Architecture

Obcerv components Copied

The Obcerv system is composed of the following components:

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Platform Copied

The Obcerv platform consists of an operator, which manages services across the whole Kubernetes cluster, and at least one Obcerv instance that provides platform functionality.

You can run multiple Obcerv instances in different namespaces to separate different concerns. Any Obcerv apps must be installed in the same namespace as their Platform instance.

Additionally, Obcerv is capable of coexisting with other applications running in the same cluster.

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App design Copied

An App typically consists of the following components:

When you install a new App using a Helm chart the backend and user interface are automatically connected to the Platform and Webconsole. However, you may need to setup new Collection Agent plugins to collect metrics.

Geneos Copied

In general, Obcerv works with other parts of the Geneos system to collect data. Metrics can be published to Obcerv as unmodified Collection Agent datapoints or in legacy Geneos formats. In either case, you must configure your Gateway to publish data to Obcerv. To do this, follow the instructions in the Gateway Obcerv Quickstart.

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Data model Copied

The canonical Obcerv data model is an internal, normalised, model for representing data that is collected, processed, or stored by the Obcerv platform.

Entities Copied

An Entity is an emitter (whether actual, or conceptual) of observable data and is uniquely defined by a dictionary of unordered dimensions (key/value pairs).

As a result:

  1. Entities are considered identical if and only if their dimensions are identical.
  2. Entities with non-identical dimensions are considered distinct.

This strict definition ensures that the way Obcerv treats observable data is independent of how data is collected or processed and allows Obcerv to maintain the notion of Entity identification across multiple samples.

Different associations between and grouping of different entities can be obtained by slicing and dicing dimensions in multiple ways.

Datapoints Copied

Datapoints are the format used by Obcerv and other tools to communicate. A datapoint represents a single piece of observable data emitted by, or collected from, an Entity.

A datapoint is associated exactly with a single Entity in a self-describing way. That is, every datapoint contains the fully qualified dimensions of the emitting Entity rather than an internal or abbreviated representation.

Note that each datapoint:

Datapoint types Copied

Timestamps Copied

In order to make datapoints amenable to processing as a time series, datapoints are transmitted regardless of how they are collected or whether they have changed over an interval. This means that consecutive datapoints in time may be identical except for their timestamp fields.

Note the following:

["Obcerv"] ["User Guide"]

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