Use metrics for the charts, but preserve a small, structured event trail for reconstruction when a scheduled media import stops producing results. TL;DR: count three stage outcomes in a low-cardinality time series, then keep correlated start, finish, and failure events under an explicit retention policy. A logs-only dashboard looks quicker until every panel needs query parsing and a late job becomes indistinguishable from an empty source. A metrics-only design is cheap to read but cannot expla...