One pipeline, one fork: services emit OTLP to the OpenTelemetry Collector, which routes metrics to Prometheus and logs & traces to Splunk. In the series finale, we draw the architecture, show the Collector config that makes the fork happen, and walk a 2 AM incident end-to-end through the stack.
// blog / observability
Observability
OpenTelemetry, Prometheus, and Splunk aren't competitors — they own three different stages of the telemetry pipeline. In Part 2, we break down what each tool does, why Prometheus deliberately handles only metrics, and why logs and traces both land in Splunk. One comparison table included.
Monitoring tells you that something is wrong; observability tells you why. In Part 1 of this series, we unpack what observability really means and take a practical tour of its three pillars — metrics, logs, and traces — and how they work together to turn a 2 AM incident into a 20-minute fix.