Prometheus vs Prometheus cortex
Prometheus and Prometheus Cortex are two related but distinct concepts in the world of monitoring and observability. Here’s a breakdown of the key differences:
Prometheus
- Prometheus is an open-source monitoring system and time series database that collects metrics from various sources, such as applications, services, and infrastructure.
- It provides a query language called PromQL to extract insights from the collected data.
- Prometheus is designed to be highly scalable and can handle large amounts of data.
- It is widely used in production environments for monitoring and alerting.
Prometheus Cortex
- Prometheus Cortex is an open-source, horizontally scalable, and highly available long-term storage solution for Prometheus.
- It is designed to store and query large amounts of time series data, making it suitable for big data use cases.
- Cortex provides a distributed architecture, allowing it to scale horizontally and handle high volumes of data.
- It is often used in conjunction with Prometheus to provide a complete monitoring and observability solution.
Key differences
- Purpose: Prometheus is a monitoring system, while Prometheus Cortex is a long-term storage solution for Prometheus.
- Scalability: Both Prometheus and Cortex are designed to be scalable, but Cortex is specifically designed for large-scale, distributed environments.
- Data storage: Prometheus stores data in memory and on disk, while Cortex stores data in a distributed NoSQL database.
- Querying: Prometheus provides a query language (PromQL) for querying data, while Cortex provides a query engine that can handle complex queries and aggregations.
When to use each
- Use Prometheus when you need a monitoring system that can collect and store metrics from various sources and doesn’t require long-term storage or high scalability.
- Use Prometheus Cortex when you need a scalable, long-term storage solution for large amounts of time series data and want to leverage the power of Prometheus’ query language and alerting capabilities.
Prometheus is a monitoring system, while Prometheus Cortex is a long-term storage solution for Prometheus. Both are powerful tools for monitoring and observability, but they serve different purposes and are designed for different use cases.
What is Prometheus Cortex ?
In the current digital era, where milliseconds count, software applications must be sustained, which calls for a robust monitoring and warning system. Introducing Prometheus Cortex, a powerful addition to the Prometheus ecosystem that provides long-term, scalable storage along with sophisticated querying capabilities. Let’s take a closer look at Prometheus Cortex, going over all of its features, from its practical applications to its foundations.