Why might heartbeat requests distort the overall median response times?

Heartbeat requests can distort the overall median response times predominantly because they arrive in high volume and frequency. These requests are typically generated at regular intervals, leading to a larger number of them being processed in a short time frame. When analyzing median response times, an influx of these frequent heartbeat requests can skew the measurements, as they contribute a significant number of responses that may have very low or consistent response times compared to other requests.

In situations where heartbeat requests are frequently sent, they can dominate the dataset, causing the median to reflect their characteristics rather than those of other, more variable requests. This results in a distorted view of the system's performance, as it may not accurately represent the experiences of typical user transactions or other critical requests being processed by the system.

Understanding this behavior is crucial for accurately interpreting performance metrics and ensuring that the monitoring and reporting of response times provide a true picture of application performance under normal operational conditions.