Query App Insights

Query App Insights

Query Azure Application Insights telemetry to answer questions about command usage, extension activity, performance.

Prerequisites

• APP_INSIGHTS_API_KEY env var
• APP_INSIGHTS_CLIENT_ID env var

Workflow

1. Validate credentials - check env vars exist
2. Test API - tsx scripts/queryAppInsights.ts "customEvents | take 1"
3. Interpret question - identify commands, extensions, time ranges, metrics
4. Find executor name - if checking a command, find its executor name (see references)
5. Build KQL query - use executor names, not command IDs
6. Execute - tsx scripts/queryAppInsights.ts "<kql-query>"
7. Answer - interpret results, format clearly

Key Points

• Telemetry uses executor names, not command IDs
• Event pattern: ends with /commandExecution (Legacy/v2) or stored in dependencies table (OTEL/v3)
• Tables: customEvents (Legacy), dependencies (OTEL Spans), requests (Root Spans)
• OTEL Properties: name (Span name), cloud_RoleName (Extension name), operation_Id (Trace ID), operation_ParentId (Parent Span ID)
• OTEL Root Filter: where operation_ParentId == operation_Id (Finds top-level spans in v3)
• Measurements: customMeasurements.executionTime (ms for Legacy) or duration (ms for OTEL)

References

• references/command-id-vs-executor.md - Finding executor names, shared executors, commands without telemetry
• references/query-patterns.md - Common KQL patterns
• references/script.md - Script implementation details