Most Rails engineers know the basics of database performance. They know that if a query is slow, an index may be the solution. Some know the trade-offs between having and not having an index. Or why an index on a low-cardinality column might not help. But everyone is surprised when ... Read more

Donald Knuth wrote an often quoted paper in the 70s which is still referenced when talking about performance in web apps today. Premature optimization is the root of all evil. In my line of work, it is sometimes invoked as a sort of apology; an excuse for why more time ... Read more

Let's get the confusing part out of the way: we're going to get a little "meta". This post is about using one performance tool (Stackprof) to improve another performance tool (Scout's Rails Agent) so Scout can diagnose a common performance pitfall (N+1 queries). Did I just put "performance" in a ... Read more

Teaser for a soon-to-be released capability: Overview metrics for all your background jobs Chart throughput, latency, error rate, and more. Detailed drill-down on slow jobs See what's making the job slow, identify N+1 queries, and more. Tech preview - want in? Background job monitoring currently supports sidekiq, and is tech ... Read more

Most Ruby developers use Git for their version control system of choice. Git is a wonderful tool that can save you countless hours of lost productivity and makes collaborating with others a cinch. Git's distributed nature also allows devs to work anywhere with or without an internet connection without fear ... Read more

The Scout Java Application Monitoring Agent is under active development and we have a few spots open in our alpha program. Email support@scoutapp.com for access. For many Rubyists, Ruby is the first language that they learn and perhaps the only programming language that they know. Ruby provides an excellent gateway ... Read more

High monitoring overhead is a silent killer : your app's requests take longer, throughput capacity shrinks, end users requests start stacking up in a request queue, you react by provisioning more servers, and finally, more servers == more $$$. So how does Scout's overhead compare with the competition? To find ... Read more

What's a Rails stacks look like in the wild these days? Most popular Rails version? Most popular Ruby? Is Delayed Job still hanging on? If you're curious about the above, you've come to the right place. We collect gems used on the apps we monitor at Scout to assist with ... Read more

Logging is the lowest common denominator of monitoring - it's low effort and low overhead. You can put ANYTHING into a log file (sans animated GIF memes - save that for Slack). The downside of being a logging addict: logs can quickly become a noisy mess. Digging through logs while ... Read more

Here's a behind-the-scenes rundown of how we ensure our apps are in peak condition in 2020 Read more