What is Azure Monitor's Log Analytics and KQL?

Log Analytics workspaces are the central data store for Azure Monitor logs — all diagnostic logs, activity logs, VM agent logs, and application logs are collected here. KQL (Kusto Query Language) is the query language used to analyze this data. KQL is a read-only, declarative query language with a pipe (|) syntax: AzureActivity | where OperationName == "Delete" | summarize count() by Caller | order by count_ desc. Key operators: where (filter), project (select columns), summarize (aggregate), extend (add calculated columns), join (merge tables), parse (extract fields from strings), render (visualize as chart). KQL powers Azure Monitor alerts, workbooks, Application Insights analytics, and Microsoft Sentinel security queries. Proficiency in KQL is a key skill for Azure operations engineers.