Glossary · Observability

What Is OpenTelemetry?

OpenTelemetry is the open standard for how modern systems produce and ship observability data, without locking you into any one vendor.

OpenTelemetry (OTel) is an open-source, vendor-neutral observability framework, a set of APIs, SDKs, a Collector and semantic conventions, for generating and collecting traces, metrics and logs and exporting them over a single protocol (OTLP).

What OpenTelemetry actually is

OpenTelemetry is a CNCF project that standardises the three core telemetry signals, traces, metrics and logs. It gives you language APIs and SDKs to instrument code, a Collector to receive and route the data, semantic conventions so signals are named consistently, and OTLP as the wire protocol to move everything. In short, it is the plumbing and the vocabulary for observability.

Why vendor-neutrality matters

Before OpenTelemetry, each monitoring vendor had its own agent and format, so switching tools meant re-instrumenting everything. With OpenTelemetry you instrument once and can send the data to any compatible backend, which removes lock-in and lets you change or combine backends without touching application code. That portability is the whole point.

How it fits Ops Singularity

Ops Singularity's TelemetryOps pillar is OpenTelemetry-native: it ingests OTLP traces, metrics and logs directly, so the same open instrumentation that feeds your dashboards also feeds Sentinel AI for autonomous, governed resolution.

Frequently asked questions

Is OpenTelemetry free?

Yes. OpenTelemetry is an open-source project under the CNCF. The instrumentation, SDKs and Collector are free; you choose where to send the data.

What are the three signals in OpenTelemetry?

Traces, metrics and logs. OpenTelemetry standardises all three (with profiling emerging as a fourth) and moves them over OTLP.

One governed intelligence layer for every operation.

Ops Singularity turns open telemetry into autonomous, governed resolution. See it on your own stack.

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