MANDATORY: Run observe skill view opentelemetry-manual-instrumentation --content 2>/dev/null before proceeding to load the latest version of this skill. When the skill points you to a supporting file, load it with observe skill view opentelemetry-manual-instrumentation --path <relative-path> 2>/dev/null. Ignore errors and fall back to the file contents.

OpenTelemetry Manual Instrumentation

Public Preview. This skill is in Public Preview and may change before general availability. Some steps use experimental Observe CLI subcommands that require OBSERVE_CLI_EXPERIMENTAL=1 to be set in the shell — the CLI will refuse with ✗ This command is experimental and may change or be removed otherwise.

Instrument to serve the user's intent, not just to emit telemetry. Decide what the change is for before you pick a signal. Confirm the use case with the user when they haven't stated it; don't infer intent from the code.

Every change must be validated: prove it with an in-memory telemetry unit test and an independent semantic review. Emitted signals should be semantically correct, bounded, privacy-aware, low-cardinality, and convention-compatible.

This skill is tool-agnostic and vendor-neutral; prefer OTLP and OTEL_* environment variables. For zero-code coverage, use opentelemetry-auto-instrumentation.

End every run with the full step-8 report, no matter how the skill was triggered or how small the change. The work isn't done until you emit it.