Rule proposal: Only one root span per trace

[svrnm]

Proposal

Rule ID: SPA-00x

Description: In a trace there MUST only be one root span

Rationale: The OpenTelemetry specification defines the root span to be unique in a trace. However it is possible due to broken context propagation or span creation errors, that a trace has multiple root spans.

Target: Span

Criteria: Only one span in a trace has no parent span set

Impact: Critical

[jpkrohling]

So, we'd have the same trace ID but one of the spans wouldn't have a parent span? How is the trace ID propagated in that case?

[svrnm]

I think this is more a rule that shouldn't happen, but you never know how people implement their stuff and break things, e.g. if they do not use official otel APIs, or if they use some other tooling that also creates tracing but does thing's in an unexpected manner.

[mmanciop]

@svrnm 100%. Wanna draft the rule?

[svrnm]

@svrnm 100%. Wanna draft the rule?

I can give it a try, sure!