open-telemetry / open-telemetry/opentelemetry-cpp-contrib

nginx module logs debug info as errors

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Webserver
Dominant language
Python
Stars
153
Forks
184
Avg merge
2d 9h
Merged PRs (30d)
26

Description

Most (all?) mod_opentelemetry logs use NGX_LOG_ERR severity (see e.g. https://github.com/open-telemetry/opentelemetry-cpp-contrib/blob/a02e0052e43934a9cffe23315750be03dc22dc3d/instrumentation/otel-webserver-module/src/nginx/ngx_http_opentelemetry_module.c#L671)

This is not so nice, since those are expected messages and are not created because of errors, so it seems counter intuitive to print them as errors instead of as info or debug level. It would be great if the module would only print real errors as errors, as currently our logs regularly contain false positives and we need to post-process our logs to filter those out.

Contributor guide

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First steps

  1. Read the whole issue, then the project's contributing guide.
  2. Comment on the issue to say you are picking it up — it saves two people doing the same work.
  3. Fork the repository and make your change on a branch.
  4. Open a pull request that references the issue number.

Research direction

Start in instrumentation/otel-webserver-module/src/nginx/ngx_http_opentelemetry_module.c, especially the NGX_LOG_ERR call around line 671, and audit the other module log calls. Separate expected diagnostic messages from actual errors, then verify that only real errors retain error severity while informational or debug messages no longer appear as errors.

Written by the indexing model from the issue text.

Assessment

Tech stack
c, nginx
Domain
observability
Issue type
Bug
Difficulty
2/5
Estimated time
1-3 hours
Activity status
Quiet
Clarity
Mostly clear
Newbie friendliness
64/100

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