Introduction

  • 2 minutes

This module introduces you to continuous feedback practices and monitoring tools essential for tracking application usage and flow. Learn how to implement Azure Monitor, Log Analytics, and Application Insights to gain deep insights into application performance, user behavior, and system health. Explore Kusto Query Language (KQL) for powerful data analysis.

Why continuous monitoring matters

In modern DevOps practices, continuous monitoring is crucial for:

  • Early issue detection: Identify problems before they impact users
  • Performance optimization: Track metrics to improve application responsiveness
  • User experience insights: Understand how users interact with your applications
  • Data-driven decisions: Make informed choices based on real telemetry data
  • Proactive alerting: Receive notifications when thresholds are exceeded
  • Cost optimization: Monitor resource usage to control cloud spending

What you'll learn

This module covers the complete monitoring and observability stack in Azure:

Azure Monitor and Log Analytics

  • Centralized monitoring: Single platform for all telemetry data
  • Log collection: Gather logs from applications, infrastructure, and services
  • Metrics visualization: Create dashboards and charts for real-time insights
  • Advanced analytics: Use powerful query capabilities to analyze data

Application Insights

  • Application Performance Monitoring (APM): Track request rates, response times, and failure rates
  • Dependency tracking: Monitor calls to databases, APIs, and external services
  • Exception monitoring: Capture and analyze application exceptions
  • Live metrics: View real-time telemetry as requests flow through your application
  • Usage analytics: Understand user behavior and feature adoption

Kusto Query Language (KQL)

  • Powerful queries: Analyze large volumes of telemetry data efficiently
  • Data exploration: Discover patterns and anomalies in your data
  • Custom metrics: Create calculated fields and aggregations
  • Visualization: Generate charts and tables from query results

Inner loop and outer loop

  • Inner loop: Fast feedback during local development
  • Outer loop: Comprehensive monitoring in production environments
  • Feedback integration: Route insights back to development teams

By implementing Application Insights and Azure Monitor, you can:

  • Collect telemetry: Automatically capture requests, dependencies, and exceptions
  • Analyze with KQL: Query logs to identify slow database queries
  • Visualize performance: Create dashboards showing response times by endpoint
  • Set alerts: Configure notifications when error rates exceed thresholds
  • Optimize code: Use insights to improve slow-performing code paths

This module teaches you how to implement these monitoring capabilities effectively.

Learning objectives

After completing this module, students and professionals can:

  • Implement tools to track feedback and telemetry data from applications
  • Plan for continuous monitoring strategies across development and production environments
  • Implement Application Insights for comprehensive application performance monitoring
  • Use Kusto Query Language (KQL) to query and analyze telemetry data
  • Design and implement metrics and queries for actionable insights
  • Monitor application performance using Azure Monitor and Log Analytics
  • Understand the inner loop and outer loop development workflows

Prerequisites

  • Understanding of DevOps concepts: Familiarity with CI/CD pipelines and agile practices
  • Azure fundamentals: Basic knowledge of Azure portal and services
  • Application development experience: Understanding of web applications and APIs
  • Logging concepts: Familiarity with application logging and tracing
  • Basic query skills: Experience with SQL or similar query languages is helpful but not required