docs(): added what new in v4 article and initial draf of alerting docs, #6490

docs/sources/alerting/alerting.md

-+++
-title = "Configuring Alert Rules"
-description = "Configuring Alert Rules"
-keywords = ["grafana", "alerting", "guide", "rules"]
-type = "docs"
-[menu.docs]
-name = "Alert Rules"
-parent = "alerting"
-weight = 1
-+++
-
-# Alert Rules
-
-> Alerting is only available in Grafana v4.0 and above.
-
-
-hk
-
-

docs/sources/alerting/rules.md

++++
+title = "Alerting Engine Rules Guide"
+description = "Configuring Alert Rules"
+keywords = ["grafana", "alerting", "guide", "rules"]
+type = "docs"
+[menu.docs]
+name = "Engine & Rules"
+parent = "alerting"
+weight = 1
++++
+
+# Alerting Engine & Rules Guide
+
+> Alerting is only available in Grafana v4.0 and above.
+
+## Introduction
+
+{{< imgbox max-width="40%" img="/img/docs/v4/drag_handles_gif.gif" caption="Alerting overview" >}}
+
+Alerting in Grafana allows you to attach rules to your graph panels. When you save the dashboard
+Grafana will extract the alert rules into a seperate alert rule storage and schedule them for evaluation.
+
+In the alert tab of the graph panel you can configure how often the alert rule should be evaluated
+and the conditions that need to be met for the alert to change state and trigger its
+[notifications]({{< relref "/notifications.md" >}}).
+
+## Execution
+
+The alert rules are evaluated in the Grafana backend in a scheduler and query execution engine that is part
+of core Grafana. We have not implemented clustering for this scheduler yet, so if you run multiple
+instances of grafana-server you have to make sure [execute_alerts]({{< relref "/installation/configuration.md#alerting" >}})
+is true on only one instance or otherwise you will get duplicated notifications.
+
+<div class="clearfix"></div>
+
+## Rule Config
+
+{{< imgbox max-width="40%" img="/img/docs/v4/alerting_conditions.png" caption="Alerting Conditions" >}}
+
+Currently only the graph panel supports alert rules but this will be added to the **Singlestat** and **Table**
+panels as well in a future release. The rule config allows you to specify a name, how often the rule
+should be evaluated and a series of conditions that all need to be true for the alert to fire.
+
+### Name & Evaluation interval
+
+Here you can specify the name of the alert rule and how often the scheduler should evaluate the alert rule.
+
+### Conditions
+
+Currently the only condition type that exists is a `Query` condition that allows you to
+specify a query letter, time range and an aggregation function. The letter refers to
+a query you already have added in the **Metrics** tab. The result from the query and the aggregation function is
+a single value that is then used in the threshold check. The query used in an alert rule cannot
+contain any template variables. Currently we only support `AND` operator between conditions.
+
+We plan to add other condition types in the future, like `Other Alert`, where you can include the state
+of another alert in your conditions, and `Time Of Day`.
+
+#### Multiple Series
+
+If a query returns multiple series then the aggregation function and threshold check will be evaluated for each series.
+What Grafana does not do currently is track alert rule state **per series**. This has implications that is exemplified
+in the scenario below.
+
+- Alert condition with query that returns 2 series: **server1** and **server2**
+- **server1** series cause the alert rule to fire and switch to state `Alerting`
+- Notifications are sent out with message:  _load peaking (server1)_
+- In a subsequence evaluation of the same alert rule the **server2** series also cause the alert rule to fire
+- No new notifications are sent as the alert rule is already in state `Alerting`.
+
+So as you can see from the above scenario Grafana will not send out notifications when other series cause the alert
+to fire if the rule already is in state ´Alerting`. To improve support for queries that return multiple series
+we plan to track state **per series** in a future release.
+
+### No Data / Null values
+
+Below you condition you can configure how the rule evaluation engine should handle queries that return no data or only null valued
+data.
+
+No Data Option | Description
+------------ | -------------
+NoData | Set alert rule state to `NoData`
+Alerting | Set alert rule state to `Alerting`
+Keep Last State | Keep the current alert rule state, what ever it is.
+
+### Execution errors or timeouts
+
+The last option is how to handle execution or timeout errors.
+
+Error or timeout option | Description
+------------ | -------------
+Alerting | Set alert rule state to `Alerting`
+Keep Last State | Keep the current alert rule state, what ever it is.
+
+If you an unreliable time series store that where queries sometime timesout or fail randomly you can set this option
+t `Keep Last State` to basically ignore them.
+
+## Troubleshooting
+
+{{< imgbox max-width="40%" img="/img/docs/v4/alert_test_rule.png" caption="Test Rule" >}}
+
+First level of troubleshooting you can do is hit the **Test Rule** button. You will get result back that you can expand
+to the point where you can see the raw data that was returned form your query.
+
+Further troubleshooting can also be done by inspecting the grafana-server log. If it's not an error or for some reason
+the log does not say anything you can enable debug logging for some relevant components. This is done
+in grafana's ini config file.
+
+Example showing loggers that could be relevant when troubleshooting alerting.
+
+```ini
+[log]
+filters = alerting.scheduler:debug \
+          alerting.engine:debug \
+          alerting.resultHandler:debug \
+          alerting.evalHandler:debug \
+          alerting.evalContext:debug \
+          alerting.extractor:debug \
+          alerting.notifier:debug \
+          alerting.notifier.slack:debug \
+          alerting.notifier.pagerduty:debug \
+          alerting.notifier.email:debug \
+          alerting.notifier.webhook:debug \
+          tsdb.graphite:debug \
+          tsdb.prometheus:debug \
+          tsdb.opentsdb:debug \
+          tsdb.influxdb:debug \
+```
+
+If you want to see raw query sent to Graphite and raw response in log you also have to set grafana.ini option `app_mode` to
+`development`.

docs/sources/guides/whats-new-in-v4.md

++++
+title = "What's New in Grafana v4.0"
+description = "Feature & improvement highlights for Grafana v4.0"
+keywords = ["grafana", "new", "documentation", "4.0"]
+type = "docs"
+[menu.docs]
+name = "Version 4.0"
+identifier = "v4.0"
+parent = "whatsnew"
+weight = -1
++++
+
+# What's New in Grafana v4.0
+
+As usual this release contains a ton of minor new features, fixes and improved UX. But on top of the usual new goodies
+is a core new feature: Alerting! Read on below for a detailed description of what's new in v4.0.
+
+## Alerting
+
+{{< imgbox max-width="40%" img="/img/docs/v4/drag_handles_gif.gif" caption="Alerting overview" >}}
+
+Alerting is a really revolutionary feature for Grafana. It transforms Grafana from a
+visualization tool into a truly mission critical monitoring tool. The alert rules are very easy to
+configure using your existing graph panels and threshold levels can be set simply by dragging handles to
+the right side of the graph. The rules will continually be evaluated by grafana-server and
+notifications will be sent out when the rule conditions are met.
+
+This feature has been worked on for over a year with many iterations and rewrites
+just to make sure the foundations are really solid. We are really proud to finally release it!
+Since the alerting execution is processed in the backend all data source plugins are not supported.
+Right now Graphite, Prometheus, InfluxDB and OpenTSDB are supported. Elasticsearch is being worked
+on but will be not ready for v4 release.
+
+<div class="clearfix"></div>
+
+### Rules
+
+{{< imgbox max-width="40%" img="/img/docs/v4/alerting_conditions.png" caption="Alerting Conditions" >}}
+
+The rule config allows you to specify a name, how often the rule should be evaluated and a series
+of conditions that all need to be true for the alert to fire.
+
+Currently the only condition type that exists is a `Query` condition that allows you to
+specify a query letter, time range and an aggregation function. The letter refers to
+a query you already have added in the **Metrics** tab. The result from the
+query and the aggregation function is a single value that is then used in the threshold check.
+
+We plan to add other condition types in the future, like `Other Alert`, where you can include the state
+of another alert in your conditions, and `Time Of Day`.
+
+### Notifications
+
+{{< imgbox max-width="40%" img="/img/docs/v4/slack_notification.png" caption="Alerting Slack Notification" >}}
+
+Alerting would not be very useful if there was no way to send notifications when rules trigger and change state. You
+can setup notifications of different types. We currently have `Slack`, `PagerDuty`, `Email` and `Webhook` with more in the
+pipe that will be added during beta period. The notifications can then be added to your alert rules.
+If you have configured an external image store in the grafana.ini config file (s3 and webdav options available)
+you can get very rich notifications with an image of the graph and the metric
+values all included in the notification.
+
+### Annotations
+
+Alert state changes are recorded in a new annotation store that is built into Grafana. This store
+currently only supports storing annotations in Grafana's own internal database (mysql, postgres or sqlite).
+The Grafana annotation storage is currently only used for alert state changes but we hope to add the ability for users
+to add graph comments in the form of annotations directly from within Grafana in a future release.
+
+### Alert List Panel
+
+{{< imgbox max-width="30%" img="/img/docs/v4/alert_list_panel.png" caption="Alert List Panel" >}}
+
+This new panel allows you to show alert rules or a history of alert rule state changes. You can filter based on states your
+interested in. Very useful panel for overview style dashboards.
+
+<div class="clearfix"></div>
+
+## Ad-hoc filter variable
+
+{{< imgbox max-width="30%" img="/img/docs/v4/adhoc_filters.gif" caption="Ad-hoc filters variable" >}}
+
+This is a new and very different type of template variable. It will allow you to create new key/value filters on the fly.
+With autocomplete for both key and values. The filter condition will be automatically applied to all
+queries that use that data source. This feature opens up more exploratory dashboards. In the gif animation to the right
+you have a dashboard for Elasticsearch log data. It uses one query variable that allow you to quickly change how the data
+is grouped, and an interval variable for controlling the granularity of the time buckets. What was missing
+was a way to dynamically apply filters to the log query. With the `Ad-Hoc Filters` variable you can
+dynamically add filters to any log property!
+
+## UX Improvements
+
+We always try to bring some UX/UI refinements & polish in every release.
+
+### TV-mode & Kiosk mode
+
+
+<div class="row">
+  <div class="medium-6 columns">
+    <p>
+      Grafana is so often used on wall mounted TVs that we figured a clean TV mode would be
+      really nice. In TV mode the top navbar, row & panel controls will all fade to transparent.
+    </p>
+
+    <p>
+      This happens automatically after one minute of user inactivity but can also be toggled manually
+      with the <code>d v</code> sequence shortcut. Any mouse movement or keyboard action will
+      restore navbar & controls.
+    </p>
+
+    <p>
+      Another feature is the kiosk mode. This can be enabled with <code>d k</code>
+      shortcut or by adding <code>&kiosk</code> to the URL when you load a dashboard.
+      In kiosk mode the navbar is completely hidden/removed from view.
+    </p>
+  </div>
+  <div class="medium-6 columns">
+   {{< lightboxhelper max-width="100%" img="/img/docs/v4/tvmode.png" caption="TV mode" >}}
+   <video width="320" height="240" controls>
+    <source src="/assets/videos/tvmode.mp4" type="video/mp4">
+    Your browser does not support the video tag.
+  </video>
+  </div>
+</div>
+
+### New row menu & add panel experience
+
+{{< imgbox max-width="50%" img="/img/docs/v4/add_panel.gif" caption="Add Panel flow" >}}
+
+We spent a lot of time improving the dashboard building experience. Trying to make it both
+more efficient and easier for beginners. After many good but not great experiments
+with a `build mode` we eventually decided to just improve the green row menu and
+continue work on a `build mode` for a future release.
+
+The new row menu automatically slides out when you mouse over the edge of the row. You no longer need
+to hover over the small green icon and the click it to expand the row menu.
+
+There is some minor improvements to drag and drop behaviour. Now when dragging a panel from one row
+to another you will insert the panel and Grafana will automatically make room for it.
+When you drag a panel within a row you will simply reorder the panels.
+
+If you look at the animation to the right you can see that you can drag and drop a new panel. This is not
+required, you can also just click the panel type and it will be inserted at the end of the row
+automatically. Dragging a new panel has an advantage in that you can insert a new panel where ever you want
+not just at the end of the row.
+
+We plan to further improve dashboard building in the future with a more rich grid & layout system.
+
+### Keyboard shortcuts
+
+{{< imgbox max-width="40%" img="/img/docs/v4/shortcuts.png" caption="Shortcuts" >}}
+
+Grafana v4 introduces a number of really powerful keyboard shortcuts. You can now focus a panel
+by hovering over it with your mouse. With a panel focused you can simple hit `e` to toggle panel
+edit mode, or `v` to toggle fullscreen mode. `p r` removes the panel. `p s` opens share
+modal.
+
+Some nice navigation shortcuts are:
+
+- `g h` for go to home dashboard
+- `s s` open search with starred pre-selected
+- `s t` open search in tags list view
+
+<div class="clearfix"></div>
+
+## Upgrade & Breaking changes
+
+There are no breaking changes. Old dashboards and features should work the same. Grafana-server will automatically upgrade it's db
+schema on restart. It's advisable to do a backup of Grafana's database before updating.
+
+If your are using plugins make sure to update your plugins as some might not work perfectly v4.
+
+You can update plugins using grafana-cli
+
+    grafana-cli plugins update-all
+
+## Changelog
+
+Checkout the [CHANGELOG.md](https://github.com/grafana/grafana/blob/master/CHANGELOG.md) file for a complete list
+of new features, changes, and bug fixes.
+

docs/sources/installation/configuration.md

@@ -601,7 +601,15 @@ secret key. ex AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA
 
 
 ### url
 ### url
 Url to where Grafana will send PUT request with images
 Url to where Grafana will send PUT request with images
+
 ### username
 ### username
 basic auth username
 basic auth username
+
 ### password
 ### password
 basic auth password
 basic auth password
+
+## [alerting]
+
+### execute_alerts = true
+
+Makes it possible to turn off alert rule execution.