Tracing Configuration | Spring Cloud Sleuth

Introduction

Tracing is a crucial aspect of distributed systems, allowing for the tracking of requests across multiple services. Spring Cloud Sleuth provides an easy way to add distributed tracing to your Spring applications. This tutorial will guide you through the configuration process for tracing using Spring Cloud Sleuth.

Prerequisites

Before you begin, ensure you have the following:

Java Development Kit (JDK) 8 or higher
Maven or Gradle for dependency management
Basic understanding of Spring Boot applications

Adding Dependencies

To start using Spring Cloud Sleuth, you need to add the appropriate dependencies to your project. Depending on your build tool, you can do this as follows:

Using Maven

Add the following dependency to your pom.xml file:

<dependency>
    <groupId>org.springframework.cloud</groupId>
    <artifactId>spring-cloud-starter-sleuth</artifactId>
</dependency>

Using Gradle

Add the following dependency to your build.gradle file:

implementation 'org.springframework.cloud:spring-cloud-starter-sleuth'

Basic Configuration

After adding the necessary dependencies, Spring Cloud Sleuth will automatically configure itself with sensible defaults. However, you can customize the configuration through your application.properties or application.yml file.

Application Properties

Here is an example configuration in application.properties:

spring.sleuth.sampler.probability=1.0
spring.sleuth.logging.enabled=true

Application YAML

Similarly, in application.yml:

spring:
  sleuth:
    sampler:
      probability: 1.0
    logging:
      enabled: true

In this configuration, we set the sampling probability to 1.0, meaning all requests will be traced. Adjust this value as necessary for production use.

Advanced Configuration

Spring Cloud Sleuth allows for more advanced configurations, including customization of the span names and adding custom tagging.

Custom Span Names

You can define custom span names for specific methods in your service. For example:

Annotate your method like this:

@NewSpan("customSpanName")
public void myMethod() {
    // method implementation
}

Adding Tags

You can also add tags to your spans for better context during tracing. Use the Tracer bean to add tags:

Example of adding tags:

@Autowired
private Tracer tracer;

public void myMethod() {
    Span span = tracer.currentSpan();
    span.tag("myTag", "myValue");
}

Conclusion

Configuring tracing in Spring Cloud Sleuth is straightforward and provides powerful tools for monitoring and debugging distributed systems. From basic configuration to advanced customization, Spring Cloud Sleuth enhances the observability of your microservices.

For further reading and advanced use cases, refer to the official documentation of Spring Cloud Sleuth.

Tracing Configuration in Spring Cloud Sleuth