OpenTelemetry aws-sdk Instrumentation for Node.js

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component owners: @blumamir @jj22ee @trivikr

This module provides automatic instrumentation for the AWS SDK for JavaScript v3 modules, which may be loaded using the @opentelemetry/sdk-trace-node package and is included in the @opentelemetry/auto-instrumentations-node bundle.

If total installation size is not constrained, it is recommended to use the @opentelemetry/auto-instrumentations-node bundle with https://www.npmjs.com/package/@opentelemetry/sdk-node" class="text-primary hover:underline" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">@opentelemetry/sdk-node for the most seamless instrumentation experience.

Compatible with OpenTelemetry JS API and SDK 1.0+.

Installation

``bash
npm install --save @opentelemetry/instrumentation-aws-sdk
`

Supported Versions

- @aws-sdk/client-* versions >=3.0.0 <4

Usage

For further automatic instrumentation instruction see the @opentelemetry/instrumentation package.

`js
const { NodeTracerProvider } = require('@opentelemetry/sdk-trace-node');
const { registerInstrumentations } = require('@opentelemetry/instrumentation');
const {
AwsInstrumentation,
} = require('@opentelemetry/instrumentation-aws-sdk');

const provider = new NodeTracerProvider();
provider.register();

registerInstrumentations({
instrumentations: [
new AwsInstrumentation({
// see under for available configuration
}),
],
});
`

$3

aws-sdk instrumentation has few options available to choose from. You can set the following:

| Options | Type | Description |
| ----------------------------------------- | ---------------------------------------- | ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
| preRequestHook | AwsSdkRequestCustomAttributeFunction | Hook called before request send, which allow to add custom attributes to span. |
| responseHook | AwsSdkResponseCustomAttributeFunction | Hook for adding custom attributes when response is received from aws. |
| exceptionHook | AwsSdkExceptionCustomAttributeFunction | Hook for adding custom attributes when exception is received from aws. |
| suppressInternalInstrumentation | boolean | Most aws operation use http requests under the hood. Set this to true to hide all underlying http spans. |
| sqsExtractContextPropagationFromPayload | boolean | Will parse and extract context propagation headers from SQS Payload, false by default. When should it be used? |
| dynamoDBStatementSerializer | AwsSdkDynamoDBStatementSerializer | AWS SDK instrumentation will serialize DynamoDB commands to the db.statement attribute using the specified function. Defaults to using a serializer that returns undefined. |

Span Attributes

The instrumentations are collecting the following attributes:

| Attribute Name | Type | Description | Example |
| -------------- | ------ | --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- | --------------------------- |
| rpc.system | string | Always equals "aws-api" | |
| rpc.method | string | The name of the operation corresponding to the request, as returned by the AWS SDK. If the SDK does not provide a way to retrieve a name, the name of the command SHOULD be used, removing the suffix Command if present, resulting in a PascalCase name with no spaces. | PutObject |
| rpc.service | string | The name of the service to which a request is made, as returned by the AWS SDK. If the SDK does not provide a away to retrieve a name, the name of the SDK's client interface for a service SHOULD be used, removing the suffix Client if present, resulting in a PascalCase name with no spaces. | S3, DynamoDB, Route53 |
| cloud.region | string | Region name for the request | "eu-west-1" |

$3

The instrumentation user can configure a preRequestHook function which will be called before each request, with a normalized request object and the corresponding span.
This hook can be used to add custom attributes to the span with any logic.
For example, user can add interesting attributes from the request.params, and write custom logic based on the service and operation.
Usage example:

`js
awsInstrumentationConfig = {
preRequestHook: (span, request) => {
if (span.serviceName === 's3') {
span.setAttribute('s3.bucket.name', request.commandInput['Bucket']);
}
},
};
`

$3

AWS contains dozens of services accessible with the JS SDK. For many services, the default attributes specified above are enough, but other services have specific trace semantic conventions, or need to inject/extract intra-process context, or set intra-process context correctly.

Specific service logic currently implemented for:

- SQS
- SNS
- Lambda
- DynamoDb
- Amazon Bedrock Runtime (See the GenAI semantic conventions.)

Potential Side Effects

The instrumentation is doing best effort to support the trace specification of OpenTelemetry. For SQS, it involves defining new attributes on the Messages array, as well as on the manipulated types generated from this array (to set correct trace context for a single SQS message operation). Those properties are defined as non-enumerable properties, so they have minimum side effect on the app. They will, however, show when using the Object.getOwnPropertyDescriptors and Reflect.ownKeys functions on SQS Messages array and for each Message in the array.

Semantic Conventions

This package emits telemetry using a mix of Semantic Convention versions. While not ideal, this is a result of there being a number of separate AWS services instrumented with independent maintenance.

- As a baseline, initial implementations follow Version 1.7.0.
- SQS instrumentation was updated to follow v1.36.0.

Attributes collected (this list is currently not exhaustive):

| Attribute | Short Description | Service |
| ------------------------------------------------ | ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- | -------- |
| http.status_code / http.response.status_code | (aws-sdk) HTTP response status code. See "HTTP Semantic Convention migration" note below. | |
| rpc.method | The name of the (logical) method being called. | |
| rpc.service | The full (logical) name of the service being called. | |
| rpc.system | A string identifying the remoting system. | |
| cloud.region | The AWS Region where the requested service is being accessed. | |
| aws.dynamodb.attribute_definitions | The JSON-serialized value of each item in the AttributeDefinitions request field. | dynamodb |
| aws.dynamodb.consistent_read | The value of the ConsistentRead request parameter. | dynamodb |
| aws.dynamodb.consumed_capacity | The JSON-serialized value of each item in the ConsumedCapacity response field. | dynamodb |
| aws.dynamodb.count | The value of the Count response parameter. | dynamodb |
| aws.dynamodb.exclusive_start_table | The value of the ExclusiveStartTableName request parameter. | dynamodb |
| aws.dynamodb.global_secondary_index_updates | The JSON-serialized value of each item in the the GlobalSecondaryIndexUpdates request field. | dynamodb |
| aws.dynamodb.global_secondary_indexes | The JSON-serialized value of each item of the GlobalSecondaryIndexes request field. | dynamodb |
| aws.dynamodb.index_name | The value of the IndexName request parameter. | dynamodb |
| aws.dynamodb.item_collection_metrics | The JSON-serialized value of the ItemCollectionMetrics response field. | dynamodb |
| aws.dynamodb.limit | The value of the Limit request parameter. | dynamodb |
| aws.dynamodb.local_secondary_indexes | The JSON-serialized value of each item of the LocalSecondaryIndexes request field. | dynamodb |
| aws.dynamodb.projection | The value of the ProjectionExpression request parameter. | dynamodb |
| aws.dynamodb.provisioned_read_capacity | The value of the ProvisionedThroughput.ReadCapacityUnits request parameter. | dynamodb |
| aws.dynamodb.provisioned_write_capacity | The value of the ProvisionedThroughput.WriteCapacityUnits request parameter. | dynamodb |
| aws.dynamodb.scan_forward | The value of the ScanIndexForward request parameter. | dynamodb |
| aws.dynamodb.scanned_count | The value of the ScannedCount response parameter. | dynamodb |
| aws.dynamodb.segment | The value of the Segment request parameter. | dynamodb |
| aws.dynamodb.select | The value of the Select request parameter. | dynamodb |
| aws.dynamodb.table_count | The number of items in the TableNames response parameter. | dynamodb |
| aws.dynamodb.table_names | The keys in the RequestItems object field. | dynamodb |
| aws.dynamodb.total_segments | The value of the TotalSegments request parameter. | dynamodb |
| db.name / db.namespace | The name of the database (TableName). See "Database Semantic Convention migration" note below. | dynamodb |
| db.operation / db.operation.name | The name of the operation. See "Database Semantic Convention migration" note below. | dynamodb |
| db.statement / db.query.text | The database statement. See "Database Semantic Convention migration" note below. | dynamodb |
| db.system / db.system.name | Database system identifier. See "Database Semantic Convention migration" note below. | dynamodb |
| faas.execution | The execution ID of the current function execution. | lambda |
| faas.invoked_name | The name of the invoked function. | lambda |
| faas.invoked_provider | The cloud provider of the invoked function. | lambda |
| faas.invoked_region | The cloud region of the invoked function. | lambda |
| messaging.destination | The message destination name. | sns, sqs |
| messaging.destination_kind | The kind of message destination. | sns, sqs |
| messaging.system | A string identifying the messaging system. | sns, sqs |
| messaging.operation | A string identifying the kind of message consumption. | sqs |
| messaging.message_id | A value used by the messaging system as an identifier for the message. | sqs |
| messaging.url | The connection string. | sqs |

$3

HTTP semantic conventions (semconv) were stabilized in v1.23.0, and a migration process
was defined. instrumentation-aws-sdk adds some minimal HTTP-related
attributes on created spans. Starting with instrumentation-aws-sdk version
0.61.0, the OTEL_SEMCONV_STABILITY_OPT_IN environment variable can be used to
customize which HTTP semantic conventions are used for those HTTP-related
attributes.

To select which semconv version(s) is emitted from this instrumentation, use the
OTEL_SEMCONV_STABILITY_OPT_IN environment variable.

- http: emit the new (stable) v1.23.0+ semantics
- http/dup: emit both the old v1.7.0 and the new (stable) v1.23.0+ semantics
- By default, if OTEL_SEMCONV_STABILITY_OPT_IN includes neither of the above tokens, the old v1.7.0 semconv is used.

For this instrumentation, the only impacted attributes are as follows:

| v1.7.0 semconv | v1.23.0 semconv | Short Description |
| ------------------ | --------------------------- | ------------------------- |
| http.status_code | http.response.status_code | HTTP response status code |

See the HTTP semconv migration plan for OpenTelemetry JS instrumentations for more details.

$3

Database semantic conventions (semconv) were stabilized in v1.33.0, and a migration process
was defined. For DynamoDB operations, instrumentation-aws-sdk emits database-related
attributes. The OTEL_SEMCONV_STABILITY_OPT_IN environment variable can be used to
customize which database semantic conventions are used.

To select which semconv version(s) is emitted from this instrumentation, use the
OTEL_SEMCONV_STABILITY_OPT_IN environment variable.

- database: emit the new (stable) v1.33.0+ semantics
- database/dup: emit both the old v1.7.0 and the new (stable) v1.33.0+ semantics
- By default, if OTEL_SEMCONV_STABILITY_OPT_IN includes neither of the above tokens, the old v1.7.0 semconv is used.

For DynamoDB instrumentation, the impacted attributes are as follows:

| v1.7.0 semconv | v1.33.0 semconv | Short Description |
| -------------- | ------------------- | ------------------------------------------------- |
| db.system | db.system.name | Database system identifier |
| db.name | db.namespace | The database name (TableName for DynamoDB) |
| db.operation | db.operation.name | The name of the operation being executed |
| db.statement | db.query.text` | The database statement (if serializer configured) |

See the database migration guide for details.

Useful links

- For more information on OpenTelemetry, visit:
- For more about OpenTelemetry JavaScript:
- For help or feedback on this project, join us in [GitHub Discussions][discussions-url]

License

Apache 2.0 - See [LICENSE][license-url] for more information.

[discussions-url]: https://github.com/open-telemetry/opentelemetry-js/discussions
[license-url]: https://github.com/open-telemetry/opentelemetry-js-contrib/blob/main/LICENSE
[license-image]: https://img.shields.io/badge/license-Apache_2.0-green.svg?style=flat
[npm-url]: https://www.npmjs.com/package/@opentelemetry/instrumentation-aws-sdk
[npm-img]: https://badge.fury.io/js/%40opentelemetry%2Finstrumentation-aws-sdk.svg