Tracking Issue: Fine-Grained Tracing for PowerContext

[PsiACE]

Goal

Track the remaining tracing work on top of PowerContext's OpenTelemetry support.

This issue replaces #159 and the tracing requirements in #1163.

Current support

• W3C Trace Context propagation
• Optional OTLP export
• HTTP and MCP ingress spans
• Application operation spans
• Outbound PowerContext Client spans
• Request, trace, and span correlation in logs

Remaining work

• Document OpenTelemetry Collector and trace backend setup
• Trace Memory search and retrieval stages
• Trace reranking and context preparation
• Trace Memory capture, extraction, indexing, and persistence
• Trace generation, embedding, and other remote calls
• Trace scheduled and background processing
• Test span hierarchy, outcomes, and context propagation

Constraints

• Do not record queries, prompts, responses, Memory content, or vectors.
• Keep span attributes bounded.
• Tracing must remain optional and must not affect Runtime behavior.
• Do not store traces or build a trace viewer in PowerContext.
• Keep the existing operation names and W3C propagation contract.

References

• docs/en/rfcs/0046_observability_foundations.md
• src/powercontext/server/tracing.py
• src/powercontext/client/tracing.py

[Ethan-Xingyue]

I'm very interested in this issue and would love to learn more about it. May I ask how difficult this issue is? I noticed that there seem to be quite a few tasks involved. Is there a specific deadline or expected timeline for completing it?

[PsiACE]

Hi @Ethan-Xingyue . Thanks for your interest! #1214 is a tracking issue, so there is no expectation to complete everything and no fixed deadline.

I can split out a smaller task: integrate Pydantic AI's existing OpenTelemetry support, then document a minimal tracing setup. If you're interested, I can open a separate issue and assign it to you.

[Ethan-Xingyue]

Hi @Ethan-Xingyue . Thanks for your interest! #1214 is a tracking issue, so there is no expectation to complete everything and no fixed deadline.

I can split out a smaller task: integrate Pydantic AI's existing OpenTelemetry support, then document a minimal tracing setup. If you're interested, I can open a separate issue and assign it to you.

Thanks for the clarification! I’d be happy to take on the smaller task of integrating Pydantic AI’s existing OpenTelemetry support and documenting a minimal tracing setup. Please feel free to open a separate issue and assign it to me～

I’m also very interested in contributing more to PowerMem and would be happy to take on other issues or tasks in the future. Looking forward to getting started and contributing more to the project!

[Ethan-Xingyue]

Hi～@PsiACE ， could you perhaps split this issue into related issues and assign them to me? I'd be very happy to participate!