Episode

Instrumenting Observability: Getting Started and Pro Tips

Systems are increasingly complex and distributed, and standard metrics, monitoring, and logging aren't enough: they catch known unknowns and send real-time updates – but what about what you don't know? How do you set up a system that helps you see what you care about now and prepare for what you'll want to know in the future?

Christine Yen, Chief Product Officer and co-founder at Honeycomb.io, joins Lachie Evenson to break down how she thinks about observability - from the problems it solves to why it's like peeling an onion - and demos how to instrument your code and make it easier to ask and answer questions (read: observable).

00:26 What is observability?
01:16 Explaining observability (tangible examples)
02:08 Contrasting observability and traditional monitoring
03:29 Check out Christine's demo
08:03 Christine's instrumentation tip

Check out a previous episode with Christine, Intro to Observability

Explore Open Source @ Microsoft.

Check out Honeycomb.io's Achieving Observability guide.

Read the Honeycomb blog.

Read about monitoring and observability on Cindy Sridharan's blog.

Visit the free Honeycomb.io sandbox to explore and see what observability is like in real life.

Create a free account (Azure)