Prometheus

Prometheus is an open-source monitoring system and time-series database designed for reliability and scalability.

What is Prometheus?

Prometheus is an open-source systems monitoring and alerting toolkit originally built at SoundCloud. It features a multi-dimensional data model, flexible query language (PromQL), and autonomous single-server architecture.

Prometheus Architecture

Prometheus Server: Scrapes and stores metrics
Exporters: Expose metrics from services
Alertmanager: Handles alerts and notifications
Pushgateway: For short-lived jobs
Client Libraries: Instrument applications

Prometheus Features

Pull-based metrics collection, powerful query language, built-in alerting, and service discovery.

Common Misconceptions

"Prometheus stores data long-term" - Designed for short-term (use Thanos/Cortex for long-term)
"Prometheus is hard to scale" - Federation and remote storage help
"Prometheus replaces logging" - Metrics, not logs