OTLP/HTTP exporter

The OTLP/HTTP exporter allows the OpenTelemetry Collector to send metrics, traces, and logs via HTTP using the OTLP format. Read on to learn how to configure the component.

Note: Use the OTLP/HTTP exporter as the default method to send traces to Splunk Observability Cloud.

The OTLP/HTTP exporter sends metrics, traces, and logs through HTTP using the OTLP format. The supported pipeline types are traces, metrics, and logs. See Process your data with pipelines for more information.

You can also use the OTLP exporter for advanced options to send data using gRPC protocol. See more at OTLP exporter.

Read more about the OTLP format at the OTel repo OpenTelemetry Protocol Specification .

Get started

Note: This component is included in the default configuration of the Splunk Distribution of the OpenTelemetry Collector to send traces to Splunk Observability Cloud when deploying in host monitoring (agent) mode. See Collector deployment modes for more information.For details about the default configuration, see Configure the Collector for Kubernetes with Helm, Collector for Linux default configuration, or Collector for Windows default configuration. You can customize your configuration any time as explained in this document.

Follow these steps to configure and activate the component:

Deploy the Splunk Distribution of the OpenTelemetry Collector to your host or container platform:
Configure the exporter as described in the next section.
Restart the Collector.

Configuration options

The following settings are required:

traces_endpoint. The target URL to send trace data to. https://ingest.<realm>.signalfx.com/v2/trace/otlp for Splunk Observability Cloud.

The following settings are optional and can be added to the configuration for more advanced use cases:

logs_endpoint. The target URL to send log data to. For example, https://example.com:4318/v1/logs.
metrics_endpoint. The target URL to send metric data to. For example, "https://ingest.<realm>.signalfx.com/v2/datapoint/otlp" to send metrics to Splunk Observability Cloud.
tls. See TLS Configuration Settings in this document for the full set of available options. Only applicable for sending data to a custom endpoint.
timeout. 30s by default. HTTP request time limit. For details see https://golang.org/pkg/net/http/#Client.
read_buffer_size. 0 by default. ReadBufferSize for HTTP client.
write_buffer_size. 512 * 1024 by default. WriteBufferSize for the HTTP client.

Sample configuration

To send traces and metrics to Splunk Observability Cloud using OTLP over HTTP, configure the metrics_endpoint and traces_endpoint settings to the REST API ingest endpoints. For example:

exporters:
  otlphttp:
    # The target URL to send trace data to. By default it's set to ``https://ingest.${SPLUNK_REALM}.signalfx.com/v2/trace/otlp``.
    traces_endpoint: https://ingest.<realm>.signalfx.com/v2/trace/otlp
    # The target URL to send metrics data to. By default it's set to 
    metrics_endpoint: https://ingest.<realm>.signalfx.com/v2/datapoint/otlp
    # Set of HTTP headers added to every request.
    headers:
      # X-SF-Token is the authentication token provided by Splunk Observability Cloud.
      X-SF-Token: <access_token>

To complete the configuration, include the exporter in the required pipeline of the service section of your configuration file. For example:

service:
  pipelines:
    metrics:
      exporters: [otlphttp]
    traces:
      exporters: [otlphttp]

Configuration examples

This is a detailed configuration example:

endpoint: "https://1.2.3.4:1234"
traces_endpoint: https://ingest.<realm>.signalfx.com/v2/trace/otlp
metrics_endpoint: https://ingest.<realm>.signalfx.com/v2/datapoint/otlp
headers:
  X-SF-Token: <access_token>
timeout: 10s
read_buffer_size: 123
write_buffer_size: 345
sending_queue:
  enabled: true
  num_consumers: 2
  queue_size: 10
retry_on_failure:
  enabled: true
  initial_interval: 10s
  randomization_factor: 0.7
  multiplier: 1.3
  max_interval: 60s
  max_elapsed_time: 10m
compression: gzip

Configure gzip compression

By default, gzip compression is turned on. To turn it off use the following configuration:

exporters:
  otlphttp:
    ...
    compression: none

Associate passthroughs to an access token

The setting access_token_passthrough from the Splunk APM (SAPM) exporter (deprecated) in no longer available.

To associate datapoints with an organization access token, make sure of the following:

include_metadata is set to true in your otlp configuration
metadata_keys is set to the org token in the Batch processor

For example:

extensions:
  headers_setter:
    headers:
      - action: upsert
        key: X-SF-TOKEN
        from_context: X-SF-TOKEN

receivers:
  otlp:
    protocols:
      http:
        include_metadata: true

processors:
  batch:
    metadata_keys:
    - X-SF-Token

exporters:
  otlphttp:
    metrics_endpoint: https://ingest.<realm>.signalfx.com/v2/datapoint/otlp
    traces_endpoint: https://ingest.<realm>.signalfx.com/v2/trace/otlp
    headers:
        "X-SF-Token": "mytoken"
    auth:
      authenticator: headers_setter

Settings

The following table shows the configuration options for the OTLP/HTTP exporter:

Troubleshooting

If you are a Splunk Observability Cloud customer and are not able to see your data in Splunk Observability Cloud, you can get help in the following ways.

Available to Splunk Observability Cloud customers

Submit a case in the Splunk Support Portal.
Contact Splunk Support.

Available to prospective customers and free trial users

Ask a question and get answers through community support at Splunk Answers.
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Documentation