When Dynatrace OneAgent is installed, a new mode called Discovery & Foundation is added alongside the existing Full-Stack/IO Stack modes. This mode provides essential metrics that allow you to discover and monitor your hosts and processes, offering insights into potential expansions of monitoring capabilities.
For monitoring business-critical applications, Dynatrace recommends using OneAgent in Full-Stack Monitoring mode, as it provides complete observability. Similarly, for monitoring critical infrastructure such as databases, queues, and messaging systems, it’s advised to use the IO Stack mode. In Discovery mode, OneAgent can be deployed across the rest of your infrastructure for full visibility at a relatively low cost. This enables complete discovery of your environment through Dynatrace without the need for an additional application. If you don’t have a CMDB product, you can use Discovery mode’s core capabilities. Additionally, if Davis identifies an issue in a location running in Discovery mode, it can indicate if the problem originated there.
Discovery mode also allows you to collect and monitor basic infrastructure metrics without the need for another monitoring tool. You can achieve this with Dynatrace at a minimal cost. Discovery mode is currently available only in environments with the DPS licensing model. To use this feature, you may apply to transition from the classic licensing model to the new, flexible DPS model.
Below are the features of these three distinct modes:
https://docs.dynatrace.com/docs/platform-modules/infrastructure-monitoring/hosts/monitoring-modes
