Jaeger Distributed Tracing Specialist

Responsibility: Jaeger/OpenTelemetry novel patterns + HuleEdu tracing conventions

Prerequisites: Assumes knowledge of basic distributed tracing concepts. For complete OpenTelemetry API documentation, use Context7 /open-telemetry/opentelemetry-python.

When to Use This Skill

Use this skill when:

✅ Instrumenting async operations with context preservation
✅ Debugging trace context propagation across service boundaries
✅ Implementing queue/event-based tracing patterns
✅ Understanding span lifecycle in async contexts
✅ Troubleshooting missing/broken spans in Jaeger UI
✅ Integrating traces with metrics and logs (correlation)
✅ Implementing HuleEdu tracing conventions

Do NOT use for:

❌ Basic "what is distributed tracing" questions (Claude knows this)
❌ Simple span creation syntax (use Context7)
❌ Generic tracing theory (not implementation-specific)

Core Capabilities

Novel OpenTelemetry Patterns

Async context propagation edge cases (threading vs asyncio)
Token management lifecycle (attach/detach ordering)
Baggage vs tags vs events (when to use each)
Sampling strategy internals and edge cases
Context pollution symptoms and debugging

HuleEdu-Specific Patterns

Service initialization (tracer setup, middleware)
Naming conventions (spans, attributes)
Trace context propagation (Kafka, Redis, HTTP)
TraceContextManagerImpl queue pattern
Correlation ID integration
LLM provider instrumentation

Quick Decision Tree

Need help with Jaeger tracing?
├─ Instrumenting new service?
│  └─ See: huleedu-patterns.md (initialization + middleware)
│
├─ Traces breaking across async boundaries?
│  ├─ Queue processing? → examples/async-propagation.md (TraceContextManagerImpl)
│  ├─ Kafka events? → examples/async-propagation.md (event chaining)
│  └─ Threading? → fundamentals.md (manual scope activation)
│
├─ Missing spans in Jaeger UI?
│  └─ See: examples/troubleshooting.md (common causes + fixes)
│
├─ Custom instrumentation pattern?
│  ├─ LLM calls? → examples/advanced-instrumentation.md (custom attributes)
│  ├─ Debugging markers? → fundamentals.md (span events vs attributes)
│  └─ Multi-span operations? → examples/advanced-instrumentation.md
│
├─ Novel OpenTelemetry API question?
│  └─ Use Context7: /open-telemetry/opentelemetry-python
│
└─ Understanding async context propagation?
   └─ See: fundamentals.md (asyncio vs threading gotchas)

File Reference

| File | Content | Use When | |------|---------|----------| | fundamentals.md | Context7 novel patterns, OpenTelemetry gotchas | Learning non-obvious tracing behaviors | | huleedu-patterns.md | HuleEdu naming, initialization, conventions | Implementing tracing in new service | | async-propagation.md | Queue, Kafka, background task patterns | Fixing broken trace chains | | advanced-instrumentation.md | Custom attributes, span events, LLM patterns | Adding domain-specific instrumentation | | troubleshooting.md | Jaeger UI queries, debugging missing spans | Diagnosing tracing issues |

jaeger-tracing-specialist