UX Research Report: Prometheus and OTel's Resource Attributes.
summary
UX research via CNCF LFX mentors collects feedback from 70 users surveyed (7 interviews, 63 survey respondents) and identifies four workflows: mapping all OTel resource attributes to labels (causing cardinality explosion), using target_info with PromQL joins (most users find joins painful), selective promote_resource_attributes (requires up‑front choices and breaks historical data) and manual attribute injection. Findings show about 43% neutral satisfaction, ~30% dissatisfied, ~27% satisfied, and ~90% find joins challenging. Recommendations: native resource‑attribute query support, cardinality‑aware promotion, clearer docs and cross‑project alignment.
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chapters (10)
- 0:00Research project intro
- 3:43Resource attributes in Prometheus
- 5:53Four user workflows
- 11:19Pain points in current approaches
- 16:25User expectations for integration
- 18:36Philosophical differences
- 20:43Recommendations for communities
- 24:15Cross-project communication importance
- 24:58LFX mentorship benefits
- 26:48Q&A on target info
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