Network insights in OpenTelemetry

The complexity of modern applications demands comprehensive observability to pinpoint performance bottlenecks and optimize application performance. OpenTelemetry, a vendor-neutral observability framework, excels at capturing application-level insights, but the inclusion of network visibility is crucial. This thesis explores the integration of network telemetry data into OpenTelemetry, aiming to provide a holistic understanding of application performance and detect network-related issues.

The project successfully establishes the groundwork for incorporating network visibility into application monitoring using OpenTelemetry. The developed system is positioned for submission as an open-source project. Focusing on the network connecting a 3-tier application, the project ensures that the network path and associated latency are visible during the evaluation of application performance.

The achieved objectives include displaying individual network components, capturing ingress and egress timestamps, and seamlessly integrating network monitoring data into existing traces in OpenTelemetry. These enhancements empower the system to offer insights into latency, network component processing time, and their correlation with requests and existing traces.

Despite these accomplishments, the project falls short of fully identifying the reasons for latency. The selected data retrieval method, Netflow / IPFIX, lacks detailed information about the device's status, limiting the ability to precisely determine the causes of latency. Nevertheless, the project significantly advances observability in distributed applications, providing valuable troubleshooting and performance optimization insights.

Future enhancements could focus on capturing more detailed device status information to identify the root causes of latency better, thereby continuing the trajectory of improvement in observability within distributed applications.