Monitoring and Operations Architecture
This document describes the monitoring and operational architecture for production-ready deployments.
Overview
The monitoring and operations architecture provides:
- Visibility: Full system health monitoring
- Alerting: Proactive issue detection
- Documentation: Complete operational procedures
- Training: Customer team empowerment
Architecture Components
Monitoring Stack
┌─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┐
│ Monitoring Stack │
├─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┤
│ │
│ ┌──────────────┐ ┌──────────────┐ ┌──────────────┐ │
│ │ Prometheus │ │ Grafana │ │ Alertmanager │ │
│ │ (Metrics) │ │ (Dashboards) │ │ (Alerts) │ │
│ └──────┬───────┘ └──────┬───────┘ └──────┬───────┘ │
│ │ │ │ │
│ └─────────────────┼──────────────────┘ │
│ │ │
│ ┌────────────────────────▼──────────────────────────┐ │
│ │ Prometheus Operator │ │
│ │ (CRD Management) │ │
│ └────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘ │
│ │
└─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘
│
│ (Scrapes metrics)
▼
┌─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┐
│ Kubernetes Cluster │
│ ┌──────────────┐ ┌──────────────┐ ┌──────────────┐ │
│ │ Pods │ │ Nodes │ ┌──────────────┐ │
│ │ (Metrics) │ │ (Metrics) │ │ Services │ │
│ └──────────────┘ └──────────────┘ └──────────────┘ │
└─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘Component Descriptions
Prometheus:
- Metrics collection and storage
- Time-series database
- Query language (PromQL)
- Alert rule evaluation
Grafana:
- Visualization and dashboards
- Alert visualization
- Metric exploration
- Dashboard sharing
Alertmanager:
- Alert routing
- Alert grouping
- Notification channels
- Alert silencing
Prometheus Operator:
- Kubernetes CRDs for Prometheus
- Service discovery
- Configuration management
- Automatic target discovery
Monitoring Architecture
Metrics Collection
Application Pods
│
│ (exposes metrics)
▼
ServiceMonitor / PodMonitor
│
│ (discovers targets)
▼
Prometheus
│
│ (scrapes metrics)
▼
Time-Series DatabaseMetrics Flow
Application Exposes Metrics:
- HTTP endpoint (
/metrics) - Prometheus format
- Standard metrics
- HTTP endpoint (
ServiceMonitor Discovers Targets:
- Kubernetes service discovery
- Automatic target discovery
- Label-based selection
Prometheus Scrapes Metrics:
- Regular intervals (15s default)
- Stores in time-series database
- Evaluates alert rules
Grafana Visualizes:
- Queries Prometheus
- Creates dashboards
- Displays metrics
Alerting Architecture
Alert Flow
Prometheus
│
│ (evaluates rules)
▼
Alert Rules
│
│ (fires alerts)
▼
Alertmanager
│
│ (routes alerts)
▼
Notification Channels
(Email, Slack, PagerDuty, etc.)Alert Rule Types
Resource Alerts:
- High CPU usage
- High memory usage
- Disk space low
- Pod crash loops
Application Alerts:
- High error rate
- Slow response times
- Service unavailable
- Application failures
Infrastructure Alerts:
- Node not ready
- Network issues
- Storage issues
- Cluster health
Dashboard Architecture
Dashboard Types
Cluster Overview:
- Overall cluster health
- Resource usage
- Pod status
- Node status
Application Dashboards:
- Application metrics
- Request rates
- Error rates
- Response times
Infrastructure Dashboards:
- Node metrics
- Network metrics
- Storage metrics
- Cluster metrics
Dashboard Organization
Grafana
├── Cluster Overview
├── Applications
│ ├── Argo Workflows
│ ├── Application Health
│ └── Custom Applications
├── Infrastructure
│ ├── Nodes
│ ├── Network
│ └── Storage
└── AlertsOperational Architecture
Runbook Structure
Runbooks
├── Deployment Runbook
├── Incident Response Playbook
├── Scaling Guide
├── Backup and Restore
└── Upgrade ProcedureKnowledge Transfer
Training
├── Day 1: Foundation
├── Day 2: Operations
├── Day 3: Maintenance
├── Day 4: Advanced
└── Day 5: CertificationSupport Architecture
Support Model
Support
├── Immediate (0-30 days)
│ ├── Business hours + on-call
│ ├── < 2 hour response
│ └── All channels
├── Standard (31-90 days)
│ ├── Business hours + on-call
│ ├── < 4 hour response
│ └── Email, Slack
└── Ongoing
├── Business hours
├── < 24 hour response
└── Email, TicketsIntegration Points
Application Integration
Metrics Exposure:
- Applications expose
/metricsendpoint - Prometheus format
- Standard metrics (CPU, memory, requests)
Service Discovery:
- ServiceMonitor CRD
- Automatic discovery
- Label-based selection
Infrastructure Integration
Node Metrics:
- Node Exporter
- System metrics
- Hardware metrics
Kubernetes Metrics:
- kube-state-metrics
- Object metrics
- Resource metrics
Security Architecture
Access Control
Grafana:
- User authentication
- Role-based access
- Dashboard permissions
Prometheus:
- Network policies
- Service account permissions
- RBAC
Data Security
Metrics:
- No sensitive data in metrics
- Aggregated data only
- Retention policies
Alerts:
- No sensitive data in alerts
- Secure notification channels
- Alert encryption
Scalability
Horizontal Scaling
Prometheus:
- Can scale with sharding
- Federation for aggregation
- Long-term storage
Grafana:
- Stateless design
- Can scale horizontally
- Load balancing
Performance
Metrics Collection:
- Efficient scraping
- Metric cardinality management
- Retention policies
Query Performance:
- Indexed queries
- Query optimization
- Caching
Related Documentation
Remember: Good architecture enables good operations. Design for observability and operational excellence.