observability-and-instrumentation
Instruments code so production behavior is visible and diagnosable. Use when adding logging, metrics, tracing, or alerting. Use when shipping any feature that runs in production and you need evidence it works. Use when production issues are reported but you can't tell what happened from the available data.
npx skills add addyosmani/agent-skills --skill observability-and-instrumentation --agent claude-code
Same command for any agent — swap --agent for codex, cursor, copilot.
Weekly change comes from our own snapshots, not the repository page — it measures attention, not adoption.
# Observability and Instrumentation ## Overview Code you can't observe is code you can't operate. Observability is the ability to answer "what is the system doing and why?" from the outside, using the telemetry the code emits. Instrumentation is not a post-launch add-on — it's written alongside the feature, the same way tests are. If a feature ships without telemetry, the first user-reported bug becomes archaeology instead of a query. ## When to Use - Building any feature that will run in production - Adding a new service, endpoint, background job, or external integration - A production incident took too long to diagnose ("we couldn't tell what happened") - Setting up or reviewing alerting rules - Reviewing a PR that adds I/O, retries, queues, or cross-service calls **NOT for:** - Diagnosing a failure happening right now — use the `debugging-and-error-recovery` skill (observability is what makes that skill fast next time) - Profiling and optimizing measured slowness — use the `performance-optimization` skill - Launch-day monitoring checklists and rollback triggers — see the `shipping-and-launch` skill; this skill covers the instrumentation that feeds them ## Process ### 1. Define "
- Overview
- When to Use
- Process
- 1. Define "working" before instrumenting
- 2. Pick the right signal for each question
- 3. Structured logging
- 4. Metrics
- 5. Distributed tracing
- 6. Alerting
- 7. Verify the telemetry itself
- Common Rationalizations
- Red Flags
- Verification
What does the observability-and-instrumentation skill do?
Instruments code so production behavior is visible and diagnosable. Use when adding logging, metrics, tracing, or alerting. Use when shipping any feature that runs in production and you need evidence it works. Use when production issues are reported but you can't tell what happened from the available data.
How do I install it?
Run `npx skills add addyosmani/agent-skills --skill observability-and-instrumentation --agent claude-code` — it drops the skill into your project so the agent can pick it up. Swap the --agent value for codex, cursor or copilot if you use one of those.
Where does this skill come from?
From addyosmani/agent-skills, a repository with 81,574 stars. We read it straight from the repository tree rather than a submitted listing, so what you see here is what is actually published.
Is a popular skill a good skill?
Not necessarily. Stars measure attention, not adoption — a repository can trend for a week and be abandoned. That is why we show the weekly change from our own snapshots next to the total, instead of a single flattering number.