mem stats are of type counter (instead of gauge)

[amoghe]

Steps to reproduce:

1. Start telegraf with [[inputs.mem]]
2. Observe that mem stats like "total", "available", "used" are all added using AddCounter

Expected behavior:

I expected these to be Gauges, since they are absolute utilization numbers

Maybe I'm missing context on why these have the Counter type. I could work on adding a note to the README if needed to clarify this.

[amoghe]

@sparrc , looks like this was added in b18d375 . But the commit message doesn't indicate why a counter was chosen as the type for this (and other) metrics.

I notice that swap plugin differentiates between emitting its gauges and counters (emitting both, depending on the metric). Maybe thats the right approach for the mem plugin as well? (Unless I've misunderstood something)

[danielnelson]

Looks like a bug to me, we can change those fields to be Gauges.

[amoghe]

I can take a stab at this, if you'd like.

[danielnelson]

Sure, thanks