Server monitoring helps you spot issues before users are impacted. Monitor infrastructure metrics and add application-level checks; set thresholds, alerting, and escalation so the right people act in time.
What to monitor
- CPU, memory, disk: Usage and trends; alert before you hit limits.
- Network: Throughput, errors, latency to key endpoints.
- Application: HTTP endpoints, DB connectivity, queue depth, key business metrics.
Define baselines and thresholds per service; avoid alert fatigue by tuning over time.
Tools and centralization
- Use a central system (e.g. Prometheus, Grafana, Datadog, or provider dashboards) so all metrics and logs are in one place.
- Alerting: Notify on-call when thresholds are breached; define escalation if no one acknowledges.
- Dashboards: One view per service or environment so you can quickly see health.
On-call and escalation
- Define on-call rotation and how to hand off.
- Document runbooks for common failures (restart, scale, failover).
- Test alerts and restore procedures regularly so the team is ready.
Summary
Monitor CPU, memory, disk, network, and application health; set thresholds and get alerts before users are impacted. Use a central platform and clear on-call and escalation.
