Background
The RealTheory Collector is a lightweight agent that runs inside your Kubernetes cluster and continuously streams metrics, performance, cost, and health data to the RealTheory platform.
To ensure uninterrupted visibility and compatibility with evolving platform services, the Collector is designed to restart periodically under specific circumstances.
Expected Restart Behavior
By design, each RealTheory Collector performs a self-restart on a weekly cadence. This automatic restart ensures that:
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The latest image version is pulled from the official RealTheory container registry
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The Collector remains in sync with the RealTheory backend and can take advantage of new features and compatibility updates
In addition to this scheduled restart, the Collector may also restart under other expected conditions, such as:
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Security token rotation – Refreshing credentials to maintain secure communication with RealTheory services
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TLS certificate renewal – Updating certificates used for encrypted data transmission
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Configuration or secret updates – Reloading specific configuration changes without requiring a full redeployment
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Memory optimization – Performing a controlled restart to clear memory fragmentation and maintain stable operation
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Explicit management actions – Restarting when an upgrade or restart command is issued through the RealTheory Management Console
These restarts typically take less than a second and are transparent. In-flight data is buffered and resent automatically after the Collector is back online, so no data is lost and no action is required.
When to Investigate
Under normal conditions, a Collector restarts no more than a few times per week (including the scheduled restart).
If you observe restarts occurring multiple times per day or notice data gaps in the RealTheory console, this may indicate an underlying issue such as:
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Network instability or failing health checks
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A misconfigured deployment (for example, custom registry or pinned image version)
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Resource constraints on the node hosting the Collector
If frequent restarts persist, please contact RealTheory Support so we can review your Collector logs and metrics to diagnose further.
See Also