PHP 8: Observability baked right in | Datadog

What this post added

This post details Datadog's collaboration with the PHP internals community to develop and ship the new observer API in PHP 8. It outlines the limitations of previous observability hooks (zend_execute_ex, custom opcode handlers, Zend Extension hooks) and explains how the new observer API overcomes these challenges, particularly in relation to stack limitations, performance overhead, and compatibility with the JIT compiler. The post highlights the contributions of key community members and the technical design choices made to ensure broad applicability across various observability tools.