Introduction
When I started my very first Azure Integration Services project, I felt a mix of excitement and nervous energy.
The goal sounded straightforward on paper: connect on-premises systems like NAV, WinDMS, and TMS with modern cloud apps like Salesforce.
As the architect, I was eager to design elegant workflows using Logic Apps, Service Bus, and API Management.
My whiteboard diagrams looked beautiful, and I thought the hardest part—figuring out how all the pieces fit together—was done.
Then we went live.
Within days, strange things began to happen.
A Service Bus queue silently ballooned overnight.
A partner API changed its response format without warning.
Hybrid connections to NAV would occasionally drop for no obvious reason.
Our carefully planned system was working, but we were often flying blind.
Every incident felt like chasing shadows.
That’s when I discovered the real heroes of cloud integration: Monitoring and Observability.
They weren’t just fancy dashboards or optional add-ons.
They were the difference between reacting to problems in panic and confidently understanding what was happening inside the system—even when nobody had planned for it.
In this post, I’ll share what that project taught me :
- what monitoring and observability actually mean,
- why both are essential for Azure Integration Services,
- how to set them up, follow best practices, and manage costs,
- and how they help you sleep better at night when critical integrations are running across cloud and on-prem systems.
If you’re about to build your first Azure integration—or already running one—these lessons could save you countless hours of guesswork and frustration.
Monitoring: Your Cloud’s Early Warning System
Let’s start with the simpler of the two.
Think of monitoring as your home’s security alarm.
You define a set of conditions (“if a window opens after midnight, sound the alarm”) and the system alerts you when those conditions are met.
In Azure Integration Services, monitoring typically includes:
- Logic Apps: Tracking run success/failure, duration, and retries.
- Service Bus: Watching queue length and dead-letter messages.
- API Management: Monitoring request counts, response times, and error rates.
- Azure Functions: Tracking CPU usage, execution time, and failure counts.
Monitoring answers a straightforward question:
“Is something wrong right now?”
It is reactive but essential.
During my first project, Azure Monitor alerts saved us more than once.
When a Service Bus queue crossed a set threshold, we received an instant email.
That gave us time to scale up consumers before transactions were delayed.
Observability: Becoming the Detective
Monitoring tells you something broke, Observability helps you figure out why.
If monitoring is the smoke detector, observability is the fire investigator.
It gives you access to logs, metrics, and traces—all the clues you need to diagnose problems, even those you didn’t anticipate.
In AIS, observability might mean:
- Tracing a single transaction from NAV → Service Bus → Logic App → Azure Function → Salesforce.
- Using Application Insights to query failures across multiple services.
- Correlating latency spikes with network outages or downstream throttling.
Observability answers deeper questions:
- “Why did the Logic App fail for only certain messages?”
- “Which dependency slowed down the API call?”
Why Observability Matters
In hybrid integrations, unknown issues are inevitable:
- A partner system updates its API without notice.
- A VPN tunnel introduces intermittent latency.
- A Function timeout occurs only for large payloads.
With observability in place, you can explore and investigate in real time instead of guessing.
Monitoring vs. Observability: Two Sides of the Same Coin
| Monitoring | Observability |
|---|---|
| Predefined rules and alerts | Open-ended exploration |
| Answers “Is something wrong?” | Answers “Why is it wrong?” |
| Reactive | Diagnostic and proactive |
| Ideal for known issues | Critical for unknown or complex issues |
The takeaway? You need both.
Monitoring alerts you to trouble; observability helps you fix it fast.
Should You Use Them? - Absolutely Yes!
Some teams ask if monitoring and observability are “optional,” especially when budgets are tight.
My answer is simple: skipping them is like driving at night without headlights.
Here’s why:
- Reduced Downtime: Early alerts prevent small hiccups from becoming outages.
- Faster Troubleshooting: Observability shortens incident resolution from hours to minutes.
- Customer Trust: Users care about reliability, not just features.
- Operational Insights: Data from monitoring feeds capacity planning and cost optimization.
Even in small projects, the return on investment is huge compared to the cost of prolonged outages or lost data.
How to Implement Monitoring and Observability in Azure Integration Services
The good news is Azure provides built-in tools.
Here’s a practical roadmap drawn from my own projects.
1. Start With Azure Monitor
Azure Monitor collects metrics (CPU, memory, queue length) and logs (resource health, activity logs).
Use it to:
- Set up alerts on key metrics like Logic App failures or Service Bus queue growth.
- Create dashboards to visualize overall health.
2. Add Application Insights
For deep telemetry and distributed tracing:
- Enable Application Insights on Logic Apps and Functions.
- Use correlation IDs to trace a single message across services.
- Write custom events to capture business-specific data (e.g., transaction IDs).
3. Leverage Log Analytics
Combine logs from multiple sources:
- Query failures using Kusto Query Language (KQL).
- Correlate on-premises logs (via agents) with cloud telemetry.
4. Use API Management Analytics
APIM provides built-in reports on API calls, response times, and errors.
These insights help identify abusive patterns or performance bottlenecks.
5. Don’t Forget Hybrid Connectivity
If you’re integrating on-premises systems:
- Monitor Hybrid Connections or On-Premises Data Gateway status.
- Collect logs from VPN or ExpressRoute for full visibility.
Best Practices I Learned the Hard Way
Add correlation IDs and structured logging in every Logic App and Function.
Retrofitting is painful.
2.Balance Signal and Noise
Too many alerts lead to “alert fatigue.”
Prioritize business-critical metrics and tune thresholds.
Logs may contain sensitive info.
Use Azure Key Vault for secrets and enable data masking where possible.
Use Logic Apps to auto-notify teams in Teams or Slack, or even trigger remediation (like restarting a Function).
5.Control Costs
Application Insights can generate a lot of data.
- Adjust sampling rates.
- Set retention policies (e.g., 30–90 days).
- Use Daily Cap to limit unexpected charges.
Don’t wait for a real failure.
Simulate incidents to make sure alerts and dashboards behave as expected.
As integrations evolve, update thresholds, retention settings, and telemetry fields.
How Monitoring & Observability Help in Daily Operations
After implementing these practices in my first project, the difference was night and day:
- Faster Incident Response: When a Logic App failed due to malformed TMS data, we traced the root cause in minutes instead of hours.
- Capacity Planning: Queue length data helped forecast peak loads and scale resources efficiently.
- Performance Tuning: Detailed traces revealed a slow API call in Salesforce, which we optimized to cut processing time by 40%.
These weren’t just technical wins.
They improved business outcomes—fewer missed transactions, happier customers, and lower operational stress.
Cost Considerations
One of the most common questions I hear is: “How much will this cost?”
The answer depends on data volume, retention, and sampling.
Here’s a rough guide as of 2025 pricing(always check Azure’s calculator for updates):
| Service | Typical Pricing Model | |
|---|---|---|
| Azure Monitor | $2.76 per GB of ingested data | |
| Application Insights | $2.76 per GB + optional multi-step web tests | |
| Log Analytics | $2.76 per GB | |
| API Management Analytics | Included in APIM tier |
Tips to Control Costs
- Use sampling in Application Insights to collect only a percentage of telemetry during peak loads.
- Set data retention to match your compliance needs (e.g., 30 days for ops, longer for audits).
- Regularly review unused dashboards and queries.
Key Takeaways From the Trenches
1.Monitoring tells you when to worry. Observability tells you where to look.One without the other is like having a smoke detector but no flashlight.
2.Plan early, not after go-live.
Adding telemetry after deployment is painful and expensive.
3.Culture matters.
Tools alone don’t create reliability.
Encourage collaboration between developers and operations.
4.Costs are manageable.
With smart sampling and retention policies, you can get enterprise-grade insights without breaking the bank.
Final Word
My first Azure Integration project taught me a lesson I carry into every engagement:
Visibility is not optional.
Whether you’re integrating NAV with Salesforce or connecting dozens of global partners, monitoring and observability are the backbone of reliable cloud systems.
- Monitoring gives you the immediate signal that something’s wrong.
- Observability gives you the power to diagnose, fix, and prevent future issues.
Invest in both from day one.
Your future self—and your business stakeholders—will thank you when the inevitable 2 a.m. alert arrives and you already know exactly where to look.
Next Steps
If you’re starting an Azure Integration Services project today:
- Enable Azure Monitor and Application Insights on every resource.
- Define a core set of metrics and alerts tied to business outcomes.
- Create a retention and cost plan before data starts flowing.
- Foster a DevOps culture where developers own not just code but also system health.
It might feel like extra work up front, but take it from someone who learned the hard way:
Monitoring and observability are the headlights that let you drive safely in the cloud.
It’s not enough to build a system—you need to see inside it 😎.
Related posts
- How to use Logic app Run History | How to troubleshoot Logic App workflow execution
- Logic App and Slack - Sending messages to slack channel | Logic app and slack integration | Connecting Logic App to Slack channel
- Getting Started with Logic Apps - What happened to the Request? | Tracking and Monitoring Logic App request