Write a result someone can observe
“Make sure the site works” cannot be checked consistently. Name a visitor action and its visible result instead: the booking form reaches a confirmation page, the download returns the intended file, or the contact route displays its success message.
Treat status as one piece of evidence
RFC 9110 defines successful HTTP responses, but a 200 response does not prove that the right page loaded or that its main action works. Save enough evidence to support the decision. That might include the final URL, response status, a screenshot, or a test record that contains no personal data.
Give the failure somewhere to go
A check without an owner becomes noise. Name the role that can inspect the failure and choose what happens next. Set the review interval from the consequence of failure and the rate of change, not from a desire to monitor everything continuously.
Sources
- RFC 9110: HTTP Semantics, section 15 on response status codes.
- Google SRE Book: Monitoring Distributed Systems, on actionable alerts and black-box monitoring.