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Monitoring As Code With Checkly

Nov 22, 2023 | Episode

Monitoring as code could be the future of synthetic monitoring, allowing for continuous monitoring of APIs and websites through automation scripts and configurations stored in a repository, making it a collaborative effort in a DevOps culture.

Monitoring as Code: The Future of Synthetic Monitoring?

In this episode of the SMC Journal Podcast, the CEO of Checkly discusses the evolution of synthetic monitoring and the rise of “Monitoring as Code.” The discussion highlighted the need for modern monitoring solutions that integrate seamlessly with DevOps practices and CI/CD pipelines.

The Problem with Traditional Synthetic Monitoring

While synthetic monitoring has been around for a while, traditional approaches often felt outdated in the face of modern DevOps practices. The cumbersome nature of older tools that often involved connecting multiple applications and complex scripting processes. This has led to inefficient workflows and hindered the agility required in fast-paced development environments.

What is Monitoring as Code?

Monitoring as Code takes inspiration from Infrastructure as Code principles, allowing developers to define and manage their monitoring configurations using code stored in repositories. This approach brings several benefits, including:

  • Version control: Tracking changes to monitoring configurations becomes easier, enabling better collaboration and rollback options.
  • Automation: Monitoring configurations can be seamlessly integrated into CI/CD pipelines, ensuring that tests are automatically executed with every deployment.
  • Team Collaboration: By storing monitoring configurations as code, the entire DevOps team can contribute to and review the setup, fostering a more collaborative approach to monitoring.

Synthetic Monitoring vs. Real User Monitoring

Wwith the increasing popularity of Real User Monitoring (RUM), is there still a need for synthetic monitoring? Both approaches are essential for a comprehensive monitoring strategy. While RUM provides valuable insights into actual user behavior, synthetic monitoring allows for proactive testing of critical transactions even before real users encounter issues.

How Checkly Enables Monitoring as Code

Checkly empowers developers to create synthetic monitoring scripts using JavaScript and TypeScript, stored in their repositories. These scripts can then be deployed using various tools like Terraform, Pulumi, or Checkly’s CLI, allowing for flexible integration into existing workflows.

The platform offers a range of metrics beyond basic uptime/downtime monitoring, including:

  • Response times: Measuring the duration of various stages in API requests and website interactions.
  • Web Vitals: Providing detailed insights into frontend performance, allowing teams to assess the impact of code changes on user experience.

Checkly’s Integrations and Future Plans

Checkly understands that observability often involves multiple tools. That’s why the platform offers integrations with popular visualization platforms like Grafana Labs through its Prometheus Exporter and a comprehensive analytics API.

Looking ahead, Checkly aims to expand its capabilities further by introducing:

  • Multi-step API checks: Allowing for more complex testing scenarios.
  • Enhanced Playwright support: Including visual snapshot testing.
  • Additional check types: Such as DNS, ICMP, and TCP checks.

The conversation highlighted how Monitoring as Code, as exemplified by Checkly, represents a significant shift in how teams approach synthetic monitoring. By embracing code-driven configurations, automation, and collaboration, organizations can ensure that their monitoring practices keep pace with the demands of modern software development. To learn more about Checkly and explore its capabilities, visit their website or join their vibrant Slack community.

Video Insights on Monitoring As Code

🤔 The use of Monitoring as Code has the potential to revolutionize synthetic monitoring, allowing for more efficient and scalable monitoring practices.
🚀 “Monitoring as code” is a concept that enables continuous monitoring of APIs and websites using synthetic users, driven by open source technologies like Playwright and JavaScript/TypeScript.
🛒 Synthetic monitoring aims to provide a clear signal of whether a system is running and working from an end user perspective, particularly important for e-commerce companies to ensure their online shops are functioning properly for customers.
🚀 “Monitoring as code enables monitoring to become a team sport, where all configurations, alerts, dashboards, and private locations can be checked into a repository.”
💡 Synthetic monitoring allows for early bug detection before real users experience them, ensuring crucial transactions are tested and catching issues before they become a problem.
🌐 Synthetic monitoring involves instantiating a real browser that runs like a user, allowing for more accurate metrics and insights.
🔄 Monitoring As Code enables users to identify the specific code changes that may have influenced website performance, helping them make informed decisions about rolling back or improving their deployments.
🚀 Checkly aims to go even deeper in synthetic monitoring by adding multi-step API checks and enhanced playwright support, making it easier for various industries to test their systems and improve their monitoring capabilities.

Check out this SMC Journal episode about Real User Monitoring.

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