Trickster is an HTTP reverse proxy/cache and query accelerator for time series databases. Trickster dramatically improves dashboard chart rendering times for end users, while eliminating redundant computations on the TSDBs it fronts. In short, Trickster makes read-heavy Dashboard/TSDB environments, as well as those with highly-cardinalized datasets, significantly more performant and scalable.
Trickster works with virtually any Dashboard application that makes queries to any of these TSDB's:
Prometheus
InfluxDB
Circonus IRONdb
Most dashboards request from a time series database the entire time range of data they wish to present, every time a user's dashboard loads, as well as on every auto-refresh. Trickster's Delta Proxy inspects the time range of a client query to determine what data points are already cached, and requests from the tsdb only the data points still needed to service the client request. This results in dramatically faster chart load times for everyone, since the tsdb is queried only for tiny incremental changes on each dashboard load, rather than several hundred data points of duplicative data.
When Trickster requests data from a tsdb, it adjusts the clients's requested time range slightly to ensure that all data points returned are aligned to normalized step boundaries. For example, if the step is 300s, all data points will fall on the clock 0's and 5's. This ensures that the data is highly cacheable, is conveyed visually to users in a more familiar way, and that all dashboard users see identical data on their screens.
Trickster's Fast Forward feature ensures that even with step boundary normalization, real-time graphs still always show the most recent data, regardless of how far away the next step boundary is. For example, if your chart step is 300s, and the time is currently 1:21p, you would normally be waiting another four minutes for a new data point at 1:25p. Trickster will break the step interval for the most recent data point and always include it in the response to clients requesting real-time data.
Docker images are available on Docker Hub:
$ docker run --name trickster -d -v /path/to/trickster.conf:/etc/trickster/trickster.conf -p 0.0.0.0:9090:9090 tricksterio/trickster
See the 'deploy' Directory for more information about using or creating Trickster docker images.
See the 'deploy' Directory for both Kube and Helm deployment files and examples.
To build Trickster from the source code yourself you need to have a working Go environment with version 1.9 or greater installed.
You can directly use the go tool to download and install the trickster
binary into your GOPATH:
$ go get github.com/Comcast/trickster
$ trickster -origin http://prometheus.example.com:9090
You can also clone the repository yourself and build using make:
$ mkdir -p $GOPATH/src/github.com/Comcast
$ cd $GOPATH/src/github.com/Comcast
$ git clone https://github.com/Comcast/trickster.git
$ cd trickster
$ make build
$ ./trickster -origin http://prometheus.example.com:9090
The Makefile provides several targets:
- build: build the
tricksterbinary - docker: build a docker container for the current
HEAD - clean: delete previously-built binaries and object files
- Refer to the docs directory for additional info.
Refer to CONTRIBUTING.md
As the Trickster community grows, we'd like to keep track of who is using it in their stack. We invite you to submit a PR with your company name and @githubhandle to be included on the list.