Understanding logs, metrics, and traces
The foundation of observability is data! Where does this data come from? How often should you collect it? How much is too much and how much is not enough? Who is the owner of this data? Who is the keeper of this data? Who is the user of this data? Can it be ingested in its raw form? Do you need to apply Extract, Transform, Load (ETL), or filtering? Data itself is everywhere and is ever-increasing in volume with modern architectures. We will explain the forms of data that aid observability in this section and highlight some use cases for each of these forms.
The primary forms of data that we will discuss here are logs, metrics, and traces. They are often referred to as the pillars of observability. When you start your observability journey, to begin with, you may not have all three forms of data and that is alright. You can start with one or two forms and add the remaining forms to the solution as the solution matures. Having all three forms...
