Introduction to observability

Software is becoming exponentially more complex.

• Infrastructure is seeing the convergence of patterns like microservices, polyglot persistence, containers that continue to decompose monoliths into agile, complex little systems. Great for products; hard on humans.

• The number of products is also multiplying; there are countless platforms and creative ways for empowering humans to do cool new stuff. Great for users, hard to make using stable, predictable infrastructure components.

To successfully deliver and run a product or service under these escalating conditions, you need observability.

What is observability?

Observability is a term from control theory.

“In control theory, observability is a measure of how well internal states of a system can be inferred by knowledge of its external outputs. The observability and controllability of a system are mathematical duals.” - Wikipedia (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Observability)

In the world of software products and services, observability means you can answer any questions about what’s happening on the inside of the system just by observing the outside of the system, without having to ship new code to answer new questions. Observability is what we need our tools to deliver now that system complexity is outpacing our ability to predict what’s going to break.

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