Metrics Types - When to use what ?

This writeup talks about different metric type that an application can emit as telemetry. It intends to cover the case of when to use which metric types and the usecase for them. Metrics is one of the oldest forms of telemetry. There are many APM solutions, whose billing model runs on the number of metrics you send to them. But it is often not clear to app devs on what kind of metrics to emit from applications. Infact, the types of metrics can be confusing sometimes. ...

April 30, 2026 · 7 min · Akshay Deshpande

When to Emit What O11y Signal?

The intention of this page is to put together the Observability Signal Guidelines which will provide the required visibility into the systems without hurting the cost aspect of the solution. Three basic observability signals that any application emits are: Metrics, Traces and Logs The general question is - When to emit what signal? The answer lies in the intent behind the signal being emitted. What do you intend to measure with the Observability signal that you are emitting? ...

September 4, 2025 · 3 min · Akshay Deshpande

Enhancing Observability with OTel Custom Processors

Observability is crucial for modern distributed systems, enabling engineers to monitor, debug, and optimize their applications effectively. OpenTelemetry (Otel) has emerged as a comprehensive, vendor-neutral observability framework for collecting, processing, and exporting telemetry data such as traces, metrics, and logs. This blog post will explore how custom processors in OpenTelemetry can significantly enhance your observability strategy, making it highly customizable and powerful. The repo link where I have implemented a very simple Otel-Custom-Processor. https://github.com/AkshayD110/otel-custom-processor/tree/master ...

April 27, 2025 · 3 min · Akshay Deshpande