Docs Cloud Redpanda Connect Components Catalog Tracers redpanda redpanda Page options Copy as Markdown Copied! View as plain text Ask AI about this topic Add MCP server to VS Code Type: Tracer ▼ TracerCacheInputOutput Available in: Cloud, Self-Managed Export distributed tracing data to a Redpanda topic, enabling you to monitor and debug your Redpanda Connect pipelines. Traces are exported in OpenTelemetry format as JSON, allowing integration with observability platforms like Jaeger, Grafana Tempo, or custom trace consumers. Common Advanced tracers: label: "" redpanda: seed_brokers: [] # No default (required) topic: otel-traces service: redpanda-connect sampling: enabled: false ratio: "" # No default (optional) tracers: label: "" redpanda: seed_brokers: [] # No default (required) client_id: redpanda-connect tls: enabled: false skip_cert_verify: false enable_renegotiation: false root_cas: "" root_cas_file: "" client_certs: cert: "" key: "" cert_file: "" key_file: "" password: "" sasl: mechanism: "" # No default (required) username: "" password: "" token: "" extensions: "" # No default (optional) aws: region: "" # No default (optional) endpoint: "" # No default (optional) tcp: connect_timeout: 0s keep_alive: idle: 15s interval: 15s count: 9 tcp_user_timeout: 0s credentials: profile: "" # No default (optional) id: "" # No default (optional) secret: "" # No default (optional) token: "" # No default (optional) from_ec2_role: "" # No default (optional) role: "" # No default (optional) role_external_id: "" # No default (optional) metadata_max_age: 1m request_timeout_overhead: 10s conn_idle_timeout: 20s tcp: connect_timeout: 0s keep_alive: idle: 15s interval: 15s count: 9 tcp_user_timeout: 0s partitioner: "" # No default (optional) idempotent_write: true compression: "" # No default (optional) allow_auto_topic_creation: true timeout: 10s max_message_bytes: 1MiB broker_write_max_bytes: 100MiB topic: otel-traces format: json service: redpanda-connect tags: {} sampling: enabled: false ratio: "" # No default (optional) This tracer automatically captures trace spans as messages flow through your pipeline, recording timing information, component metadata, and error details. Use this to: Track message flow through complex pipelines with multiple processors. Identify performance bottlenecks by analyzing span durations. Debug failures by examining trace context and error details. Monitor pipeline health across distributed Redpanda Connect instances. Correlate activity across multiple services using trace IDs. The tracer writes to a dedicated Redpanda topic that can be consumed by trace analysis tools. Configure sampling to control trace volume in high-throughput environments. Fields allow_auto_topic_creation Whether to automatically create the trace topic if it doesn’t exist. If false, the topic must be created manually before starting the tracer. Type: bool Default: true broker_write_max_bytes The maximum number of bytes this output can write to a broker connection in a single write. This field corresponds to Kafka’s socket.request.max.bytes. Type: string Default: 100MiB # Examples: broker_write_max_bytes: 128MB # --- broker_write_max_bytes: 50mib client_id An identifier for the client connection. This appears in broker logs and metrics to help identify which Redpanda Connect instance is sending traces. Type: string Default: redpanda-connect compression Compression codec to use for trace messages. Options include gzip, snappy, lz4, zstd, or none. Compression can reduce network bandwidth and storage costs. Type: string Options: lz4, snappy, gzip, none, zstd conn_idle_timeout The maximum duration that connections can remain idle before they are automatically closed. This field accepts Go duration format strings such as 100ms, 1s, or 5s. Type: string Default: 20s format The format for trace data. Currently only json is supported, which exports OpenTelemetry spans as JSON messages. Type: string Default: json Option Summary json Emit in OTLP JSON Format protobuf Emit in OTLP Protobuf Format idempotent_write Enable idempotent writes to prevent duplicate trace messages in case of retries. Recommended for production environments. Type: bool Default: true max_message_bytes The maximum size of individual trace messages. Traces exceeding this size will be truncated or dropped. Type: string Default: 1MiB # Examples: max_message_bytes: 100MB # --- max_message_bytes: 50mib metadata_max_age The maximum age of cached cluster metadata before it is refreshed. Reducing this value can help detect cluster changes faster but increases metadata requests. Type: string Default: 1m partitioner Override the default partitioner for trace messages. By default, traces are distributed across partitions for load balancing. Type: string Option Summary least_backup Chooses the least backed up partition (the partition with the fewest amount of buffered records). Partitions are selected per batch. manual Manually select a partition for each message, requires the field partition to be specified. murmur2_hash Kafka’s default hash algorithm that uses a 32-bit murmur2 hash of the key to compute which partition the record will be on. round_robin Round-robin’s messages through all available partitions. This algorithm has lower throughput and causes higher CPU load on brokers, but can be useful if you want to ensure an even distribution of records to partitions. request_timeout_overhead Additional time to apply as overhead when calculating request deadlines. This buffer helps prevent premature timeouts. Type: string Default: 10s sampling Configure trace sampling to control the volume of trace data. Sampling is essential for high-throughput pipelines to prevent trace data from overwhelming your observability infrastructure. Type: object sampling.enabled Whether to enable trace sampling. When disabled, all traces are exported. When enabled, traces are sampled according to the configured ratio. Type: bool Default: false sampling.ratio The sampling ratio as a decimal between 0 and 1. For example, 0.1 samples 10% of traces, 0.01 samples 1%. Lower ratios reduce trace volume and overhead. For high-throughput production systems, start with 0.01-0.1 and adjust based on your needs. Type: float # Examples: ratio: 0.05 # --- ratio: 0.85 # --- ratio: 0.5 sasl[] Specify one or more methods or mechanisms of SASL authentication, which are attempted in order. If the broker supports the first SASL mechanism, all connections use it. If the first mechanism fails, the client picks the first supported mechanism. If the broker does not support any client mechanisms, all connections fail. Type: object # Examples: sasl: - mechanism: SCRAM-SHA-512 password: bar username: foo sasl[].aws Contains AWS specific fields for when the mechanism is set to AWS_MSK_IAM. Type: object sasl[].aws.credentials Optional manual configuration of AWS credentials to use. More information can be found in Amazon Web Services. Type: object sasl[].aws.credentials.from_ec2_role Use the credentials of a host EC2 machine configured to assume an IAM role associated with the instance. Type: bool sasl[].aws.credentials.id The ID of credentials to use. Type: string sasl[].aws.credentials.profile A profile from ~/.aws/credentials to use. Type: string sasl[].aws.credentials.role A role ARN to assume. Type: string sasl[].aws.credentials.role_external_id An external ID to provide when assuming a role. Type: string sasl[].aws.credentials.secret The secret for the credentials being used. This field contains sensitive information that usually shouldn’t be added to a configuration directly. For more information, see Manage Secrets before adding it to your configuration. Type: string sasl[].aws.credentials.token The token for the credentials being used, required when using short term credentials. Type: string sasl[].aws.endpoint Allows you to specify a custom endpoint for the AWS API. Type: string sasl[].aws.region The AWS region to target. Type: string sasl[].aws.tcp TCP socket configuration. Type: object sasl[].aws.tcp.connect_timeout Maximum amount of time a dial will wait for a connect to complete. Zero disables. Type: string Default: 0s sasl[].aws.tcp.keep_alive TCP keep-alive probe configuration. Type: object sasl[].aws.tcp.keep_alive.count Maximum unanswered keep-alive probes before dropping the connection. Zero defaults to 9. Type: int Default: 9 sasl[].aws.tcp.keep_alive.idle Duration the connection must be idle before sending the first keep-alive probe. Zero defaults to 15s. Negative values disable keep-alive probes. Type: string Default: 15s sasl[].aws.tcp.keep_alive.interval Duration between keep-alive probes. Zero defaults to 15s. Type: string Default: 15s sasl[].aws.tcp.tcp_user_timeout Maximum time to wait for acknowledgment of transmitted data before killing the connection. Linux-only (kernel 2.6.37+), ignored on other platforms. When enabled, keep_alive.idle must be greater than this value per RFC 5482. Zero disables. Type: string Default: 0s sasl[].extensions Key/value pairs to add to OAUTHBEARER authentication requests. Type: string sasl[].mechanism The SASL mechanism to use. Type: string Option Summary AWS_MSK_IAM AWS IAM based authentication as specified by the 'aws-msk-iam-auth' java library. OAUTHBEARER OAuth Bearer based authentication. PLAIN Plain text authentication. REDPANDA_CLOUD_SERVICE_ACCOUNT Redpanda Cloud Service Account authentication when running in Redpanda Cloud. SCRAM-SHA-256 SCRAM based authentication as specified in RFC5802. SCRAM-SHA-512 SCRAM based authentication as specified in RFC5802. none Disable sasl authentication sasl[].password A password to provide for PLAIN or SCRAM-* authentication. This field contains sensitive information that usually shouldn’t be added to a configuration directly. For more information, see Manage Secrets before adding it to your configuration. Type: string Default: "" sasl[].token The token to use for a single session’s OAUTHBEARER authentication. Type: string Default: "" sasl[].username A username to provide for PLAIN or SCRAM-* authentication. Type: string Default: "" seed_brokers[] A list of broker addresses to connect to in order. Use commas to separate multiple addresses in a single list item. Type: array # Examples: seed_brokers: - "localhost:9092" # --- seed_brokers: - "foo:9092" - "bar:9092" # --- seed_brokers: - "foo:9092,bar:9092" service The service name to identify this Redpanda Connect instance in traces. This appears in trace visualizations and helps correlate traces across distributed systems. Use descriptive names like order-processor or analytics-pipeline. Type: string Default: redpanda-connect tags Custom key-value tags to attach to all traces from this instance. Use tags to add metadata like environment (production, staging), region, version, or instance identifiers. Tags appear as resource attributes in OpenTelemetry traces. Type: string Default: {} tcp Configure TCP socket-level settings to optimize network performance and reliability. These low-level controls are useful for: High-latency networks: Increase connect_timeout to allow more time for connection establishment Long-lived connections: Configure keep_alive settings to detect and recover from stale connections Unstable networks: Tune keep-alive probes to balance between quick failure detection and avoiding false positives Linux systems with specific requirements: Use tcp_user_timeout (Linux 2.6.37+) to control data acknowledgment timeouts Most users should keep the default values. Only modify these settings if you’re experiencing connection stability issues or have specific network requirements. Type: object tcp.connect_timeout Maximum amount of time a dial will wait for a connect to complete. Zero disables. Type: string Default: 0s tcp.keep_alive TCP keep-alive probe configuration. Type: object tcp.keep_alive.count Maximum unanswered keep-alive probes before dropping the connection. Zero defaults to 9. Type: int Default: 9 tcp.keep_alive.idle Duration the connection must be idle before sending the first keep-alive probe. Zero defaults to 15s. Negative values disable keep-alive probes. Type: string Default: 15s tcp.keep_alive.interval Duration between keep-alive probes. Zero defaults to 15s. Type: string Default: 15s tcp.tcp_user_timeout Maximum time to wait for acknowledgment of transmitted data before killing the connection. Linux-only (kernel 2.6.37+), ignored on other platforms. When enabled, keep_alive.idle must be greater than this value per RFC 5482. Zero disables. Type: string Default: 0s timeout The maximum time to wait for trace messages to be acknowledged by the broker before considering the write failed. Type: string Default: 10s tls Configure Transport Layer Security (TLS) settings to secure network connections. This includes options for standard TLS as well as mutual TLS (mTLS) authentication where both client and server authenticate each other using certificates. Key configuration options include enabled to enable TLS, client_certs for mTLS authentication, root_cas/root_cas_file for custom certificate authorities, and skip_cert_verify for development environments. Type: object tls.client_certs[] A list of client certificates for mutual TLS (mTLS) authentication. Configure this field to enable mTLS, authenticating the client to the server with these certificates. You must set tls.enabled: true for the client certificates to take effect. Certificate pairing rules: For each certificate item, provide either: Inline PEM data using both cert and key or File paths using both cert_file and key_file. Mixing inline and file-based values within the same item is not supported. Type: object Default: [] # Examples: client_certs: - cert: foo key: bar # --- client_certs: - cert_file: ./example.pem key_file: ./example.key tls.client_certs[].cert A plain text certificate to use. Type: string Default: "" tls.client_certs[].cert_file The path of a certificate to use. Type: string Default: "" tls.client_certs[].key A plain text certificate key to use. This field contains sensitive information that usually shouldn’t be added to a configuration directly. For more information, see Manage Secrets before adding it to your configuration. Type: string Default: "" tls.client_certs[].key_file The path of a certificate key to use. Type: string Default: "" tls.client_certs[].password A plain text password for when the private key is password encrypted in PKCS#1 or PKCS#8 format. The obsolete pbeWithMD5AndDES-CBC algorithm is not supported for the PKCS#8 format. Because the obsolete pbeWithMD5AndDES-CBC algorithm does not authenticate the ciphertext, it is vulnerable to padding oracle attacks that can let an attacker recover the plaintext. This field contains sensitive information that usually shouldn’t be added to a configuration directly. For more information, see Manage Secrets before adding it to your configuration. Type: string Default: "" # Examples: password: foo # --- password: ${KEY_PASSWORD} tls.enable_renegotiation Whether to allow the remote server to request renegotiation. Enable this option if you’re seeing the error message local error: tls: no renegotiation. Type: bool Default: false tls.enabled Whether to use TLS for the connection to the Redpanda cluster. Type: bool Default: false tls.root_cas Specify a root certificate authority to use (optional). This is a string that represents a certificate chain from the parent-trusted root certificate, through possible intermediate signing certificates, to the host certificate. Use either this field for inline certificate data or root_cas_file for file-based certificate loading. This field contains sensitive information that usually shouldn’t be added to a configuration directly. For more information, see Manage Secrets before adding it to your configuration. Type: string Default: "" # Examples: root_cas: |- -----BEGIN CERTIFICATE----- ... -----END CERTIFICATE----- tls.root_cas_file Specify the path to a root certificate authority file (optional). This is a file, often with a .pem extension, which contains a certificate chain from the parent-trusted root certificate, through possible intermediate signing certificates, to the host certificate. Use either this field for file-based certificate loading or root_cas for inline certificate data. Type: string Default: "" # Examples: root_cas_file: ./root_cas.pem tls.skip_cert_verify Whether to skip server-side certificate verification. Set to true only for testing environments as this reduces security by disabling certificate validation. When using self-signed certificates or in development, this may be necessary, but should never be used in production. Consider using root_cas or root_cas_file to specify trusted certificates instead of disabling verification entirely. Type: bool Default: false topic The Redpanda topic where trace data is written. This topic should be dedicated to traces and configured with appropriate retention policies. Default: otel-traces Type: string Default: otel-traces Back to top × Simple online edits For simple changes, such as fixing a typo, you can edit the content directly on GitHub. Edit on GitHub Or, open an issue to let us know about something that you want us to change. Open an issue Contribution guide For extensive content updates, or if you prefer to work locally, read our contribution guide . Was this helpful? thumb_up thumb_down group Ask in the community mail Share your feedback group_add Make a contribution 🎉 Thanks for your feedback! none Metrics