Does It Add Up? Exploring the Delta Temporality in OpenTelemetry & Beyond
Talkat Observability Day Europe 2023 · on Tuesday, 2023-04-18· at 10:20· Hall 7, Room E | Ground Floor | Europe Complex·
summary
Explains when delta versus cumulative temporality actually matters, shows how OpenTelemetry uses start_time_unix_nano plus timestamp to form unbroken sequences, and walks the Collector pipeline from receivers to processors and exporters. Demonstrates practical tools: the cumulative_to_delta and delta_to_rate processors and the Transform processor, warns that some exporters (example: Prometheus remote write) drop delta points, and gives concrete guidance on when to convert temporality based on backend support and rate computation needs.
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chapters (12)
- 0:00Delta temporality in OpenTelemetry
- 1:04Observability history & metrics
- 3:38StatsD vs Prometheus
- 5:04Temporality in OpenTelemetry
- 7:32Delta vs cumulative examples
- 9:20Time values in data points
- 13:15Impact on data pipelines
- 15:22Collector pipeline overview
- 17:10Processors for temporality
- 19:39Exporters & backend compatibility
- 21:43Delta to cumulative in backends
- 22:45Conclusion & best practices
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