info: To determine the technical writer assigned to the Stage/Group associated with this page, see https://about.gitlab.com/handbook/engineering/ux/technical-writing/#assignments
---
# Service Ping Guide **(FREE SELF)**
> Introduced in GitLab Ultimate 11.2, more statistics.
This guide describes Service Ping's purpose and how it's implemented.
For more information about Product Intelligence, see:
Service Ping is a process in GitLab that collects and sends a weekly payload to GitLab Inc.
The payload provides important high-level data that helps our product, support,
and sales teams understand how GitLab is used. For example, the data helps to:
- Compare counts month over month (or week over week) to get a rough sense for how an instance uses
different product features.
- Collect other facts that help us classify and understand GitLab installations.
- Calculate our Stage Monthly Active Users (SMAU), which helps to measure the success of our stages
and features.
Service Ping information is not anonymous. It's linked to the instance's hostname. However, it does
not contain project names, usernames, or any other specific data.
Sending a Service Ping payload is optional and can be [disabled](#disable-service-ping) on any self-managed instance.
When Service Ping is enabled, GitLab gathers data from the other instances
and can show your instance's usage statistics to your users.
### Terminology
We use the following terminology to describe the Service Ping components:
- **Service Ping**: the process that collects and generates a JSON payload.
- **Service Data**: the contents of the Service Ping JSON payload. This includes metrics.
- **Metrics**: primarily made up of row counts for different tables in an instance's database. Each
metric has a corresponding [metric definition](metrics_dictionary.md#metrics-definition-and-validation)
in a YAML file.
### Why should we enable Service Ping?
- The main purpose of Service Ping is to build a better GitLab. Data about how GitLab is used is collected to better understand feature/stage adoption and usage, which helps us understand how GitLab is adding value and helps our team better understand the reasons why people use GitLab and with this knowledge we're able to make better product decisions.
- As a benefit of having Service Ping active, GitLab lets you analyze the users' activities over time of your GitLab installation.
- As a benefit of having Service Ping active, GitLab provides you with The DevOps Report,which gives you an overview of your entire instance's adoption of Concurrent DevOps from planning to monitoring.
- You get better, more proactive support. (assuming that our TAMs and support organization used the data to deliver more value)
- You get insight and advice into how to get the most value out of your investment in GitLab. Wouldn't you want to know that a number of features or values are not being adopted in your organization?
- You get a report that illustrates how you compare against other similar organizations (anonymized), with specific advice and recommendations on how to improve your DevOps processes.
- Service Ping is enabled by default. To disable it, see [Disable Service Ping](#disable-service-ping).
- When Service Ping is enabled, you have the option to participate in our [Registration Features Program](#registration-features-program) and receive free paid features.
#### Registration Features Program
> Introduced in GitLab 14.1.
Starting with GitLab version 14.1, free self-managed users running [GitLab EE](../ee_features.md) can receive paid features by registering with GitLab and sending us activity data via [Service Ping](#what-is-service-ping).
The paid feature available in this offering is [Email from GitLab](../../tools/email.md).
Administrators can use this [Premium](https://about.gitlab.com/pricing/premium/) feature to streamline
their workflow by emailing all or some instance users directly from the Admin Area.
NOTE:
Registration is not yet required for participation, but will be added in a future milestone.
### Limitations
- Service Ping does not track frontend events things like page views, link clicks, or user sessions, and only focuses on aggregated backend events.
- Because of these limitations we recommend instrumenting your products with Snowplow for more detailed analytics on GitLab.com and use Service Ping to track aggregated backend events on self-managed.
## View the Service Ping payload **(FREE SELF)**
You can view the exact JSON payload sent to GitLab Inc. in the administration panel. To view the payload:
1. Sign in as a user with [Administrator](../../user/permissions.md) permissions.
1. On the top bar, select **Menu >****{admin}** **Admin**.
1. On the left sidebar, select **Settings > Metrics and profiling**.
1. Expand the **Usage statistics** section.
1. Select **Preview payload**.
For an example payload, see [Example Service Ping payload](#example-service-ping-payload).
## Disable Service Ping **(FREE SELF)**
NOTE:
The method to disable Service Ping in the GitLab configuration file does not work in
GitLab versions 9.3 to 13.12.3. See the [troubleshooting section](#cannot-disable-service-ping-using-the-configuration-file)
on how to disable it.
You can disable Service Ping either using the GitLab UI, or editing the GitLab
configuration file.
### Disable Service Ping using the UI
To disable Service Ping in the GitLab UI:
1. Sign in as a user with [Administrator](../../user/permissions.md) permissions.
1. On the top bar, select **Menu >****{admin}** **Admin**.
1. On the left sidebar, select **Settings > Metrics and profiling**.
1. Expand the **Usage statistics** section.
1. Clear the **Enable service ping** checkbox.
1. Select **Save changes**.
### Disable Service Ping using the configuration file
To disable Service Ping and prevent it from being configured in the future through
the admin area:
**For installations using the Linux package:**
1. Edit `/etc/gitlab/gitlab.rb`:
```ruby
gitlab_rails['usage_ping_enabled'] = false
```
1. Reconfigure GitLab:
```shell
sudo gitlab-ctl reconfigure
```
**For installations from source:**
1. Edit `/home/git/gitlab/config/gitlab.yml`:
```yaml
production: &base
# ...
gitlab:
# ...
usage_ping_enabled: false
```
1. Restart GitLab:
```shell
sudo service gitlab restart
```
## Service Ping request flow
The following example shows a basic request/response flow between a GitLab instance, the Versions Application, the License Application, Salesforce, the GitLab S3 Bucket, the GitLab Snowflake Data Warehouse, and Sisense:
```mermaid
sequenceDiagram
participant GitLab Instance
participant Versions Application
participant Licenses Application
participant Salesforce
participant S3 Bucket
participant Snowflake DW
participant Sisense Dashboards
GitLab Instance->>Versions Application: Send Service Ping
loop Process usage data
Versions Application->>Versions Application: Parse usage data
Versions Application->>Versions Application: Write to database
Versions Application->>Versions Application: Update license ping time
end
loop Process data for Salesforce
Versions Application-xLicenses Application: Request Zuora subscription id
Licenses Application-xVersions Application: Zuora subscription id
Versions Application-xSalesforce: Request Zuora account id by Zuora subscription id
Salesforce-xVersions Application: Zuora account id
Versions Application-xSalesforce: Usage data for the Zuora account
1. The Service Ping [cron job](https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab/-/blob/master/app/workers/gitlab_service_ping_worker.rb#L24) is set in Sidekiq to run weekly.
1. When the cron job runs, it calls [`Gitlab::UsageData.to_json`](https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab/-/blob/master/app/services/service_ping/submit_service.rb#L49).
1.`Gitlab::UsageData.to_json` [cascades down](https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab/-/blob/master/lib/gitlab/usage_data.rb) to ~400+ other counter method calls.
1. The response of all methods calls are [merged together](https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab/-/blob/master/lib/gitlab/usage_data.rb#L68) into a single JSON payload in `Gitlab::UsageData.to_json`.
1. The JSON payload is then [posted to the Versions application](https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab/-/blob/master/app/services/service_ping/submit_service.rb#L20)
and update existing business analysis artefacts to use `example_metric_without_archived` instead of `example_metric`
### 3. Deprecate a metric
If a metric is obsolete and you no longer use it, you can mark it as deprecated.
For an example of the metric deprecation process take a look at this [example merge request](https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab/-/merge_requests/59899)
To deprecate a metric:
1. Check the following YAML files and verify the metric is not used in an aggregate:
endpoint, and assure that test suite does not fail when metric that you wish to remove is not included into test payload.
1. Create an issue in the
[GitLab Data Team project](https://gitlab.com/gitlab-data/analytics/-/issues).
Ask for confirmation that the metric is not referred to in any SiSense dashboards and
can be safely removed from Service Ping. Use this
[example issue](https://gitlab.com/gitlab-data/analytics/-/issues/7539) for guidance.
This step can be skipped if verification done during [deprecation process](#3-deprecate-a-metric)
reported that metric is not required by any data transformation in Snowflake data warehouse nor it is
used by any of SiSense dashboards.
1. After you verify the metric can be safely removed,
update the attributes of the metric's YAML definition:
- Set the `status:` to `removed`.
- Set `milestone_removed:` to the number of the
milestone in which the metric was removed.
Do not remove the metric's YAML definition altogether. Some self-managed
instances might not immediately update to the latest version of GitLab, and
therefore continue to report the removed metric. The Product Intelligence team
requires a record of all removed metrics in order to identify and filter them.
For example please take a look at this [merge request](https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab/-/merge_requests/60149/diffs#b01f429a54843feb22265100c0e4fec1b7da1240_10_10).
1. After you verify the metric can be safely removed,
For example please take a look at this [merge request](https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab/-/merge_requests/60149/diffs#6335dc533bd21df26db9de90a02dd66278c2390d_167_167).
1. Remove any other records related to the metric:
- The feature flag YAML file at [`config/feature_flags/*/*.yaml`](https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab/-/tree/master/config/feature_flags).
- The entry in the known events YAML file at [`lib/gitlab/usage_data_counters/known_events/*.yaml`](https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab/-/tree/master/lib/gitlab/usage_data_counters/known_events).
1. Update the Metrics Dictionary following [guidelines instructions](dictionary.md).
## Implementing Service Ping
Service Ping consists of two kinds of data, counters and observations. Counters track how often a certain event
happened over time, such as how many CI pipelines have run. They are monotonic and always trend up.
Observations are facts collected from one or more GitLab instances and can carry arbitrary data. There are no
general guidelines around how to collect those, due to the individual nature of that data.
- **Ordinary Batch Counters:** Simple count of a given ActiveRecord_Relation
- **Distinct Batch Counters:** Distinct count of a given ActiveRecord_Relation in a given column
- **Sum Batch Counters:** Sum the values of a given ActiveRecord_Relation in a given column
- **Alternative Counters:** Used for settings and configurations
- **Redis Counters:** Used for in-memory counts.
NOTE:
Only use the provided counter methods. Each counter method contains a built in fail safe to isolate each counter to avoid breaking the entire Service Ping.
For large tables, PostgreSQL can take a long time to count rows due to MVCC [(Multi-version Concurrency Control)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multiversion_concurrency_control). Batch counting is a counting method where a single large query is broken into multiple smaller queries. For example, instead of a single query querying 1,000,000 records, with batch counting, you can execute 100 queries of 10,000 records each. Batch counting is useful for avoiding database timeouts as each batch query is significantly shorter than one single long running query.
For GitLab.com, there are extremely large tables with 15 second query timeouts, so we use batch counting to avoid encountering timeouts. Here are the sizes of some GitLab.com tables:
-`relation` the ActiveRecord_Relation to perform the count
-`column` the column to perform the distinct count, by default is the primary key
-`batch`: default `true` to use batch counting
-`batch_size`: if none set it uses default value 10000 from `Gitlab::Database::BatchCounter`
-`start`: custom start of the batch counting to avoid complex min calculations
-`end`: custom end of the batch counting to avoid complex min calculations
WARNING:
Counting over non-unique columns can lead to performance issues. Take a look at the [iterating tables in batches](../iterating_tables_in_batches.md) guide for more details.
Handles `::Redis::CommandError` and `Gitlab::UsageDataCounters::BaseCounter::UnknownEvent`
returns -1 when a block is sent or hash with all values -1 when a `counter(Gitlab::UsageDataCounters)` is sent
different behavior due to 2 different implementations of Redis counter
Method: `redis_usage_data(counter, &block)`
Arguments:
-`counter`: a counter from `Gitlab::UsageDataCounters`, that has `fallback_totals` method implemented
- or a `block`: which is evaluated
#### Ordinary Redis Counters
Examples of implementation:
- Using Redis methods [`INCR`](https://redis.io/commands/incr), [`GET`](https://redis.io/commands/get), and [`Gitlab::UsageDataCounters::WikiPageCounter`](https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab/-/blob/master/lib/gitlab/usage_data_counters/wiki_page_counter.rb)
- Using Redis methods [`HINCRBY`](https://redis.io/commands/hincrby), [`HGETALL`](https://redis.io/commands/hgetall), and [`Gitlab::UsageCounters::PodLogs`](https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab/-/blob/master/lib/gitlab/usage_counters/pod_logs.rb)
##### UsageData API Tracking
<!-- There's nearly identical content in `##### Adding new events`. If you fix errors here, you may need to fix the same errors in the other location. -->
1. Track event using `UsageData` API
Increment event count using ordinary Redis counter, for given event name.
Tracking events using the `UsageData` API requires the `usage_data_api` feature flag to be enabled, which is enabled by default.
API requests are protected by checking for a valid CSRF token.
To be able to increment the values, the related feature `usage_data_<event_name>` should be enabled.
```plaintext
POST /usage_data/increment_counter
```
| Attribute | Type | Required | Description |
| :-------- | :--- | :------- | :---------- |
| `event` | string | yes | The event name it should be tracked |
Response
-`200` if event was tracked
-`400 Bad request` if event parameter is missing
-`401 Unauthorized` if user is not authenticated
-`403 Forbidden` for invalid CSRF token provided
1. Track events using JavaScript/Vue API helper which calls the API above
Note that `usage_data_api` and `usage_data_#{event_name}` should be enabled to be able to track events
HyperLogLog (HLL) is a probabilistic algorithm and its **results always includes some small error**. According to [Redis documentation](https://redis.io/commands/pfcount), data from
used HLL implementation is "approximated with a standard error of 0.81%".
With `Gitlab::UsageDataCounters::HLLRedisCounter` we have available data structures used to count unique values.
Implemented using Redis methods [PFADD](https://redis.io/commands/pfadd) and [PFCOUNT](https://redis.io/commands/pfcount).
##### Adding new events
1. Define events in [`known_events`](https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab/-/blob/master/lib/gitlab/usage_data_counters/known_events/).
Example event:
```yaml
- name: users_creating_epics
category: epics_usage
redis_slot: users
aggregation: weekly
feature_flag: track_epics_activity
```
Keys:
-`name`: unique event name.
Name format for Redis HLL events `<name>_<redis_slot>`.
[See Metric name](metrics_dictionary.md#metric-name) for a complete guide on metric naming suggestion.
Consider including in the event's name the Redis slot to be able to count totals for a specific category.
Example names: `users_creating_epics`, `users_triggering_security_scans`.
-`category`: event category. Used for getting total counts for events in a category, for easier
access to a group of events.
-`redis_slot`: optional Redis slot. Default value: event name. Only event data that is stored in the same slot
can be aggregated. Ensure keys are in the same slot. For example:
`users_creating_epics` with `redis_slot: 'users'` builds Redis key
`{users}_creating_epics-2020-34`. If `redis_slot` is not defined the Redis key will
be `{users_creating_epics}-2020-34`.
Recommended slots to use are: `users`, `projects`. This is the value we count.
-`expiry`: expiry time in days. Default: 29 days for daily aggregation and 6 weeks for weekly
aggregation.
-`aggregation`: may be set to a `:daily` or `:weekly` key. Defines how counting data is stored in Redis.
Aggregation on a `daily` basis does not pull more fine grained data.
-`feature_flag`: optional `default_enabled: :yaml`. If no feature flag is set then the tracking is enabled. One feature flag can be used for multiple events. For details, see our [GitLab internal Feature flags](../feature_flags/index.md) documentation. The feature flags are owned by the group adding the event tracking.
1. Use one of the following methods to track the event:
- In the controller using the `RedisTracking` module and the following format:
- Using `track_usage_event(event_name, values)` in services and GraphQL.
Increment unique values count using Redis HLL, for a given event name.
Examples:
- [Track usage event for an incident in a service](https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab/-/blob/v13.8.3-ee/app/services/issues/update_service.rb#L66)
- [Track usage event for an incident in GraphQL](https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab/-/blob/v13.8.3-ee/app/graphql/mutations/alert_management/update_alert_status.rb#L16)
<!-- There's nearly identical content in `##### UsageData API Tracking`. If you find / fix errors here, you may need to fix errors in that section too. -->
Increment unique users count using Redis HLL, for a given event name.
To track events using the `UsageData` API, ensure the `usage_data_api` feature flag
is set to `default_enabled: true`. Enabled by default in GitLab 13.7 and later.
API requests are protected by checking for a valid CSRF token.
```plaintext
POST /usage_data/increment_unique_users
```
| Attribute | Type | Required | Description |
| :-------- | :--- | :------- | :---------- |
| `event` | string | yes | The event name to track |
Response:
-`200` if the event was tracked, or if tracking failed for any reason.
-`400 Bad request` if an event parameter is missing.
-`401 Unauthorized` if the user is not authenticated.
-`403 Forbidden` if an invalid CSRF token is provided.
- Using the JavaScript/Vue API helper, which calls the `UsageData` API.
To track events using the `UsageData` API, ensure the `usage_data_api` feature flag
is set to `default_enabled: true`. Enabled by default in GitLab 13.7 and later.
Example for an existing event already defined in [known events](https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab/-/blob/master/lib/gitlab/usage_data_counters/known_events/):
We have the following recommendations for [Adding new events](#adding-new-events):
- Event aggregation: weekly.
- Key expiry time:
- Daily: 29 days.
- Weekly: 42 days.
- When adding new metrics, use a [feature flag](../../operations/feature_flags.md) to control the impact.
- For feature flags triggered by another service, set `default_enabled: false`,
- Events can be triggered using the `UsageData` API, which helps when there are > 10 events per change
##### Enable/Disable Redis HLL tracking
Events are tracked behind optional [feature flags](../feature_flags/index.md) due to concerns for Redis performance and scalability.
For a full list of events and corresponding feature flags see, [known_events](https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab/-/blob/master/lib/gitlab/usage_data_counters/known_events/) files.
To enable or disable tracking for specific event in <https://gitlab.com> or <https://about.staging.gitlab.com>, run commands such as the following to
[enable or disable the corresponding feature](../feature_flags/index.md).
```shell
/chatops run feature set <feature_name> true
/chatops run feature set <feature_name> false
```
We can also disable tracking completely by using the global flag:
```shell
/chatops run feature set redis_hll_tracking true
/chatops run feature set redis_hll_tracking false
```
##### Known events are added automatically in Service Data payload
All events added in [`known_events/common.yml`](https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab/-/blob/master/lib/gitlab/usage_data_counters/known_events/common.yml) are automatically added to Service Data generation under the `redis_hll_counters` key. This column is stored in [version-app as a JSON](https://gitlab.com/gitlab-services/version-gitlab-com/-/blob/master/db/schema.rb#L209).
For each event we add metrics for the weekly and monthly time frames, and totals for each where applicable:
-`#{event_name}_weekly`: Data for 7 days for daily [aggregation](#adding-new-events) events and data for the last complete week for weekly [aggregation](#adding-new-events) events.
-`#{event_name}_monthly`: Data for 28 days for daily [aggregation](#adding-new-events) events and data for the last 4 complete weeks for weekly [aggregation](#adding-new-events) events.
Redis HLL implementation calculates automatic total metrics, if there are more than one metric for the same category, aggregation, and Redis slot.
-`#{category}_total_unique_counts_weekly`: Total unique counts for events in the same category for the last 7 days or the last complete week, if events are in the same Redis slot and we have more than one metric.
-`#{category}_total_unique_counts_monthly`: Total unique counts for events in same category for the last 28 days or the last 4 complete weeks, if events are in the same Redis slot and we have more than one metric.
Your Rails console returns the generated SQL queries.
Example:
```ruby
pry(main)> Gitlab::UsageData.count(User.active)
(2.6ms) SELECT "features"."key" FROM "features"
(15.3ms) SELECT MIN("users"."id") FROM "users" WHERE ("users"."state" IN ('active')) AND ("users"."user_type" IS NULL OR "users"."user_type" IN (6, 4))
(2.4ms) SELECT MAX("users"."id") FROM "users" WHERE ("users"."state" IN ('active')) AND ("users"."user_type" IS NULL OR "users"."user_type" IN (6, 4))
(1.9ms) SELECT COUNT("users"."id") FROM "users" WHERE ("users"."state" IN ('active')) AND ("users"."user_type" IS NULL OR "users"."user_type" IN (6, 4)) AND "users"."id" BETWEEN 1 AND 100000
```
### 4. Optimize queries with #database-lab
Paste the SQL query into `#database-lab` to see how the query performs at scale.
-`#database-lab` is a Slack channel which uses a production-sized environment to test your queries.
- GitLab.com's production database has a 15 second timeout.
- Any single query must stay below [1 second execution time](../query_performance.md#timing-guidelines-for-queries) with cold caches.
- Add a specialized index on columns involved to reduce the execution time.
To have an understanding of the query's execution we add in the MR description the following information:
- For counters that have a `time_period` test we add information for both cases:
-`time_period = {}` for all time periods
-`time_period = { created_at: 28.days.ago..Time.current }` for last 28 days period
- Execution plan and query time before and after optimization
- Query generated for the index and time
- Migration output for up and down execution
We also use `#database-lab` and [explain.depesz.com](https://explain.depesz.com/). For more details, see the [database review guide](../database_review.md#preparation-when-adding-or-modifying-queries).
#### Optimization recommendations and examples
- Use specialized indexes [example 1](https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab/-/merge_requests/26871), [example 2](https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab/-/merge_requests/26445).
- Use defined `start` and `finish`, and simple queries. These values can be memoized and reused, [example](https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab/-/merge_requests/37155).
- Avoid joins and write the queries as simply as possible, [example](https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab/-/merge_requests/36316).
- Set a custom `batch_size` for `distinct_count`, [example](https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab/-/merge_requests/38000).
When adding, updating, or removing metrics, please update the [Metrics Dictionary](dictionary.md).
### 6. Add new metric to Versions Application
Check if new metrics need to be added to the Versions Application. See `usage_data` [schema](https://gitlab.com/gitlab-services/version-gitlab-com/-/blob/master/db/schema.rb#L147) and Service Data [parameters accepted](https://gitlab.com/gitlab-services/version-gitlab-com/-/blob/master/app/services/usage_ping.rb). Any metrics added under the `counts` key are saved in the `stats` column.
### 7. Add the feature label
Add the `feature` label to the Merge Request for new Service Ping metrics. These are user-facing changes and are part of expanding the Service Ping feature.
### 8. Add a changelog
Ensure you comply with the [Changelog entries guide](../changelog.md).
### 9. Ask for a Product Intelligence Review
On GitLab.com, we have DangerBot set up to monitor Product Intelligence related files and DangerBot recommends a [Product Intelligence review](review_guidelines.md).
### 10. Verify your metric
On GitLab.com, the Product Intelligence team regularly [monitors Service Ping](https://gitlab.com/groups/gitlab-org/-/epics/6000).
They may alert you that your metrics need further optimization to run quicker and with greater success.
The Service Ping JSON payload for GitLab.com is shared in the
[#g_product_intelligence](https://gitlab.slack.com/archives/CL3A7GFPF) Slack channel every week.
You may also use the [Service Ping QA dashboard](https://app.periscopedata.com/app/gitlab/632033/Usage-Ping-QA) to check how well your metric performs. The dashboard allows filtering by GitLab version, by "Self-managed" & "SaaS" and shows you how many failures have occurred for each metric. Whenever you notice a high failure rate, you may re-optimize your metric.
### Service Ping local setup
To set up Service Ping locally, you must:
1. [Set up local repositories](#set-up-local-repositories).
1. [Test local setup](#test-local-setup).
1. (Optional) [Test Prometheus-based Service Ping](#test-prometheus-based-service-ping).
#### Set up local repositories
1. Clone and start [GitLab](https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab-development-kit).
1. Clone and start [Versions Application](https://gitlab.com/gitlab-services/version-gitlab-com).
Make sure to run `docker-compose up` to start a PostgreSQL and Redis instance.
1. Point GitLab to the Versions Application endpoint instead of the default endpoint:
1. Open [service_ping/submit_service.rb](https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab/-/blob/master/app/services/service_ping/submit_service.rb#L5) in your local and modified `PRODUCTION_URL`.
- [`gitlab-exporter`](https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab-exporter): Exports process metrics
from various GitLab components.
- Other various GitLab services, such as Sidekiq and the Rails server, which export their own metrics.
#### Test with an Omnibus container
This is the recommended approach to test Prometheus based Service Ping.
The easiest way to verify your changes is to build a new Omnibus image from your code branch by using CI, then download the image
and run a local container instance:
1. From your merge request, click on the `qa` stage, then trigger the `package-and-qa` job. This job triggers an Omnibus
build in a [downstream pipeline of the `omnibus-gitlab-mirror` project](https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/build/omnibus-gitlab-mirror/-/pipelines).
1. In the downstream pipeline, wait for the `gitlab-docker` job to finish.
1. Open the job logs and locate the full container name including the version. It takes the following form: `registry.gitlab.com/gitlab-org/build/omnibus-gitlab-mirror/gitlab-ee:<VERSION>`.
1. On your local machine, make sure you are signed in to the GitLab Docker registry. You can find the instructions for this in
[Authenticate to the GitLab Container Registry](../../user/packages/container_registry/index.md#authenticate-with-the-container-registry).
1. Once signed in, download the new image by using `docker pull registry.gitlab.com/gitlab-org/build/omnibus-gitlab-mirror/gitlab-ee:<VERSION>`
1. For more information about working with and running Omnibus GitLab containers in Docker, please refer to [GitLab Docker images](https://docs.gitlab.com/omnibus/docker/README.html) in the Omnibus documentation.
#### Test with GitLab development toolkits
This is the less recommended approach, because it comes with a number of difficulties when emulating a real GitLab deployment.
The [GDK](https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab-development-kit) is not set up to run a Prometheus server or `node_exporter` alongside other GitLab components. If you would
like to do so, [Monitoring the GDK with Prometheus](https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab-development-kit/-/blob/main/doc/howto/prometheus/index.md#monitoring-the-gdk-with-prometheus) is a good start.
The [GCK](https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab-compose-kit) has limited support for testing Prometheus based Service Ping.
By default, it already comes with a fully configured Prometheus service that is set up to scrape a number of components,
but with the following limitations:
- It does not run a `gitlab-exporter` instance, so several `process_*` metrics from services such as Gitaly may be missing.
- While it runs a `node_exporter`, `docker-compose` services emulate hosts, meaning that it would normally report itself to not be associated
with any of the other services that are running. That is not how node metrics are reported in a production setup, where `node_exporter`
always runs as a process alongside other GitLab components on any given node. From Service Ping's perspective none of the node data would therefore
appear to be associated to any of the services running, because they all appear to be running on different hosts. To alleviate this problem, the `node_exporter` in GCK was arbitrarily "assigned" to the `web` service, meaning only for this service `node_*` metrics appears in Service Ping.
## Aggregated metrics
> - [Introduced](https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab/-/merge_requests/45979) in GitLab 13.6.
WARNING:
This feature is intended solely for internal GitLab use.
To add data for aggregated metrics into Service Ping payload you should add corresponding definition at [`config/metrics/aggregates/*.yaml`](https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab/-/blob/master/config/metrics/aggregates/) for metrics available at Community Edition and at [`ee/config/metrics/aggregates/*.yaml`](https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab/-/blob/master/ee/config/metrics/aggregates/) for Enterprise Edition ones.
Each aggregate definition includes following parts:
-`name`: Unique name under which the aggregate metric is added to the Service Ping payload.
-`operator`: Operator that defines how the aggregated metric data is counted. Available operators are:
-`OR`: Removes duplicates and counts all entries that triggered any of listed events.
-`AND`: Removes duplicates and counts all elements that were observed triggering all of following events.
-`time_frame`: One or more valid time frames. Use these to limit the data included in aggregated metric to events within a specific date-range. Valid time frames are:
-`7d`: Last seven days of data.
-`28d`: Last twenty eight days of data.
-`all`: All historical data, only available for `database` sourced aggregated metrics.
-`source`: Data source used to collect all events data included in aggregated metric. Valid data sources are:
-`feature_flag`: Name of [development feature flag](../feature_flags/index.md#development-type)
that is checked before metrics aggregation is performed. Corresponding feature flag
should have `default_enabled` attribute set to `false`. The `feature_flag` attribute
is optional and can be omitted. When `feature_flag` is missing, no feature flag is checked.
Example aggregated metric entries:
```yaml
- name: example_metrics_union
operator: OR
events:
- 'users_expanding_secure_security_report'
- 'users_expanding_testing_code_quality_report'
- 'users_expanding_testing_accessibility_report'
source: redis
time_frame:
- 7d
- 28d
- name: example_metrics_intersection
operator: AND
source: database
time_frame:
- 28d
- all
events:
- 'dependency_scanning_pipeline_all_time'
- 'container_scanning_pipeline_all_time'
feature_flag: example_aggregated_metric
```
Aggregated metrics collected in `7d` and `28d` time frames are added into Service Ping payload under the `aggregated_metrics` sub-key in the `counts_weekly` and `counts_monthly` top level keys.
```ruby
{
:counts_monthly => {
:deployments => 1003,
:successful_deployments => 78,
:failed_deployments => 275,
:packages => 155,
:personal_snippets => 2106,
:project_snippets => 407,
:promoted_issues => 719,
:aggregated_metrics => {
:example_metrics_union => 7,
:example_metrics_intersection => 2
},
:snippets => 2513
}
}
```
Aggregated metrics for `all` time frame are present in the `count` top level key, with the `aggregate_` prefix added to their name.
For example:
`example_metrics_intersection`
Becomes:
`counts.aggregate_example_metrics_intersection`
```ruby
{
:counts => {
:deployments => 11003,
:successful_deployments => 178,
:failed_deployments => 1275,
:aggregate_example_metrics_intersection => 12
}
}
```
### Redis sourced aggregated metrics
> - [Introduced](https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab/-/merge_requests/45979) in GitLab 13.6.
To declare the aggregate of events collected with [Redis HLL Counters](#redis-hll-counters),
you must fulfill the following requirements:
1. All events listed at `events` attribute must come from
To declare the aggregate of metrics collected with [Estimated Batch Counters](#estimated-batch-counters),
you must fulfill the following requirements:
- Metrics names listed in the `events:` attribute, have to use the same names you passed in the `metric_name` argument while persisting metrics in previous step.
- Every metric listed in the `events:` attribute, has to be persisted for **every** selected `time_frame:` value.
In GitLab 13.5, `pg_system_id` was added to send the [PostgreSQL system identifier](https://www.2ndquadrant.com/en/blog/support-for-postgresqls-system-identifier-in-barman/).
## Exporting Service Ping SQL queries and definitions
Two Rake tasks exist to export Service Ping definitions.
- The Rake tasks export the raw SQL queries for `count`, `distinct_count`, `sum`.
- The Rake tasks export the Redis counter class or the line of the Redis block for `redis_usage_data`.
- The Rake tasks calculate the `alt_usage_data` metrics.
In the home directory of your local GitLab installation run the following Rake tasks for the YAML and JSON versions respectively:
