Logs Bridge API
Status: Stable
Note: this document defines a log backend API. The API is not intended to be called by application developers directly. It is provided for logging library authors to build log appenders, which use this API to bridge between existing logging libraries and the OpenTelemetry log data model.
The Logs Bridge API consist of these main classes:
- LoggerProvider is the entry point of the API. It provides access to
Logger
s. - Logger is the class responsible for emitting logs as LogRecords.
graph TD A[LoggerProvider] -->|Get| B(Logger) B -->|Emit| C(LogRecord)
LoggerProvider
Logger
s can be accessed with a LoggerProvider
.
In implementations of the API, the LoggerProvider
is expected to be the stateful
object that holds any configuration.
Normally, the LoggerProvider
is expected to be accessed from a central place.
Thus, the API SHOULD provide a way to set/register and access a global default
LoggerProvider
.
LoggerProvider operations
The LoggerProvider
MUST provide the following functions:
- Get a
Logger
Get a Logger
This API MUST accept the following parameters:
-
name
: This name uniquely identifies the instrumentation scope, such as the instrumentation library (e.g.io.opentelemetry.contrib.mongodb
), package, module or class name. If an application or library has built-in OpenTelemetry instrumentation, both Instrumented library and Instrumentation library may refer to the same library. In that scenario, thename
denotes a module name or component name within that library or application. -
version
(optional): Specifies the version of the instrumentation scope if the scope has a version (e.g. a library version). Example value: 1.0.0. -
schema_url
(optional): Specifies the Schema URL that should be recorded in the emitted telemetry. -
attributes
(optional): Specifies the instrumentation scope attributes to associate with emitted telemetry. This API MUST be structured to accept a variable number of attributes, including none.
Logger
s are identified by name
, version
, and schema_url
fields. When more
than one Logger
of the same name
, version
, and schema_url
is created, it
is unspecified whether or under which conditions the same or different Logger
instances are returned. It is a user error to create Loggers with different
attributes
but the same identity.
The term identical applied to Logger
s describes instances where all
identifying fields are equal. The term distinct applied to Logger
s describes
instances where at least one identifying field has a different value.
The effect of associating a Schema URL with a Logger
MUST be that the telemetry
emitted using the Logger
will be associated with the Schema URL, provided that
the emitted data format is capable of representing such association.
Logger
The Logger
is responsible for emitting LogRecord
s.
Logger operations
The Logger
MUST provide functions to:
- Emit a
LogRecord
Emit a LogRecord
The effect of calling this API is to emit a LogRecord
to the processing pipeline.
The API MUST accept the following parameters:
- Timestamp
- Observed Timestamp. If unspecified the implementation SHOULD set it equal to the current time.
- The Context associated with the
LogRecord
. The API MAY implicitly use the current Context as a default behavior. - Severity Number
- Severity Text
- Body
- Attributes
All parameters are optional.
Optional and required parameters
The operations defined include various parameters, some of which are marked optional. Parameters not marked optional are required.
For each optional parameter, the API MUST be structured to accept it, but MUST NOT obligate a user to provide it.
For each required parameter, the API MUST be structured to obligate a user to provide it.
Concurrency requirements
For languages which support concurrent execution the Logs Bridge APIs provide specific guarantees and safeties.
LoggerProvider - all methods are safe to be called concurrently.
Logger - all methods are safe to be called concurrently.
Artifact Naming
The Logs Bridge API is not intended to be called by application developers directly, and SHOULD include documentation that discourages direct use. However, in the event OpenTelemetry were to add a user facing API, the Logs Bridge API would be a natural starting point. Therefore, Log Bridge API artifact, package, and class names MUST NOT include the terms “bridge”, “appender”, or any other qualifier that would prevent evolution into a user facing API.