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View linked resources for Splunk APM services, traces, and spans 🔗
Important
The original µAPM product, released in 2019, is now called µAPM Previous Generation (µAPM PG). Wherever you see the reference, µAPM now refers to the product released on March 31, 2020.
If you’re using µAPM Previous Generation (µAPM PG), see Overview of SignalFx Microservices APM Previous Generation (µAPM PG).
Use global data links with Splunk APM properties to view more resources for APM properties. APM properties are services, traces, spans, and span tags.
With data links, you can associate APM properties with custom dashboards, log events, or entirely custom resources. Data links transfer the context of the property you’re viewing to the resource.
If you’re viewing a service, a data link can transfer information about any endpoints you filtered for, including any filters for selected endpoints, the selected environment, and any tags you filtered for within the selected time range.
If you’re viewing a trace ID, a data link can transfer information about the corresponding service, the operation that created the trace, any global tags for the trace, and the start/end time of the trace.
If you’re viewing a span ID, a data link can transfer information about the corresponding service, the span’s operation, all span tags for the span’s operation, and the start/end time of the span.
If you’re viewing a span tag, a data link can transfer information about the corresponding service, the span’s operation, the span’s ID, the trace’s ID, every other span tag, and the start/end time of the associated span.
The data link can transfer APM property context to these resources:
- Infrastructure Monitoring dashboard
- Splunk instance
- Custom URL
- Kibana
You have to manually configure data links for APM properties before they’re available. For information about creating data links for APM, see Link logs and other resources to Splunk APM services, traces, and spans.
View data links for a service 🔗
Access data links for services in the Monitoring and Troubleshooting tabs on the APM page.
View data links for a service in two places in the Monitoring tab:
From the service list:
From the floating bar in the service map for a selected service:
Each View Dashboard link sends you to the top-ranked data link that links to a dashboard. For more information, see Clicking on a property value to follow a link.
View data links for a service from the floating bar in the service map for a selected service in the Troubleshooting tab:

View data links for a trace 🔗
Access data links for traces from the traces page when you select a trace for a service.
Follow these steps to view a specific trace ID and drill down into data links for the trace ID:
In the application, go to the APM page.
Select a service from the Troubleshooting tab.
From the service map, click Show Traces.
Click a trace you want to analyze.
From the service info menu, click the dropdown icon for the trace ID:
View data links for a span 🔗
Drill down into data links for span IDs, including child span IDs and parent span IDs.
Follow these steps to view data links for a specific span ID:
In the application, go to the APM page.
Select a service from the Troubleshooting tab.
From the service map, click Show Traces.
Click a trace you’re investigating.
From the list of spans, select one you want to drill down into.
Under the SPAN category, there is a Span ID value. If the span is a child of another span, you also see a Parent ID value representing the span ID of the parent span. Click the dropdown menu for the span ID or parent ID to view global data links for the span:
View data links for a span tag 🔗
Drill down into data links for span tags field-value pairs associated with any span.
Follow these steps to view data links for a specific span tag:
In the application, go to the APM page.
Select a service from the Troubleshooting tab.
From the service map, click Show Traces.
Click a trace you’re investigating.
From the list of spans, select one you want to drill down into.
Under the TAGS category, you see a list of every span tag associated with the span. Click the dropdown menu for the span tag to view data links for the span tag: