Distributed Tracing Explained

We generally have two types of telemetry data. We have log data and time-series statistics. The time-series data is also known as metrics. In the context of a microservices environment. The metrics, for example, will allow you to get an aggregate understanding of what’s happening to all instances of a given service. Then we have logs, on the other hand, that provide extremely fine-grained detail on a given service. But have no built-in way to provide that detail in the context of a request.

Due to the nature of how distributed systems fail, you can't use metrics and logs to discover and address all of your problems. We need a third piece to the puzzle and this is distributed tracing.

Start a free trial for all my Elearning courses at Pluralsight with the following link:

Visit my website for additional technical content:

Thank you!
Matt Conran