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Gaining visibility into your applications and infrastructure is crucial for
maintaining performance and stability. Therefore, Google Distributed Cloud (GDC) air-gapped
provides a monitoring platform for collecting and analyzing your metrics.
The GDC monitoring platform lets you collect and query
metrics from your deployed workloads. You can monitor and visualize your systems
using built-in observability tools from the monitoring platform.
By effectively collecting and querying metrics, you can gain valuable insights
into your air-gapped environment and ensure the optimal performance of your
workloads.
Key concepts
The GDC monitoring platform introduces the following
concepts:
Metrics are quantitative measurements collected from your
GDC workloads that provide valuable insights into
resource utilization and performance. GDC uses
Prometheus for this purpose. Prometheus is an open-source monitoring system
that ensures efficient and reliable data collection.
Dashboards are visual representations of your metrics to observe trends
and system behaviour. Your GDC project includes a
dedicated Grafana instance for metrics visualization. Grafana is an
analytics platform that lets you create insightful dashboards and explore
your metrics data. GDC provides prebuilt dashboards
for standard components, offering immediate visibility into your
environment.
Monitoring workflow
To facilitate the monitoring processes of your components, the
GDC monitoring platform operates in the following
workflow:
Collect metrics: When your GDC environment is up
and running, metrics from core components are automatically collected and
displayed in pre-configured Grafana dashboards. This feature provides
immediate network and server monitoring.
You can also configure scraping targets for your own applications and
services by deploying custom resources that define workload-specific metrics
to collect and the collection frequency.
Query metrics: You can query your collected metrics using PromQL
(Prometheus Query Language). Querying metrics lets you do the following:
Filter metrics based on labels and values.
Aggregate data over time.
Perform calculations on metric values.
Build dashboards and visualize metrics: Use Grafana to build custom
dashboards that visualize your metrics. These dashboards provide a clear and
comprehensive view of your system's performance, enabling you to do the
following:
Identify trends and anomalies.
Troubleshoot issues effectively.
Make informed decisions about resource allocation and optimization.
Metrics retention
Retention policies define how long metrics and logs are stored. These policies
are crucial for meeting compliance requirements and supporting operational
analysis.
GDC uses retention times to set up lifecycle and
retention policies for metrics. The system applies a default value of 90
days for metrics retention times.
Access methods
The following access methods are available to operate with component metrics:
Grafana user interface: You can access your project's Grafana instance
through the GDC console or directly using its URL. The user
interface lets you query and visualize metrics.
HTTP API: Programmatically retrieve metrics data using the HTTP API.
This method enables integration with external tools and automation scripts.
Further resources
Consult the comprehensive list of metrics
for detailed descriptions of all collected metrics from
GDC components. This resource provides valuable context
and facilitates advanced monitoring strategies.
[[["Easy to understand","easyToUnderstand","thumb-up"],["Solved my problem","solvedMyProblem","thumb-up"],["Other","otherUp","thumb-up"]],[["Hard to understand","hardToUnderstand","thumb-down"],["Incorrect information or sample code","incorrectInformationOrSampleCode","thumb-down"],["Missing the information/samples I need","missingTheInformationSamplesINeed","thumb-down"],["Other","otherDown","thumb-down"]],["Last updated 2025-08-29 UTC."],[[["\u003cp\u003eGoogle Distributed Cloud (GDC) air-gapped offers a monitoring platform that allows you to collect and query metrics from your deployed workloads to help maintain performance and stability.\u003c/p\u003e\n"],["\u003cp\u003eThe GDC monitoring platform uses Prometheus for metrics collection and Grafana for visualization, providing prebuilt dashboards for core components and allowing custom dashboard creation.\u003c/p\u003e\n"],["\u003cp\u003eThe monitoring workflow involves collecting metrics automatically from core components and allowing custom targets, querying metrics using PromQL for filtering and calculations, and visualizing metrics through Grafana dashboards.\u003c/p\u003e\n"],["\u003cp\u003eMetrics are retained for 90 days by default, and access is available through the Grafana user interface or programmatically via an HTTP API.\u003c/p\u003e\n"],["\u003cp\u003eUsers can access a comprehensive list of metrics collected from GDC components to enhance their monitoring strategies and gain valuable context.\u003c/p\u003e\n"]]],[],null,["# Monitoring overview\n\nGaining visibility into your applications and infrastructure is crucial for\nmaintaining performance and stability. Therefore, Google Distributed Cloud (GDC) air-gapped\nprovides a monitoring platform for collecting and analyzing your metrics.\n\nThe GDC monitoring platform lets you collect and query\nmetrics from your deployed workloads. You can monitor and visualize your systems\nusing built-in observability tools from the monitoring platform.\n\nBy effectively collecting and querying metrics, you can gain valuable insights\ninto your air-gapped environment and ensure the optimal performance of your\nworkloads.\n\nKey concepts\n------------\n\nThe GDC monitoring platform introduces the following\nconcepts:\n\n- **Metrics** are quantitative measurements collected from your\n GDC workloads that provide valuable insights into\n resource utilization and performance. GDC uses\n Prometheus for this purpose. Prometheus is an open-source monitoring system\n that ensures efficient and reliable data collection.\n\n- **Dashboards** are visual representations of your metrics to observe trends\n and system behaviour. Your GDC project includes a\n dedicated Grafana instance for metrics visualization. Grafana is an\n analytics platform that lets you create insightful dashboards and explore\n your metrics data. GDC provides prebuilt dashboards\n for standard components, offering immediate visibility into your\n environment.\n\nMonitoring workflow\n-------------------\n\nTo facilitate the monitoring processes of your components, the\nGDC monitoring platform operates in the following\nworkflow:\n\n1. **Collect metrics:** When your GDC environment is up\n and running, metrics from core components are automatically collected and\n displayed in pre-configured Grafana dashboards. This feature provides\n immediate network and server monitoring.\n\n You can also configure scraping targets for your own applications and\n services by deploying custom resources that define workload-specific metrics\n to collect and the collection frequency.\n2. **Query metrics:** You can query your collected metrics using PromQL\n (Prometheus Query Language). Querying metrics lets you do the following:\n\n - Filter metrics based on labels and values.\n - Aggregate data over time.\n - Perform calculations on metric values.\n3. **Build dashboards and visualize metrics:** Use Grafana to build custom\n dashboards that visualize your metrics. These dashboards provide a clear and\n comprehensive view of your system's performance, enabling you to do the\n following:\n\n - Identify trends and anomalies.\n - Troubleshoot issues effectively.\n - Make informed decisions about resource allocation and optimization.\n\nMetrics retention\n-----------------\n\nRetention policies define how long metrics and logs are stored. These policies\nare crucial for meeting compliance requirements and supporting operational\nanalysis.\n\nGDC uses retention times to set up lifecycle and\nretention policies for metrics. The system applies a default value of 90\ndays for metrics retention times.\n\nAccess methods\n--------------\n\nThe following access methods are available to operate with component metrics:\n\n- **Grafana user interface:** You can access your project's Grafana instance through the GDC console or directly using its URL. The user interface lets you query and visualize metrics.\n- **HTTP API:** Programmatically retrieve metrics data using the HTTP API. This method enables integration with external tools and automation scripts.\n\nFurther resources\n-----------------\n\nConsult [the comprehensive list of metrics](/distributed-cloud/hosted/docs/latest/gdch/platform-application/pa-ao-operations/metrics-overview)\nfor detailed descriptions of all collected metrics from\nGDC components. This resource provides valuable context\nand facilitates advanced monitoring strategies."]]
