Production-Ready Centralized Logging & Monitoring in .NET

Design and implement a centralized logging and monitoring solution for a production-grade .NET application using Serilog and Azure Application Insights to achieve full observability, diagnostics, and operational reliability.

Key Requirements

• Configure Serilog as the primary structured logging framework
• Integrate Azure Application Insights for distributed tracing, metrics, and exception tracking
• Implement environment-based logging (Development, Staging, Production)
• Capture and enrich logs with:
  • Correlation IDs
  • Request/response metadata
  • User and tenant context
• Centralize logs across the application (API, background services, middleware)
• Log unhandled exceptions and performance bottlenecks automatically
• Ensure logs are searchable, queryable, and dashboard-ready in Application Insights

Production Considerations

• Use log levels and filters to reduce noise
• Prevent sensitive data leakage (PII masking)
• Optimize performance and minimize logging overhead
• Support scalability and high-throughput workloads

Deliverables

• Fully working .NET application with centralized logging
• Serilog configuration with Application Insights sink
• Custom middleware for request and exception logging
• Sample dashboards and KQL queries for monitoring
• Documentation explaining architecture and best practices

Outcome
A production-hardened observability setup that enables faster debugging, proactive monitoring, and improved system reliability in real-world .NET applications.