A checkout request passes through an API gateway, an order service and a payment service. The team needs to see the full timeline of one slow request across all of these components. Which Application Insights capability provides this?
Show answer and explanation
Answer: A
The end-to-end transaction view in Application Insights correlates telemetry using operation IDs and parent IDs that are propagated through HTTP headers. It shows the sequence and duration of calls across the gateway, order service and payment service, so the slow step stands out. Custom metrics aggregate numbers over time, performance counters report machine-level values, and exception search lists failures without the surrounding call chain.
Why the other options are wrong
- B. Custom metrics record numeric values chosen by the developer, such as orders per minute. They are aggregated over time and do not follow a single request from one service to the next.
- C. Performance counters report host-level values such as CPU and memory on each machine. They cannot connect one checkout request to the calls made by other services.
- D. Exception search lists failures and their stack traces. It shows where an error was thrown but not the timeline of successful calls that led to a slow request.