If you look up “observability,” you find a very academic definition on the “measure of how well internal states of a system can be inferred from knowledge of its external outputs.” And while the concept originated from electrical engineering and control theory, it has become a buzzword in software engineering and product development in recent years.

From the halls of MIT to the command lines of Silicon Valley, observability has morphed to include tools and techniques that take system monitoring, such as how long a process takes to complete, exceptions, errors, and failures, to a new level that creates a single source of truth and instrumentation to provide actionable insights and business intelligence.

A few years ago, I was at a technology conference and an executive from Etsy told the audience, “If it moves, we track it. Sometimes we’ll draw a graph of something that isn’t moving yet, just in case it decides to make a run for it.” In other words, they are monitoring everything and making business and operating decisions on how critical business infrastructure is working.