first draft of alloy overview rewrite #2031
There are no files selected for viewing
| Original file line number | Diff line number | Diff line change | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
|
|
@@ -17,31 +17,34 @@ hero: | |||||||
| width: 110 | ||||||||
| height: 110 | ||||||||
| description: >- | ||||||||
| Grafana Alloy is a vendor-neutral distribution of the OpenTelemetry (OTel) Collector. With Alloy, you can instrument your application or infrastructure to collect, process, and forward telemetry data to the observability backend of your choice. | ||||||||
|
There was a problem hiding this comment.
Suggested change
The distribution of OTel or not part isn't finalized on the OTel side (at least I don't think it has been... yet, so we can leave that as-is. |
||||||||
| cards: | ||||||||
| title_class: pt-0 lh-1 | ||||||||
| items: | ||||||||
| - title: Introduction | ||||||||
| href: ./introduction/ | ||||||||
| description: Discover more about the key features and benefits of Alloy. | ||||||||
| - title: Concepts | ||||||||
| href: ./get-started/ | ||||||||
| description: Learn about components, modules, clustering, and the Alloy configuration syntax. | ||||||||
LisaHJung marked this conversation as resolved.
Show resolved
Hide resolved
|
||||||||
| - title: Install Alloy | ||||||||
| href: ./set-up/install/ | ||||||||
| description: Learn how to install and uninstall Alloy on Docker, Kubernetes, Linux, macOS, or Windows. | ||||||||
| - title: Configure Alloy | ||||||||
| href: ./configure/ | ||||||||
| description: Learn how to configure Alloy on Kubernetes, Linux, macOS, or Windows. | ||||||||
| - title: Run Alloy | ||||||||
| href: ./set-up/run/ | ||||||||
| description: Learn how to start, restart, and stop Alloy after you have installed it. | ||||||||
| - title: Migrate to Alloy | ||||||||
| href: ./set-up/migrate/ | ||||||||
| description: Learn how to migrate to Alloy from Grafana Agent Operator, Prometheus, Promtail, Grafana Agent Static, or Grafana Agent Flow. | ||||||||
| - title: Use Alloy to send logs to Loki | ||||||||
| href: ./tutorials/send-logs-to-loki/ | ||||||||
| description: Learn how to use Grafana Alloy to send logs to Loki. | ||||||||
| - title: Use Alloy to send metrics to Prometheus | ||||||||
| href: ./tutorials/send-metrics-to-prometheus/ | ||||||||
| description: Learn how to use Grafana Alloy to send metrics to Prometheus. | ||||||||
| - title: Reference | ||||||||
| href: ./reference/ | ||||||||
| description: Read the reference documentation about the command line tools, configuration blocks, components, and standard library. | ||||||||
|
|
@@ -53,21 +56,19 @@ cards: | |||||||
|
|
||||||||
| # Overview | ||||||||
|
|
||||||||
| Collecting the relevant telemetry data, such as metrics, logs, and traces, for analysis is an indispensable part of understanding the health of your system. | ||||||||
LisaHJung marked this conversation as resolved.
Show resolved
Hide resolved
|
||||||||
|
|
||||||||
| {{< param "PRODUCT_NAME" >}} is more than just a collector. You can use {{< param "PRODUCT_NAME" >}} to collect, process, and forward telemetry data to the observability backend of your choosing. | ||||||||
|
There was a problem hiding this comment.
Suggested change
Collecting,, processing, and forwarding is what any collector does :) There was a problem hiding this comment. The initial sentence was an attempt to rework some other suggested wording that didn't quite fit. I agree, it's better to simply drop it altogether. There was a problem hiding this comment. What do you think about changing this sentence to: |
||||||||
|
|
||||||||
| {{< param "PRODUCT_NAME" >}} has the following features to help you customize, scale, secure, and troubleshoot your data pipeline. | ||||||||
|
|
||||||||
| * Custom components | ||||||||
| * GitOps compatibility | ||||||||
| * Clustering support | ||||||||
| * Security | ||||||||
| * Debugging utilities | ||||||||
|
Comment on lines
+65
to
+69
There was a problem hiding this comment. Unless those bullet points are links, this might be too abstract and people may not understand it. We could either make them links, or explain it in more simple terms. Probably links are the better option. There was a problem hiding this comment. @ptodev , agreed. |
||||||||
|
|
||||||||
| {{< param "PRODUCT_NAME" >}} is flexible, and you can easily configure it to fit your needs in on-prem, cloud-only, or a mix of both. | ||||||||
LisaHJung marked this conversation as resolved.
Show resolved
Hide resolved
|
||||||||
|
|
||||||||
|
There was a problem hiding this comment. One thing to add here is a clear call to action, which is for them to install, configure, and collect forward telemetry data. We could do that by including the section on getting started in the original draft on the overview page OR include a blurb saying, "Getting started with Alloy consists of 3 major steps. New page:
In addition, you can use the Grafana dashboard to visualize the data collected from the app or infrastructure. For a quick overview of this process, check out the following tutorials.
What do you think? There was a problem hiding this comment. Some thoughts on this:
There was a problem hiding this comment. Agreed. @clayton-cornell Why don't we leave out the call to action part and include the suggested text on the Get Started page? |
||||||||
| ## Explore | ||||||||
|
|
||||||||
|
|
@@ -79,4 +80,3 @@ Some of these features include custom components, GitOps compatibility, clusteri | |||||||
| [Loki]: https://grafana.com/docs/loki/ | ||||||||
| [Mimir]: https://grafana.com/docs/mimir/ | ||||||||
| [Promtail]: https://grafana.com/docs/loki/latest/send-data/promtail/ | ||||||||
| Original file line number | Diff line number | Diff line change |
|---|---|---|
|
|
@@ -17,31 +17,34 @@ hero: | |
| width: 110 | ||
| height: 110 | ||
| description: >- | ||
| Grafana Alloy is a vendor-neutral distribution of the OpenTelemetry (OTel) Collector. With Alloy, you can instrument your app or infrastrastructure to collect, process, and forward telemetry data to the observability backend of your choice. | ||
| cards: | ||
| title_class: pt-0 lh-1 | ||
| items: | ||
| - title: Introduction | ||
| href: ./introduction/ | ||
| description: Discover more about the key features and benefits of Alloy. | ||
| - title: Concepts | ||
| href: ./get-started/ | ||
| description: Learn about components, modules, clustering, and the Alloy configuration syntax. | ||
| - title: Install Alloy | ||
| href: ./set-up/install/ | ||
| description: Learn how to install and uninstall Alloy on Docker, Kubernetes, Linux, macOS, or Windows. | ||
| - title: Configure Alloy | ||
| href: ./configure/ | ||
| description: Learn how to configure Alloy on Kubernetes, Linux, macOS, or Windows. | ||
| - title: Run Alloy | ||
| href: ./set-up/run/ | ||
| description: Learn how to start, restart, and stop Alloy after you have installed it. | ||
| - title: Migrate to Alloy | ||
| href: ./set-up/migrate/ | ||
| description: Learn how to migrate to Alloy from Grafana Agent Operator, Prometheus, Promtail, Grafana Agent Static, or Grafana Agent Flow. | ||
| - title: Use Alloy to send logs to Loki | ||
| href: ./tutorials/send-logs-to-loki/ | ||
| description: Learn how to use Grafana Alloy to send logs to Loki. | ||
| - title: Use Alloy to send metrics to Prometheus | ||
| href: ./tutorials/send-metrics-to-prometheus/ | ||
| description: Learn how to use Grafana Alloy to send metrics to Prometheus. | ||
| - title: Reference | ||
| href: ./reference/ | ||
| description: Read the reference documentation about the command line tools, configuration blocks, components, and standard library. | ||
|
|
@@ -53,21 +56,19 @@ cards: | |
|
|
||
| # Overview | ||
|
|
||
| Collecting the relevant telemetry data, such as metrics, logs, and traces, for analysis is an indispensable part of understanding the health of your system. | ||
|
|
||
| {{< param "PRODUCT_NAME" >}} is more than just a collector. You can use {{< param "PRODUCT_NAME" >}} to collect, process, and forward telemetry data to the observability backend of your choosing. | ||
|
There was a problem hiding this comment. Why don't we change this sentence to: Alloy is a software that collects, processes, and forwards telemetry data to an observability backend of your choice, where they can be stored & visualized. There was a problem hiding this comment. or:
|
||
|
|
||
| {{< param "PRODUCT_NAME" >}} has the following features to help you customize, scale, secure, and troubleshoot your data pipeline. | ||
|
|
||
| * Custom components | ||
| * GitOps compatibility | ||
| * Clustering support | ||
| * Security | ||
| * Debugging utilities | ||
|
|
||
| {{< param "PRODUCT_NAME" >}} is flexible, and you can easily configure it to fit your needs in on-prem, cloud-only, or a mix of both. | ||
|
|
||
|
There was a problem hiding this comment. One thing to add here is a clear call to action, which is for them to install, configure, and collect forward telemetry data. We could do that by including the section on getting started in the original draft on the overview page OR include a blurb saying, "Getting started with Alloy consists of 3 major steps. New page: Install {{< param "PRODUCT_NAME" >}} For a quick overview of this process, check out the following tutorials. Use Grafana Alloy to send logs to Loki There was a problem hiding this comment. It's normally clear to users that they have to install and configure it. The main issue is that there are many ways to do so. For example, do they have to deploy one Alloy per server? Or one central Alloy instance? What if they use OpenTelemetry? Or Prometheus? I think we should simply link to several articles which help them get started quickly with the sort of telemetry they are interested in. The ones you linked to are a good choice: Use Grafana Alloy to send logs to Loki I'd also add one more about collecting OpenTelemetry. I do also wonder if we should rename those pages like this
This reflects the current guidance on how to use components. There was a problem hiding this comment. @ptodev, this is such a great point. @clayton-cornell recommended that we do not add a CTA to an overview page, which makes sense. I suggest we include this information on the get started page: https://grafana.com/docs/alloy/latest/get-started/ Why don't we touch base on this when we restructure and improve the getting started page of the doc? |
||
| ## Explore | ||
|
|
||
|
|
@@ -79,4 +80,3 @@ Some of these features include custom components, GitOps compatibility, clusteri | |
| [Loki]: https://grafana.com/docs/loki/ | ||
| [Mimir]: https://grafana.com/docs/mimir/ | ||
| [Promtail]: https://grafana.com/docs/loki/latest/send-data/promtail/ | ||
There was a problem hiding this comment.
Choose a reason for hiding this comment
The reason will be displayed to describe this comment to others. Learn more.
Technically, Alloy is not used for application instrumentation. Normally "application instrumentation" refers to the SDK which users use for instrumenting - e.g. Prometheus or OTel.
There was a problem hiding this comment.
Choose a reason for hiding this comment
The reason will be displayed to describe this comment to others. Learn more.
Thank you for catching this @ptodev !
What role does Alloy play in data collection for applications?
Is Prometheus or OTel used to instrument an app, and the data is sent to Alloy for processing and forwarding?
If that is the case, why wouldn't they just use Prometheus or OTel to handle all of that?
There was a problem hiding this comment.
Choose a reason for hiding this comment
The reason will be displayed to describe this comment to others. Learn more.
@ptodev , perhaps we could change the sentence to
"Alloy is a software that collects, processes, and forwards telemetry data to an observability backend of your choice, where they can be stored & visualized."