types, there is a special short-form syntax to define them as an array:

Note that in this case, no type is needed, as the type is inferred based on the syntax.

Partial references

It's possible to omit some reference fields. In this case, they will be filled with the same value as the current config.

Generally, you might want to use this for simplicities sake when referencing configuration within the same project - simply omit the field.

1parameters:
2  mz_id:
3    type: reference
4    configType: management-zone
5    configId: main
6    property: id

While it's possible to omit configType and even configId, note that you can only leave the upper-most level empty and can't leave a gap. So if configType is omitted, so must project.

Below you find a full sample (using shorthand references):

Compound

The compound parameter is a parameter composed of other parameters of the same config. This parameter requires two properties:

The format string can be any string. To use parameters in it, use the syntax {{ .parameter }}, where parameter is the name of the parameter to be filled in.

For example:

1parameters:
2  example:
3    type: compound
4    format: "{{ .greeting }} {{ .entity }}!"
5    references:
6      - greeting
7      - entity
8  greeting: "Hello"
9  entity: "World"

This would produce the value Hello World! for example. Compound parameters can also be used for more complex values, such as in the following example:

1parameters:
2  example:
3    type: compound
4    format: "{{ .resource.name }}: {{ .resource.percent }}%"
5    references:
6      - resource
7  progress:
8    type: value
9    value:
10      name: "Health"
11      percent: 40

This would produce the value Health: 40%, for example.

Even though referenced parameters can only be from the same config, by using the reference parameter, it's possible to make a compound parameter with other configs. This is also true for environment variables.

1parameters:
2  example:
3    type: compound
4    format: "{{ .user }}'s dashboard is {{ .status }}"
5    references:
6      - user
7      - status
8  user:
9    type: environment
10    name: USER_NAME
11  status:
12    type: reference
13    configType: dashboard
14    configId: dashboard
15    property: status

List

Parameters of type list allow you to define lists of value parameters. When written into a template, these are written as a JSON list surrounded by square brackets and separated by commas.

This type of parameter is generally useful when you require a simple list of things, such as emails or identifiers, that can be filled with any kind of value parameter.

For example:

1parameters:
2  recipients:
3    type: list
4    values:
5        - first.last@company.com
6        - someone.else@company.com
7  geolocations:
8    type: list
9    values: ["GEOLOCATION-1234567", "GEOLOCATION-7654321"]

As shown in the example above, you can define the list values either line by line or as an array in YAML.

1{
2   "emails": {{ .recipients }}
3}

This differs from the sometimes used string list in v1, for which the template needed to include square brackets (for example, "emails": [ {{ .recipients }} ]). When such lists are encountered when converting a v1 configuration, templates are automatically updated.

OriginObjectID

When using the Dynatrace Monaco CLI to download existing configurations from Dynatrace, the created YAML files contain an originObjectId for some configuration types.

This holds the ID of the specific Dynatrace object that was downloaded. It's used when the downloaded configuration is again deployed to the same Dynatrace environment to ensure that the existing object is correctly updated.

For example, an already existing Settings 2.0 object will be extended with the data used to correctly identify it.

Note that originObjectId is optional, and you generally don't need to care about it or modify it.

String escaping of config

In general, all YAML values are escaped before being added to a configuration uploaded to Dynatrace. This ensures that fully filled templates are valid JSON when uploading. Any newlines, special characters such as double quotes, and so on are escaped.

1parameters:
2    name: "Dev"
3    example1: "This is \\n already escaped"
4    example2: "This will \n be escaped"
5    example3: This "will" be escaped too
6    text: |
7        This will also
8        be escaped

Override configuration per environment

There are many cases in which a configuration is similar but not the same between environments. Examples:

To enable this, you can override values of configurations on an environment and environment-group level using the groupOverrides and environmentOverrides fields.

Both are generally defined in the same way, differing only in whether they're applied to a group or a single environment. You can define the group/environment name to target and any configuration properties to modify.

In the example below, a configuration gets some special configuration applied for two environments, and skip ensures that the configuration will not be deployed to the production-environments group:

1configs:
2- id: test-dashboard
3  type:
4    api: dashboard
5  config:
6    name: Test Dashboard
7    template: dashboard.json
8    parameters:
9      owner: Test User
10      content: "Some Text ..."
11  environmentOverrides:
12  - environment: dev-env-42
13    override:
14      name: Special Dev Dashboard
15      parameters:
16        content: "Some even better Text!"
17  - environment: staging-env-21
18    override:
19      name: Special Staging Dashboard
20      parameters:
21        content: "Some much better Text!"
22  groupOverrides:
23  - group: production-environments
24    override:
25      skip: true