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

.

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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)

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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

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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)

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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

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Related Documentation

• Context7:

  /open-telemetry/opentelemetry-python

  - Complete OpenTelemetry API docs
• HuleEdu Observability:

  .claude/rules/071.1-service-observability-core-patterns.md

• Prometheus Metrics:

  .claude/skills/prometheus-metrics/

  - Metrics correlation patterns
• Structlog Logging:

  .claude/skills/structlog-logging/

  - Log correlation patterns

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LoC: 80