Imagine a web application that logs all incoming requests and responses for and sends them to a central observability platform for debugging and analysis. Instead of adding the code to send the logs directly into the application, a sidecar service can be attached to handle this task separately. This enables the main application to focus on its primary function, while the sidecar takes care of the logging.
The sidecar pattern enables a cleaner and more modular architecture, separating concerns and improving the overall observability and manageability of applications.
Explore related concepts
ELK Stack
The ELK Stack is a set of three open-source tools: Elasticsearch, Logstash, and Kibana, used for log management and data visualization. It enables developers to collect, parse, store, and analyze large volumes of log data for troubleshooting and monitoring purposes.
Observability
Observability is the ability to understand how your application is working and behaving in production through telemetry data (logs, metrics, traces, wide events, etc.). It enables you detect, diagnose and resolve issues in your app before they impact your users and become problems.
Container
A container is a lightweight, standalone, and executable package that includes everything needed to run a program, including the code, runtime, system tools, system libraries, dependencies, and settings. It enables developers to run applications consistently across different environments.