%% date:: [[2021-04-02]], [[2021-02-23]], [[2023-10-11]], [[2023-11-26]] parent:: [[Monitoring]] sibling:: [[Instrumentation]], [[eBPF]] %% # [[Manual monitoring]] In [[Observability]], manual [[Monitoring]] is an alternative approach to [[Instrumentation]] to forward [[Telemetry]] to the rest of the observability stack. It is generally more ad hoc or exploratory, and involves accessing the component to be monitored and executing commands to query the data required. While manual monitoring has its place, especially in earlier phases of a project, instrumentation is recommended. ## Native monitoring ### Windows If your servers are running Windows, [[PerfMon]] is a good alternative. It’s built into Windows and the interface allows you to choose the counters that you want to measure and start recording. ### Unix `vmstat 5` or `vm_stat 5` on a Mac. ### Kubernetes [[Kubernetes]] can also be [[Monitoring Kubernetes|monitored]] manually, although the nature of Kubernetes and the ephemeral nature of its pods makes it less effective and sustainable than instrumentation.