The DOI matches its Crossref record; 75 of the 75 references it cites were found in a registry or an index.
A Survey on Observability of Distributed Edge & Container-Based Microservices
Open accessAbstract
Edge computing is proposed as a technical enabler for meeting emerging network technologies (such as 5G and Industrial Internet of Things), stringent application requirements and key performance indicators (KPIs). It aims to alleviate the problems associated with centralized cloud computing systems by placing computational resources to the network’s edge, closer to the users. However, the complexity of distributed edge infrastructures grows when hosting containerized workloads as microservices, resulting in hard to detect and troubleshoot outages on critical use cases such as industrial automation processes. Observability aims to support operators in managing and operating complex distributed infrastructures and microservices architectures by instrumenting end-to-end runtime performance. To the best of our knowledge, no survey article has been recently proposed for distributed edge and containerized microservices observability. Thus, this article surveys and classifies state-of-the-art solutions from various communities. Besides surveying state-of-the-art, this article also discusses the observability concept, requirements, and design considerations. Finally, we discuss open research issues as well as future research directions that will inspire additional research in this area.
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“However, these scalability and resource efficiency benefits obtained through adoption of the MSA come at a cost of increased operational complexity in terms of monitoring and observability [4].”
From Toward Context-Aware Anomaly Detection for AIOps in Microservices Using Dynamic Knowledge Graphs (2026) · cites this paper as [4]
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Citations
Cites
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Cited by
Sorted by citations
Items 101–124 of 124
Understanding the Energy Observability of Microservice Applications in edge-cloud environments
Hussain, M. M., Muslim, A., & Recker, S. (2025) · IEEE International Conference on Cyber Security and Cloud Computing / IEEE International Conference on Edge Computing and Scalable Cloud (CSCloud/EdgeCom) · doi:10.1109/edgecom66327.2025.00020
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“Microservice architecture has gained widespread popularity in a wide range of domains, driven by its distinct advantages [1].”
A Novel End-to-End AI-Driven Onboard Observability Framework for Vehicular TCU
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“…complexity has also been highlighted in recent surveys on observability for distributed edge and container-based microservice environments, which identify telemetry as a foundational capability for understanding and operating highly heterogeneous and distributed infrastructures, Usman et al. [6].”
Resilient IIoT Communication via Edge-Based Store-and-Forward and SLO Monitoring
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“However, integrating OT and IT layers introduces strong dependency on WAN connectivity, creating a critical point of failure [Usman et al. 2022, Jammes et al. 2014].”
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“Similarly, Usman et al. [Usman et al. 2022] conducted a comprehensive study on distributed IT environments and microservices observability, aiming to identify challenges, requirements, best practices, and existing solutions for monitoring distributed systems.”
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PRISM: Cross-Layer Observability Framework for Mobile Core Networks
Samarakoon, S., Mohan, N., & Kuipers, F. A. (2026) · IFIP Networking Conference (IFIP Networking) · doi:10.23919/ifipnetworking70592.2026.11579127
Fusion Collector: QoS-Aware Multi-Tenant Telemetry Ingestion for Opentelemetry
Stylos, A., Tzanettis, I., Kakkavas, G., Mountakis, G., Zafeiropoulos, A., & Papavassiliou, S. (2026) · doi:10.1109/ict70370.2026.11594688
“Observability has become a fundamental capability for operating cloud-native infrastructures and microservice applications, enabling operators to monitor performance, diagnose failures, and maintain system reliability through timely incident response [1].”
Usman, M., Maqbool, B., & Iqbal, M. (2026) · International Journal of Human-Computer Interaction · doi:10.1080/10447318.2026.2701961
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Self-citationK-Sense: A Non-Invasive eBPF Framework For QoS Inference
Muslim, A., Aydenlou, A. B., & Recker, S. (2026) · IEEE International Conference on Fog and Edge Computing (ICFEC) · doi:10.1109/icfec69006.2026.00008
“From an operational perspective, edge and cloud platforms often host applications that cannot be modified or fully observed, such as proprietary binaries or workloads owned by independent stakeholders [3].”
Gardashova, L. A., & Mirzazada, A. (2026) · Himičeskaâ tehnologiâ. Kontrolʹ i upravlenie/Chemical Technology. Control and Management · doi:10.59048/2181-1105.1804
Monitoring and comparative analysis of containerized environments
Omarbekova, A., Kussepova, L., Zulkhazhav, A., Altaibek, M., Bekmanova, G., Nazyrova, A., & Lamasheva, Z. (2026) · Frontiers in Computer Science · doi:10.3389/fcomp.2026.1886850
Zhao, A., Desnoes, F., Fajjari, I., & Aitsaadi, N. (2026) · IEEE/IFIP Network Operations and Management Symposium (NOMS) · doi:10.1109/noms69089.2026.11668399
“Observability is composed of three pillars: logs, metrics and distributed tracing [2].”
Vejendla, K. K., Chang, K. (., Aly, S., & Maeng, B. (2026) · Cybersecurity Pedagogy and Practice Journal · doi:10.62273/gpys1669
Machine Learning Observability in Practice
Leest, J., Gerostathopoulos, I., Lago, P., & Raibulet, C. (2026) · IEEE/ACM International Conference on AI Engineering – Software Engineering for AI (CAIN) · doi:10.1145/3793653.3793771
“At its core, monitoring is enabled through observability [14, 40, 41, 46, 60] – the ability to measure and understand a system’s behavior during operation [29, 60].”
Hettiarachchi, H. K. P., & Jayasena, K. P. N. (2026) · Moratuwa Engineering Research Conference (MERCon) · doi:10.1109/mercon71835.2026.11691540
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Beyond Hardware Mixers: A Resilient Cloud-Native Architecture for Real-Time Remote Video Production
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AI-Enhanced Monitoring and Failure Prevention in Distributed Systems: A Systematic Literature Review
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Anche, S. K. (2026) · Technology and Innovation Conference (TIC) · doi:10.1109/tic68483.2026.11703021
“Observability is becoming a common process that relates to the connection of metrics, logs, and traces in order to gain insights into the context in which these elements were created; This topic has been extensively researched in distributed systems at scale [1]– [3].”
Vorontsov, Y., Калач, А. В., & Золотарев, Ю. Н. (2026) · Modelirovanie, optimizaciâ i informacionnye tehnologii. · doi:10.26102/2310-6018/2026.61.10.020
Metadata
- Authors
- Usman, M., Ferlin, S., Brunstrom, A., & Taheri, J.
- Affiliations
- Karlstad University (SE)
- Department of Computer Science, Karlstad University, Karlstad, Sweden
- Venue
- IEEE Access
- Published
- 2022
- Volume
- 10
- Pages
- 86904-86919
- ISSN
- 2169-3536 (ISSN-L)
- OpenAlex
- W4286544722
- Cited by
- 124
- References
- 75
- Citations by year
- 2026: 23 · 2025: 48 · 2024: 29 · 2023: 22 · 2022: 2
- FWCI
- 11.20
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- gold
- doi.org
- Locations
- IEEE Access (publishedVersion, cc-by)
- Digitala vetenskapliga arkivet (Diva) (Karlstad University) (submittedVersion, other-oa)
- DOAJ (DOAJ: Directory of Open Access Journals) (submittedVersion, cc-by-sa)
- Funders
- Knowledge Foundation of Sweden (KKS) through the Synergy Project AIDA—A Holistic AI-Driven Networking and Processing Framework for Industrial IoT (Rek:20200067)
- Topics
- Physical Sciences › Computer Science › Computer Networks and Communications › Software System Performance and Reliability
- Physical Sciences › Computer Science › Computer Networks and Communications › IoT and Edge/Fog Computing
- Physical Sciences › Computer Science › Information Systems › Cloud Computing and Resource Management
- Keywords
- observability, edge computing, microservices, containerization, distributed systems, industrial automation, 5G, Industrial Internet of Things
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