Module 8. Production-Ready Spring Boot: Actuator, Metrics, Observability

Module goal

Learn to prepare a Spring Boot service for production: monitoring, health checks, metrics, and operational basics.

What we cover

• Why Actuator is required in real systems.
• Which endpoints are essential for production.
• How to build a minimal observability strategy.

Step 1. Add Actuator

implementation 'org.springframework.boot:spring-boot-starter-actuator'

Step 2. Core endpoints

• /actuator/health - service health state.
• /actuator/info - service metadata.
• /actuator/metrics - application metrics.
• /actuator/prometheus - metrics scrape endpoint.

Step 3. Configuration

management.endpoints.web.exposure.include=health,info,metrics,prometheus
management.endpoint.health.show-details=when_authorized

Step 4. Minimal production pipeline

1. Service exposes /actuator/health.
2. Orchestrator/LB uses health checks.
3. Prometheus scrapes /actuator/prometheus.
4. Grafana visualizes latency, errors, throughput.

Step 5. First metrics to track

• Response time (p95/p99).
• Error rate (4xx/5xx).
• Database load.
• Memory and garbage collection.

Common mistakes

• Exposing all actuator endpoints publicly.
• No alerting for critical metrics.
• Treating logs, metrics, and traces as separate disconnected systems.

Mini homework

1. Add Actuator to the project.
2. Restrict exposed endpoints.
3. Run local Prometheus + Grafana and build 2-3 dashboards.

Final course checklist

• I understand Spring Framework architecture.
• I can use DI and auto-configuration intentionally.
• I can design REST APIs with validation and error handling.
• I can use JPA while watching performance.
• I can make services observable and production-ready.