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AWS X-Ray - FAQ

  1. **Does AWS Distro for Open Telemetry (ADOT) support trace propagation across AWS services such as Event Bridge or SQS? **Technically, that’s not ADOT but AWS X-Ray. We are working on expanding the number and types of AWS services that propagate and/or generate spans. If you have a use case depending on this, please reach out to us.
  2. Will I be able to use the W3C trace header to ingest spans into AWS X-Ray using ADOT? Yes, later in 2023. We’re working on supporting W3C trace context propagation.
  3. Can I trace requests across Lambda functions when SQS is involved in the middle? Yes. X-Ray now supports tracing across Lambda functions when SQS is involved in the middle. Traces from upstream message producers are automatically linked to traces from downstream Lambda consumer nodes, creating an end-to-end view of the application.
  4. Should I use X-Ray SDK or the OTel SDK to instrument my application? OTel offers more features than the X-Ray SDK, but to choose which one is right for your use case see Choosing between ADOT and X-Ray SDK
  5. Are span events supported in AWS X-Ray? Span events do not fit into the X-Ray model and are hence dropped.
  6. How can I extract data out of AWS X-Ray? You can retrieve Service Graph, Traces and Root cause analytics data using X-Ray APIs.
  7. Can I achieve 100% sampling? That is, I want all traces to be recorded without sampling at all. You can adjust the sampling rules to capture significantly increased amount of trace data. As long as the total segments sent do not breach the service quota limits mentioned here, X-Ray will make an effort to collect data as configured. There is no guarantee that this will result in 100% trace data capture as a result.
  8. Can I dynamically increase or decrease sampling rules through APIs? Yes, you can use the X-Ray sampling APIs to make adjustments dynamically as necessary. See this blog for a use-case based explanation.
  9. Product FAQ https://aws.amazon.com/xray/faqs/