Migrate Kubernetes monitoring from AppOptics to SolarWinds Observability SaaS

If you are currently monitoring Kubernetes (K8s) with AppOptics, the AppOptics Snap Agent is installed on a K8s cluster or pod and it provides basic information about the K8s host. However, SolarWinds Observability SaaS offers native, first-class Kubernetes monitoring based on an OpenTelemetry collector. The SolarWinds Observability SaaS K8s collector gathers a broad set of metrics from the K8s namespaces, K8s nodes, and K8s pods within each cluster. With this data, it provides an overall view of all monitored Kubernetes entities, as well as specific information about each cluster. It summarizes the data collected from each cluster to provide an assessment of that cluster's health, and it shows detailed information about the cluster and related entities that could affect its performance.

To begin monitoring K8s with SolarWinds Observability SaaS:

1. Uninstall the AppOptics Snap Agent:

   • On Windows, use the Programs and Features Control Panel to uninstall the agent.

   • On Linux, use the following commands:

     • For deb-based systems:

       sudo apt-get remove solarwinds-snap-agent

       Configuration files remain on deb-based systems after the Snap Agent is uninstalled. Do not remove these manually. To remove all configuration files from your system after you uninstall the Snap Agent, run the following command:

       sudo apt-get remove --purge solarwinds-snap-agent

     • For RPM-based systems:

       sudo yum erase solarwinds-snap-agent

2. Deploy the SolarWinds Observability SaaS K8s collector by following the instructions in Add a Kubernetes cluster.

When the SolarWinds Observability SaaS K8s collector is deployed, SolarWinds Observability SaaS displays K8s metrics, and the Kubernetes summary page displays information about clusters. The collector runs only on daemonsets. SolarWinds Observability SaaS doesn't have a sidecar option like the AppOptics Snap agent.

By default, log collection is enabled only for namespaces prefixed by kube-. Log configuration can be changed in the values.yaml file. Events collection is enabled by default, but it can be disabled or reconfigured in the events section of the values.yaml file.

Click a cluster name to open the Cluster detail page, which displays with data about the K9s cluster and related entities.

For more information about monitored K8s information, see Kubernetes monitoring and Kubernetes area overview.