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Metrics Collection Guide

This document explains how to use the pkg/metrics package to collect metrics and instrument your application.

Configuration

Metrics are configured entirely through environment variables. Enable metrics in your .env file:

METRICS_ENABLED=true
METRICS_PROVIDER=prometheus          # or opentelemetry, disabled
METRICS_NAMESPACE=ims_pocketbase

Note: All metrics configuration is loaded from environment variables - no JSON config files are used. This follows the 12-factor app methodology for configuration management.

Basic Usage

Get Metrics Provider

import "ims-pocketbase-baas-starter/pkg/metrics"

metricsProvider := metrics.GetInstance()

Metric Types

// Counter - count events
metricsProvider.IncrementCounter("user_registrations_total", map[string]string{
    "method": "email",
})

// Histogram - measure distributions (response times, sizes)
metricsProvider.RecordHistogram("request_duration_seconds", 0.125, map[string]string{
    "endpoint": "/api/users",
})

// Gauge - current values (connections, queue size)
metricsProvider.SetGauge("active_connections", 42, map[string]string{
    "server": "web-01",
})

// Timer - measure operation duration
timer := metricsProvider.StartTimer("database_query_duration_seconds", map[string]string{
    "table": "users",
})
// ... perform operation ...
timer.Stop()

Instrumentation Helpers

The package includes helper functions that automatically handle timing, counting, and error tracking:

Instrument Functions

// Using helper function (recommended)
func processUser(userID string) error {
    metricsProvider := metrics.GetInstance()

    return metrics.InstrumentRecordOperation(metricsProvider, "users", "process", func() error {
        return doProcessing(userID)
    })
}

Instrument HTTP Handlers

func HandleUserStats(e *core.RequestEvent) error {
    metricsProvider := metrics.GetInstance()

    return metrics.InstrumentHTTPHandler(metricsProvider, "GET", "/api/user-stats", func() error {
        stats, err := computeUserStats(e.App)
        if err != nil {
            return err
        }
        return e.JSON(200, stats)
    })
}

Instrument Jobs

func (h *EmailJobHandler) Handle(ctx *cronutils.CronExecutionContext, job *jobutils.JobData) error {
    metricsProvider := metrics.GetInstance()

    return metrics.InstrumentJobHandler(metricsProvider, "email", func() error {
        return h.processEmailJob(job)
    })
}

Instrument Hooks

func HandleUserUpdate(e *core.RecordEvent) error {
    metricsProvider := metrics.GetInstance()

    return metrics.InstrumentHook(metricsProvider, "user_update", func() error {
        return updateUserSettings(e.Record)
    })
}

Other Helpers

// Measure execution time
err := metrics.MeasureExecutionTime(metricsProvider, "operation_duration_seconds",
    map[string]string{"type": "data_processing"}, func() error {
        return processData()
    })

// Record cache operations
metrics.InstrumentCacheOperation(metricsProvider, true)  // cache hit
metrics.InstrumentCacheOperation(metricsProvider, false) // cache miss

// Record queue size
metrics.RecordQueueSize(metricsProvider, "email_queue", 25)

Accessing Metrics

Best Practices

// Good - consistent labels
labels := map[string]string{
    "operation": "create",
    "method": "api",
}

// Bad - avoid high cardinality (unique user IDs)
// Don't use user_id as label

// Good naming conventions
"http_requests_total"           // Use underscores
"request_duration_seconds"      // Include units
"job_queue_size"               // Descriptive names

Safety & Resilience

Your application is completely safe when Prometheus/Grafana are down!

The metrics package is designed with multiple safety layers:

1. Graceful Degradation

  • If metrics are disabled (METRICS_ENABLED=false), a no-op provider is used
  • If Prometheus/Grafana are down, metrics calls simply do nothing
  • Zero impact on application performance or functionality

2. Panic Recovery

All metrics operations use Safe* functions that recover from panics:

// Even if Prometheus client panics, your app continues running
SafeIncrementCounter(provider, "user_actions", labels)
SafeRecordHistogram(provider, "response_time", 0.5, labels)

3. Null Provider Handling

// Always safe - checks for nil provider
if provider != nil {
    provider.IncrementCounter(name, labels)
}

4. Automatic Fallback

  • Unknown provider → No-op provider
  • Configuration errors → No-op provider
  • Network issues → Operations silently succeed

5. No External Dependencies

  • Metrics are collected in-memory
  • Only the /metrics endpoint requires Prometheus to scrape
  • If scraping fails, metrics continue collecting locally

Bottom line: Your core application logic is never affected by metrics failures.

Troubleshooting

Metrics Not Showing in Grafana

If you can see metrics in Prometheus (http://localhost:8090/metrics) but not in Grafana:

  1. Check Prometheus is scraping your app:

    • Visit http://localhost:9090/targets
    • Ensure pocketbase-app target shows "UP" status

  2. Verify metrics in Prometheus:

    • Go to http://localhost:9090/graph
    • Try queries like: ims_pocketbase_hook_execution_total or ims_pocketbase_job_execution_total

  3. Check Grafana dashboard queries:

    • Your metrics use the namespace ims_pocketbase_
    • Hook metrics: ims_pocketbase_hook_execution_total{hook_type="user_create_settings"}
    • Job metrics: ims_pocketbase_job_execution_total{job_type="email_job"}

  4. Restart services if needed:

    docker-compose -f docker-compose.dev.yml restart grafana prometheus

Common Metric Names

Your instrumented code creates these metrics:

  • ims_pocketbase_hook_execution_total{hook_type="user_create_settings"} (from user hooks)
  • ims_pocketbase_job_execution_total{job_type="email_job"} (from email jobs)
  • ims_pocketbase_http_requests_total{method="GET",path="/api/users"} (from HTTP handlers)

Useful Grafana Queries

# Rate of hook executions
rate(ims_pocketbase_hook_execution_total[5m])

# Job execution rate
rate(ims_pocketbase_job_execution_total[5m])

# 95th percentile response time
histogram_quantile(0.95, rate(ims_pocketbase_http_request_duration_seconds_bucket[5m]))

That's it! Simple metrics collection for better observability.