What is Observability?

Observability, in its essence, is the ability to understand the internal state of a system by examining its external outputs. Think of it like a doctor diagnosing a patient. Instead of just monitoring vital signs (like traditional monitoring), observability allows you to analyze a wide range of symptoms and indicators to understand the underlying causes of any health issues. It provides a much deeper and more comprehensive understanding of complex systems than traditional monitoring approaches.

The key difference lies in the questions you can ask. Traditional IT monitoring primarily tells you if something is wrong, often based on predefined metrics and thresholds. Observability, on the other hand, empowers you to ask why something is wrong, even for issues you didn't anticipate. It allows you to explore the system and uncover "unknown unknowns" – unexpected behaviors or emerging problems that wouldn't be caught by pre-configured alerts.

At the heart of observability are three fundamental types of data, often referred to as the "three pillars" :

Logs: These are detailed, time-stamped records of events that occur within your applications and infrastructure.3 Logs provide a textual narrative of what happened, offering valuable context for troubleshooting and understanding system behavior. For example, an application log might lrecord a specific error message when a user tries to log in.

Metrics: These are numerical measurements of system performance and health collected over time.3 Metrics provide insights into resource utilization, response times, error rates, and other key indicators. For instance, CPU utilization on a server or the latency of API requests are examples of metrics.

Traces: These track the journey of a request as it flows through different components of a distributed system.3 Traces provide end-to-end visibility into how services interact, helping to pinpoint the source of performance bottlenecks or errors in complex environments. Imagine a user clicking a button on a website; a trace would follow that request as it travels through various microservices and databases.

Observability as a Service is a powerful concept that enables DevOps teams to gain deep insights into their systems based on external outputs. This capability allows them to analyze multiple monitoring data, correlate information, and employ advanced mechanisms to understand the state of the system. Observability is a "practice, not a product". It requires a strategic and continuous approach to truly understand and improve the performance and reliability of technology services. avlokan partners with Australian businesses to help them implement and develop this effective observability practice.