Cloud Observability in Action

2 Signal types

This chapter covers

• What different signal types are
• When and how to use a certain signal type
• The costs and benefits of each signal type
• How to figure out which signals are relevant
• Determining signal baselines

In the context of observability, signals play a central role: this is the intel we’re basing our decisions on. On a high level, we can differentiate between signals numerical in nature (e.g., the number of service invocations) and signals that carry textual payload that requires human interpretation (e.g., a log line).

As discussed in chapter 1, the system under observation, or just system (e.g., a Kubernetes application or a serverless app based on Lambda functions), emits signals from various sources. You, as a human, ...