Tracing with OpenTelemetry

YDB SDK instruments Query Service operations with OpenTelemetry spans, providing distributed tracing from application code to each gRPC call to YDB. The spans are exported via the standard OTLP protocol and are compatible with Jaeger, Grafana Tempo, Zipkin, and any other backend that supports OpenTelemetry.

Created spans

Currently, spans are supported for Query Service operations. Support for topics and other services is planned for future SDK versions.

The following spans are created:

Span Type Description
ydb.RunWithRetry Internal Covers the entire retry cycle for a single operation
ydb.Try Internal One span per attempt, including the first; child RPC spans are attached to it
ydb.CreateSession Client Creating a session via gRPC CreateSession and AttachStream
ydb.ExecuteQuery Client Execution of one YQL query
ydb.BeginTransaction Client Explicit call to start a transaction
ydb.Commit Client Transaction commit
ydb.Rollback Client Transaction rollback
ydb.Driver.Initialize Internal Initial driver initialization: cluster discovery and authentication

A typical span tree for a transactional operation with retry looks as follows:

ydb.RunWithRetry  (Internal)
├─ ydb.Try        (Internal)   ← 1st attempt: ERROR
│  ├─ ydb.ExecuteQuery (Client)
│  ├─ ydb.ExecuteQuery (Client)
│  └─ ydb.Commit       (Client) ← ERROR: Transaction Lock Invalidated
└─ ydb.Try        (Internal)   ← 2nd attempt: SUCCESS, ydb.retry.backoff_ms=50
   ├─ ydb.ExecuteQuery (Client)
   ├─ ydb.ExecuteQuery (Client)
   └─ ydb.Commit       (Client)

ydb.RunWithRetry is the parent span for the entire retry operation. For each execution attempt, a separate child span ydb.Try is created: the first ydb.Try corresponds to the first attempt, the second to the first retry attempt, and so on. RPC spans of a specific attempt, for example ydb.ExecuteQuery and ydb.Commit, are created inside the corresponding ydb.Try.

Note

If an attempt ends with an error, its span ydb.Try ends with an error status. On a retry, a new ydb.Try is created; starting from the second attempt, the attribute ydb.retry.backoff_ms — the wait time before this attempt in milliseconds — is set on it. This wait time is included in the duration of the next span ydb.Try: the span starts before the backoff pause, then after the pause, the RPC calls of this attempt are executed.

Span attributes

The SDK uses both standard OpenTelemetry semantic conventions attributes and YDB-specific extensions.

Standard OpenTelemetry attributes

The following attributes belong to the stable OpenTelemetry semantic conventions and can be processed by tracing backends as standard:

Attribute Where installed Description
db.system.name RPC spans Always "ydb"
db.namespace RPC spans Path to YDB database
server.address RPC spans Main host from the connection string
server.port RPC spans Main port from the connection string
network.peer.address RPC spans Actual gRPC endpoint used for the call
network.peer.port RPC spans Actual gRPC endpoint port used for the call
error.type Spans that failed Error type. For example: "transport_error", "ydb_error" or the full exception class name
db.response.status_code RPC spans during YdbException Textual name of the YDB status from the error, for example ABORTED, UNAVAILABLE, OVERLOADED

YDB-specific attributes

The following attributes are YDB extensions on top of the standard semantic conventions:

Attribute Where it is installed Description
ydb.node.id RPC spans ID of the YDB node that processed the query
ydb.node.dc RPC spans Data center of the YDB node that processed the query
ydb.retry.backoff_ms Spans ydb.Try, starting from the second attempt Wait time before retry in milliseconds

W3C trace context

The SDK automatically propagates the W3C traceparent header in every outgoing gRPC call. This allows the YDB server to trace internal operations within the same trace, without additional configuration. For more details about server-side tracing, see the section Passing an external trace-id to YDB.

Connecting to the SDK

Install the OpenTelemetry adapter for the YDB Go SDK:

go get github.com/ydb-platform/ydb-go-sdk-otel

Configure TracerProvider and pass the adapter to ydb.Open:

package main

import (
    "context"
    "os"

    "go.opentelemetry.io/otel"
    "go.opentelemetry.io/otel/attribute"
    "go.opentelemetry.io/otel/exporters/otlp/otlptrace/otlptracegrpc"
    "go.opentelemetry.io/otel/sdk/resource"
    sdktrace "go.opentelemetry.io/otel/sdk/trace"

    "github.com/ydb-platform/ydb-go-sdk/v3"
    ydbOtel "github.com/ydb-platform/ydb-go-sdk-otel"
)

func main() {
    ctx := context.Background()

    exporter, err := otlptracegrpc.New(ctx,
        otlptracegrpc.WithEndpoint("localhost:4317"),
        otlptracegrpc.WithInsecure(),
    )
    if err != nil {
        panic(err)
    }
    res, _ := resource.Merge(resource.Default(), resource.NewSchemaless(
        attribute.String("service.name", "my-service"),
    ))
    tp := sdktrace.NewTracerProvider(
        sdktrace.WithBatcher(exporter),
        sdktrace.WithResource(res),
    )
    defer tp.Shutdown(ctx)
    otel.SetTracerProvider(tp)

    db, err := ydb.Open(ctx,
        os.Getenv("YDB_CONNECTION_STRING"),
        ydbOtel.WithTraces(
            ydbOtel.WithTracer(tp.Tracer("ydb-go-sdk")),
        ),
    )
    if err != nil {
        panic(err)
    }
    defer db.Close(ctx)
}

Install additional dependencies opentelemetry and the OTLP exporter:

pip install ydb[opentelemetry]
pip install opentelemetry-exporter-otlp-proto-grpc

Call enable_tracing() after configuring the global TracerProvider:

from opentelemetry import trace
from opentelemetry.sdk.trace import TracerProvider
from opentelemetry.sdk.trace.export import BatchSpanProcessor
from opentelemetry.exporter.otlp.proto.grpc.trace_exporter import OTLPSpanExporter
from opentelemetry.sdk.resources import Resource

import ydb
from ydb.opentelemetry import enable_tracing

resource = Resource(attributes={"service.name": "my-service"})
provider = TracerProvider(resource=resource)
provider.add_span_processor(
    BatchSpanProcessor(OTLPSpanExporter(endpoint="http://localhost:4317"))
)
trace.set_tracer_provider(provider)

enable_tracing()

with ydb.Driver(endpoint="grpc://localhost:2136", database="/local") as driver:
    driver.wait(timeout=5)
    with ydb.QuerySessionPool(driver) as pool:
        pool.execute_with_retries("SELECT 1")

provider.shutdown()

Add the NuGet package:

dotnet add package Ydb.Sdk.OpenTelemetry

Register the YDB instrumentation when configuring OpenTelemetry in your service:

services.AddOpenTelemetry()
    .WithTracing(builder => builder
        .AddYdb()
        .AddOtlpExporter());

Add YDB SDK and OpenTelemetry dependencies (example for Maven):

<dependency>
    <groupId>tech.ydb</groupId>
    <artifactId>ydb-sdk-core</artifactId>
    <version>${ydb.sdk.version}</version>
</dependency>
<dependency>
    <groupId>io.opentelemetry</groupId>
    <artifactId>opentelemetry-sdk</artifactId>
    <version>${otel.version}</version>
</dependency>
<dependency>
    <groupId>io.opentelemetry</groupId>
    <artifactId>opentelemetry-exporter-otlp</artifactId>
    <version>${otel.version}</version>
</dependency>

Create an instance of the OpenTelemetry SDK and pass it to the transport via OpenTelemetryTracer:

import io.opentelemetry.api.OpenTelemetry;
import io.opentelemetry.exporter.otlp.trace.OtlpGrpcSpanExporter;
import io.opentelemetry.sdk.OpenTelemetrySdk;
import io.opentelemetry.sdk.resources.Resource;
import io.opentelemetry.sdk.trace.SdkTracerProvider;
import io.opentelemetry.sdk.trace.export.BatchSpanProcessor;
import io.opentelemetry.semconv.resource.attributes.ResourceAttributes;
import tech.ydb.core.auth.CloudAuthHelper;
import tech.ydb.core.grpc.GrpcTransport;
import tech.ydb.core.opentelemetry.OpenTelemetryTracer;
import tech.ydb.query.QueryClient;

Resource resource = Resource.getDefault().toBuilder()
    .put(ResourceAttributes.SERVICE_NAME, "my-service")
    .build();

SdkTracerProvider tracerProvider = SdkTracerProvider.builder()
    .setResource(resource)
    .addSpanProcessor(BatchSpanProcessor.builder(
        OtlpGrpcSpanExporter.builder()
            .setEndpoint("http://localhost:4317")
            .build()
    ).build())
    .build();

OpenTelemetry openTelemetry = OpenTelemetrySdk.builder()
    .setTracerProvider(tracerProvider)
    .build();

try (GrpcTransport transport = GrpcTransport.forConnectionString(connectionString)
        .withAuthProvider(CloudAuthHelper.getAuthProviderFromEnviron())
        .withTracer(OpenTelemetryTracer.fromOpenTelemetry(openTelemetry))
        .build();
     QueryClient queryClient = QueryClient.newClient(transport).build()) {
    // Use queryClient here
}

When using the JDBC driver, simply add the enableOpenTelemetryTracer=true parameter to the connection string — the driver will pick up the global OTel provider automatically:

jdbc:ydb://<host>:<port>/<database>?enableOpenTelemetryTracer=true

Include the OpenTelemetry tracing header from the YDB C++ SDK and add a dependency on the OTel C++ SDK:

#include <ydb-cpp-sdk/client/driver/driver.h>
#include <ydb-cpp-sdk/open_telemetry/trace.h>

#include <opentelemetry/exporters/otlp/otlp_http_exporter_factory.h>
#include <opentelemetry/exporters/otlp/otlp_http_exporter_options.h>
#include <opentelemetry/sdk/trace/tracer_provider.h>
#include <opentelemetry/sdk/trace/simple_processor_factory.h>
#include <opentelemetry/sdk/resource/resource.h>
#include <opentelemetry/trace/provider.h>

namespace sdktrace = opentelemetry::sdk::trace;
namespace otlp     = opentelemetry::exporter::otlp;
namespace resource = opentelemetry::sdk::resource;
using namespace NYdb;

// 1. Initialize the OTel tracing provider
otlp::OtlpHttpExporterOptions opts;
opts.url = "http://localhost:4318/v1/traces";
auto exporter  = otlp::OtlpHttpExporterFactory::Create(opts);
auto processor = sdktrace::SimpleSpanProcessorFactory::Create(std::move(exporter));
auto res       = resource::Resource::Create({{"service.name", "my-service"}});
auto otelProvider = std::make_shared<sdktrace::TracerProvider>(
    std::move(processor), res);
opentelemetry::trace::Provider::SetTracerProvider(otelProvider);

// 2. Wrap in the YDB tracing provider
auto ydbTraceProvider = NTrace::CreateOtelTraceProvider(otelProvider);

// 3. Create a YDB driver with tracing enabled
auto driverConfig = TDriverConfig()
    .SetEndpoint("localhost:2136")
    .SetDatabase("/local")
    .SetTraceProvider(ydbTraceProvider);

TDriver driver(driverConfig);

Install @ydbjs/telemetry together with the OpenTelemetry Node SDK and OTLP exporter:

npm install @ydbjs/telemetry @opentelemetry/sdk-node @opentelemetry/exporter-trace-otlp-http

Initialize NodeSDK before creating the driver and call register() from @ydbjs/telemetry:

import { NodeSDK } from '@opentelemetry/sdk-node'
import { OTLPTraceExporter } from '@opentelemetry/exporter-trace-otlp-http'
import { Driver } from '@ydbjs/core'
import { query } from '@ydbjs/query'
import { register } from '@ydbjs/telemetry'

const sdk = new NodeSDK({
    serviceName: 'my-service',
    traceExporter: new OTLPTraceExporter({ url: 'http://localhost:4318/v1/traces' }),
})
sdk.start()

// Must be called BEFORE creating the Driver — W3C propagation middleware
// trace context is set once during driver construction.
const instrumentation = register()

using driver = new Driver(process.env.YDB_CONNECTION_STRING)
await driver.ready()
await using sql = query(driver)
// ...

instrumentation.disable()
await sdk.shutdown()

Alternatively, use --import for auto-loading before starting the application:

node --import @opentelemetry/sdk-node/register --import @ydbjs/telemetry/register your-app.js