Edge Delta Deotel Processor

The Edge Delta Deotel processor converts OpenTelemetry formatted data back to simplified formats for non-OTLP destinations.

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Overview

The Deotel (De-OpenTelemetry) processor extracts the core content from OpenTelemetry formatted telemetry data, removing all OTLP wrapper metadata. It takes a specified field (typically body) from the OpenTelemetry structure and outputs only that field’s content, discarding resource attributes, trace context, and other metadata.

The Deotel processor is ideal for:

  • Sending logs to legacy systems that don’t support OTLP format
  • Forwarding data to custom applications in their original format
  • Reducing data size by removing OpenTelemetry metadata

Do not use the Deotel processor when:

  • Your destination supports OpenTelemetry/OTLP format
  • You need trace context for distributed tracing
  • You need resource metadata for infrastructure correlation
  • Your downstream system benefits from OpenTelemetry semantic conventions

Data Loss

The Deotel processor permanently removes OpenTelemetry metadata including:

  • Trace context (trace_id, span_id) for distributed tracing
  • Resource attributes (service name, host information, Kubernetes metadata)
  • Semantic conventions and standardized field names
  • Timestamp information from the OTLP wrapper

If you need to preserve some OpenTelemetry metadata in the output, use OTTL Transform before Deotel to merge important fields into the body or whichever field you configure the deotel processor to preserve:

processors:
- type: ottl_transform
  statements: |
    set(body_map, ParseJSON(body))
    set(body_map["service"], resource["service.name"]) 
    set(body_map["pod"], resource["k8s.pod.name"])
    set(body, String(body_map))

Configuration

You configure the Deotel processor by specifying which field to extract and preserve from the OpenTelemetry structure. The processor removes all other fields and outputs only the extracted content.

Example Input

Suppose the following OpenTelemetry formatted log is sent to the Deotel processor:

{
  "_type": "log",
  "timestamp": 1755065085076,
  "body": "{\"timestamp\":\"2025-08-13T06:04:44+00:00\",\"level\":\"INFO\",\"message\":\"Test log 4\",\"service\":\"test-service\",\"trace_id\":\"trace-4\"}",
  "resource": {
    "container.id": "123456789",
    "container.image.name": "docker.io/library/123456:latest",
    "ed.domain": "k8s",
    "ed.filepath": "/var/log/pods/busy_test-deotel_123456789/test-deotel/0.log",
    "ed.source.name": "kubernetes_input_50df",
    "ed.source.type": "kubernetes_input",
    "host.ip": "172.19.0.2",
    "host.name": "ed-api-testbench-control-plane",
    "k8s.container.name": "test-deotel",
    "k8s.namespace.name": "busy",
    "k8s.node.name": "ed-api-testbench-control-plane",
    "k8s.pod.name": "test-deotel",
    "k8s.pod.uid": "123456789",
    "service.name": "Unknown"
  },
  "attributes": {
    "level": "INFO",
    "message": "Test log 4",
    "service": "test-service",
    "timestamp": "2025-08-13T06:04:44+00:00",
    "trace_id": "trace-4"
  }
}

This configuration extracts only the body field:

- name: deotel_processor
  type: sequence
  processors:
  - type: deotel
    metadata: '{"id":"unique_id","type":"deotel","name":"Deotel"}'
    data_types:
    - log
    field_path: body

Example Output

The processor outputs only the content of the body field:

{"timestamp":"2025-08-13T06:04:44+00:00","level":"INFO","message":"Test log 4","service":"test-service","trace_id":"trace-4"}

Note how the Deotel processor:

  • Extracted only the body field content
  • Removed all resource attributes (container, Kubernetes, host information)
  • Removed the attributes object
  • Removed timestamp and _type fields
  • Output the original log format without any OpenTelemetry wrapper

Options

condition

The condition parameter contains a conditional phrase of an OTTL statement. It restricts operation of the processor to only data items where the condition is met. Those data items that do not match the condition are passed without processing. You configure it in the interface and an OTTL condition is generated. It is optional. You can select one of the following operators:

Operator Name Description Example
== Equal to Returns true if both values are exactly the same attributes["status"] == "OK"
!= Not equal to Returns true if the values are not the same attributes["level"] != "debug"
> Greater than Returns true if the left value is greater than the right attributes["duration_ms"] > 1000
>= Greater than or equal Returns true if the left value is greater than or equal to the right attributes["score"] >= 90
< Less than Returns true if the left value is less than the right attributes["load"] < 0.75
<= Less than or equal Returns true if the left value is less than or equal to the right attributes["retries"] <= 3
matches Regex match Returns true if the string matches a regular expression isMatch(attributes["name"], ".*\\.name$"

It is defined in YAML as follows:

- name: _multiprocessor
  type: sequence
  processors:
  - type: <processor type>
    condition: attributes["request"]["path"] == "/json/view"

field_path

The field to extract and preserve from the OpenTelemetry structure. Typically body or an enriched attribute.

Final

Determines whether successfully processed data items should continue through the remaining processors in the same processor stack. If final is set to true, data items output by this processor are not passed to subsequent processors within the node—they are instead emitted to downstream nodes in the pipeline (e.g., a destination). Failed items are always passed to the next processor, regardless of this setting.

The UI provides a slider to configure this setting. The default is false. It is defined in YAML as follows:

- name: multiprocessor
  type: sequence
  processors:
    - type: <processor type>
    final: true

See Also