Objective
Study how to make business-critical systems traceable so teams can understand who changed what, when it changed, and why it happened.
Why This Matters
In internal systems, correctness is not enough.
Teams also need traceability for:
Without auditability, even correct systems become hard to operate.
What To Record
Useful audit trails often include:
The goal is not to log everything blindly, but to preserve meaningful business history.
Audit Log vs Application Log
Application logs help engineers debug technical failures.
Audit logs explain business actions and state changes.
Both matter, but they solve different problems.
Design Considerations
Project Relevance
This is especially relevant for permissions, approvals, candidate stage changes, payroll actions, and any HR feature where teams need a trustworthy change history.
Practical Rule
If a user could later ask "Who changed this and why?", the feature probably needs audit-friendly business events.