Rtail

Rtail is an open source project that helps developers in centralizing logs through a modern interface. With more than 1k stars on GitHub, it is already used by many companies to improve DevOps and CI. The project was designed and developed in just one sprint (one week).

Target and challenge

Main goal for this tool was to provide an un-cluttered environment to monitor the logs coming from multiple services: a tool that matches the preferences of any developer/devop, something that can be part of the daily workflow of those people, without interfering with their habits.

Problems solved

Initially, it was impossible to focus on a particular log, because at every new line injected, the viewport was obviously automatically scrolling. To let the user inspect the logs-history, Rtail blocks the automatic scrolling after a scroll event is triggered. Once the streaming is paused, clicking the resume button restores the original behavior.

Rtail Resume

Outcomes and achievements

After the launch, Rtail quickly started to trend in the open source community. In a matter of weeks, the tool got more than 1k favs. We flew to Portland to present the product at the Node.js Interactive 2016, organized by the Linux Foundation. Part of the speech was focused on the design thinking behind the project, and I was able to elaborate UX/UI related decisions in front of a highly technical audience.

Rtail UI
Streams and logs views

Every monitored service is listed in the left sidebar, and the favorite streams are pinned above the regular ones. The list can also be additionally filtered from the search field, placed on the top-left of the view. In the right panel, the single, open stream can be favorited and filtered, too.

Rtail Views
Settings and light theme

Rtail is built to be part of the developers' daily workflow. To achieve maximum flexibility, customization features like sorting, font size, font family, and color scheme are a must.

Rtail Settings
Rtail Theme
Objects and timestamps

Every logged object or JSON can be expanded to inspect its content. To focus on just the stream itself, the timestamps can also be collapsed by clicking the relative button on the bottom of the view.

Rtail Features

Responsibilities

I worked on this project as a product designer.

Main areas of responsibility:
- UX analysis (flows)
- Design (daily iterations on the UI)

The webapp

Considering that Rtail is an open-source project, available to anyone, I didn't have the full control over the next iterations of the product. If you want to take a look at the current state of the webapp, follow the link below!

Learn more about Rtail