opentelemetry-go

Tracing and metrics in Go require manual instrumentation using the OpenTelemetry Go API and Contrib libraries. Install the packages, initialize a TracerProvider with an OTLP exporter, create spans around operations, and configure resource attributes like service name to identify your application in observability platforms.

OpenTelemetry provides automatic and manual instrumentation patterns for HTTP and gRPC. Use Contrib middleware for automatic tracing, or manually create spans in handlers. Configure an OTLP exporter to send traces to a collector, and propagate context across requests to maintain trace correlation.

Context propagation in Go ensures trace correlation across concurrent operations. Pass context.Context through goroutine calls, use OpenTelemetry's context APIs to attach and extract span data, and configure your OTLP exporter to export the linked traces for end-to-end observability.

Yes. OpenTelemetry supports instrumentation of databases and asynchronous operations through the Go API and Contrib libraries. Create spans around database calls and async tasks, propagate context through goroutines, and export telemetry via OTLP to monitor latency and errors across all components.

An OTLP exporter endpoint is required to export traces and metrics from your Go application. You must configure the exporter in code with the endpoint address. This sends telemetry to a collector or observability backend for centralized storage and analysis.

Start by setting up a Go module, installing OpenTelemetry Go API and Contrib libraries, initializing a TracerProvider with resource attributes, and configuring an OTLP exporter. Generate a sample span to verify the setup, then instrument your HTTP servers, databases, and goroutines.