Is there any way to fill in missing data in graphite when using statsD?

Question

I'm using statsD to report counter data to graphite; sends a tick everytime I get a message. This works great, except in the situation when statsD has to restart for whatever reason. Then I get huge holes in my graphs, since statsD is now no longer sending '0' every 10 seconds for periods when I didn't get any messages.

I'm reporting for various different message types and queues, and sometimes I don't get a message for a particular queue for a long time.

Is there any existing way to 'fill-in' the missing data with a default value I specify (in my case this would be 0)?

I thought about sending a '0' count for a given metric so that statsD starts sending 0's for it, but I don't always know the set of metrics I'll be reporting in advance.

Answer 1

Check out the function transformNull that Graphite provides. e.g.

transformNull(stats.timers.deploys.all.duration.total.mean, 0)

This will map sections with null data to 0.

Answer 2

You can use the "keepLastValue(requestContext, seriesList)" function in graphite to deal with missing data. It "[c]ontinues the line with the last received value when gaps (‘None’ values) appear in your data, rather than breaking your line."