GitHub Copilot

Trace GitHub Copilot sessions in VS Code and the Copilot CLI in Arize AX for full observability.

GitHub Copilot is GitHub’s AI pair programmer for VS Code and the command line. There are two ways to get Copilot activity into Arize AX: the Arize Coding Harness Tracing, which installs hooks and exports OpenInference spans directly, or Copilot’s own OpenTelemetry export, which Arize AX normalizes on ingestion.

Choose an approach

	Arize Coding Harness Tracing	Native OpenTelemetry export
Setup scope	Once per repository, since the hooks file lives in each workspace	Once per user, device, or enterprise
Central rollout	Each developer runs the installer	Through Copilot managed settings (MDM, server-managed, or file-based)
Credentials	`~/.arize/harness/config.json`, or environment variables	Managed headers stay inside the extension’s exporter and never enter environment variables
Content capture	On by default, with three separate `ARIZE_LOG_*` redaction flags	One `captureContent` toggle, off by default, lockable by an admin
Span fidelity	Native OpenInference, no convention mapping in between	Normalized from `gen_ai.*` on ingestion, so hook spans arrive unclassified

For a team or an enterprise, prefer the native OpenTelemetry export. It scales without touching every repository, and an administrator can mandate it centrally so developers configure nothing. Use the harness when you need per-category redaction control, or when you want OpenInference spans with no convention mapping in between. Both paths need an Arize AX Space ID and API key.

Launch Arize AX

To get started, sign up for a free Arize AX account and get your Space ID and API Key:

Log in at app.arize.com
Click Settings and copy the Space ID
Open the API Keys tab and create or copy an API key

Install

This installs the Arize Coding Harness. Copilot hooks are installed at the project level under .github/hooks/, so run the installer from the root of each repository where you want tracing. To avoid a per-repository install entirely, use the native OpenTelemetry export instead, which needs no installer.

Curl installer

macOS / Linux:

cd /path/to/your/project
curl -sSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/Arize-ai/coding-harness-tracing/main/install.sh | bash -s -- copilot

Windows (PowerShell):

cd C:\path\to\your\project
iwr -useb https://raw.githubusercontent.com/Arize-ai/coding-harness-tracing/main/install.bat -OutFile $env:TEMP\install.bat
& $env:TEMP\install.bat copilot

Local clone

git clone https://github.com/Arize-ai/coding-harness-tracing.git
cd /path/to/your/project
/path/to/coding-harness-tracing/install.sh copilot         # macOS / Linux
\path\to\coding-harness-tracing\install.bat copilot        # Windows

The installer writes credentials to ~/.arize/harness/config.json and registers VS Code (.github/hooks/*.json) and Copilot CLI (.github/hooks/hooks.json) hooks in the current project. The installer runs a short interactive setup. Every harness in the Arize Coding Harness Tracing repo asks the same questions, in the same order.

Setup walkthrough

1. Backend selection

Choose where spans are sent:

Phoenix — your own Phoenix instance.
Arize AX — the hosted Arize platform.

2. Credentials

The prompts depend on the backend you picked.

Arize AX
Phoenix

API key — create one on the API keys tab.
Space ID — shown on the same settings tab as your API keys.
OTLP endpoint — defaults to otlp.arize.com:443. Override it only for a hosted or dedicated instance.

Endpoint — defaults to http://localhost:6006.
API key — optional. Leave it blank when Phoenix runs without auth.

If you have already configured another harness against the same backend, the installer offers a copy-from menu so you can reuse those credentials instead of retyping them.

3. Project name

The project that this harness’s spans are grouped under. Defaults to the harness name.

4. User ID (optional)

A free-form identifier attached to every span as user.id. Useful when teammates share one backend. Leave it blank to skip.

5. Content logging

Three [Y/n] opt-outs that apply to every harness, not only the one you are installing:

Log user prompts?
Log what tools were asked to do (commands, file paths, URLs)?
Log what tools returned (file contents, command output)?

You are asked these only the first time you install any harness. Later installs reuse the existing logging block in ~/.arize/harness/config.json, which you can edit at any time.

Install flags

Flag	Effect
`--with-skills`	Symlink this harness’s management skill into `.agents/skills/`, so a coding agent in the workspace can manage the tracing config for you
`--non-interactive`, `-y`	Ask nothing, and read every value from the environment instead
`--branch NAME`	Install from a specific branch instead of `main`
`--wheel-dir DIR`	Install from local wheels in `DIR`: no network access and no remote code execution

Non-interactive install

Pass --non-interactive (or -y) to skip every prompt above and take each value from the environment instead. Nothing is asked, and a missing required value is an error rather than a prompt, which makes this the mode to use from a script, from CI, or when a coding agent is driving the install itself. Values come from the environment, or from a dotenv file named explicitly with ARIZE_ENV_FILE. Naming a file keeps the API key out of the command line and your shell history.

ARIZE_ENV_FILE=~/.arize/onboarding.env ./install.sh <harness> --non-interactive

Variable	Default	Description
`ARIZE_API_KEY` + `ARIZE_SPACE_ID`	—	Arize AX credentials. Both are required for the Arize backend.
`PHOENIX_ENDPOINT`, `PHOENIX_API_KEY`	`http://localhost:6006`	Phoenix endpoint and optional API key.
`ARIZE_BACKEND`	inferred	`arize` or `phoenix`. A space ID implies Arize AX and a Phoenix endpoint implies Phoenix. When both are present the install stops and asks you to set this rather than guess, since guessing would discard one backend’s credentials.
`ARIZE_PROJECT_NAME`	harness name	Project that spans are grouped under. Read from the dotenv file only. An installed harness exports its own project name into every session, so an inherited environment value is ignored here.
`ARIZE_USER_ID`	—	Optional `user.id` on every span.
`ARIZE_OTLP_ENDPOINT`	`otlp.arize.com:443`	Override for a hosted or dedicated Arize instance.
`ARIZE_LOG_PROMPTS`	`false`	Set `true` to capture prompt text.
`ARIZE_LOG_TOOL_DETAILS`	`false`	Set `true` to capture tool commands, file paths, and URLs.
`ARIZE_LOG_TOOL_CONTENT`	`false`	Set `true` to capture tool output.
`ARIZE_ENV_FILE`	—	Dotenv file to read. No file is read unless this is set, and a path that is not a readable file is an error rather than a fallback to the environment.
`ARIZE_WHEEL_DIR`	—	Same as `--wheel-dir`. Install from local wheels instead of downloading the repo.

A named ARIZE_ENV_FILE outranks the environment, and there is deliberately no automatic ./.env search. Reading the working directory would let a cloned repository’s dotenv choose ARIZE_OTLP_ENDPOINT or PHOENIX_ENDPOINT while your real credentials came from the environment, installing a config that ships spans and a bearer API key to an endpoint the repo picked, for every later session on that machine. Name the file you mean.

Content logging is off by default in this mode, unlike the interactive wizard where each question defaults to yes. A [Y/n] default is a person declining to change an answer they were shown; the same default unattended would capture prompts, commands, and file contents that nobody agreed to. Set the ARIZE_LOG_* variables you want to true.

The API key is never echoed. The installer reports only that it found one and where it came from, and every resolved value is reported with its source, so a wrong-credentials install stays diagnosable:

[arize] Backend: Arize AX at otlp.arize.com:443 (from default)
[arize]   space ID: my-space (from /path/to/.env)
[arize]   API key: found (from /path/to/.env)
[arize] Project name: codex (from default)

Check what’s installed

status reports which harnesses are configured and whether their hooks are actually wired into each harness’s own settings file. Both have to be true for traces to appear.

./install.sh status
./install.sh status --json    # machine-readable

hooks: NOT registered means credentials are saved but the harness was never wired up, or something removed the hooks. Re-run the install for that harness. Use --json from a script or a coding agent to gate on the exit code without parsing output: 0 means every configured harness is wired up, 1 means nothing is configured, and 2 means at least one harness’s hooks are missing. The payload contains no secrets — an API key appears only as "api_key_present": true — so it is safe to paste into a bug report.

Keep it up to date

update pulls the latest code and re-registers every harness already in config.json.

./install.sh update

Re-registering runs each harness’s installer, so in a terminal it still asks for each project name. With no terminal to answer on, in CI or a cron job, it takes the stored values instead of failing: credentials are not re-read on that path, and the project name keeps whatever is in config.json.

Configuration

Credentials live in ~/.arize/harness/config.json and apply across all projects. Per-project environment variables override config.json and can be set in your shell profile.

export ARIZE_API_KEY="<your-api-key>"
export ARIZE_SPACE_ID="<your-space-id>"
export ARIZE_PROJECT_NAME="copilot"
export ARIZE_TRACE_ENABLED="true"

Redaction controls

Each ARIZE_LOG_* flag accepts "true" or "false" and defaults to "true". Set to "false" to opt out per category:

export ARIZE_LOG_PROMPTS="false"
export ARIZE_LOG_TOOL_DETAILS="false"
export ARIZE_LOG_TOOL_CONTENT="false"

Flag	Redacts
`ARIZE_LOG_PROMPTS`	User prompt and assistant response text
`ARIZE_LOG_TOOL_DETAILS`	Tool names and arguments
`ARIZE_LOG_TOOL_CONTENT`	Tool call output content

Observe

Once tracing is enabled, Copilot activity from both VS Code and the CLI streams to Arize AX. You’ll see:

Turn traces — each prompt → response cycle as a parent span
Tool spans — nested spans for each tool call with inputs, outputs, and duration
Subagent spans — activity from any subagents Copilot spawns (VS Code)
Error spans — errorOccurred events from the CLI
Session grouping — all turns from the same session grouped by session_id

Hooks Captured

Copilot in VS Code and on the CLI use different event names. The Agent Kit handles both with one install command.

Surface	Hook File	Events
VS Code	`.github/hooks/session-start.json`	`SessionStart`
VS Code	`.github/hooks/user-prompt.json`	`UserPromptSubmit`
VS Code	`.github/hooks/pre-tool.json`	`PreToolUse`
VS Code	`.github/hooks/post-tool.json`	`PostToolUse`
VS Code	`.github/hooks/stop.json`	`Stop`
VS Code	`.github/hooks/subagent-stop.json`	`SubagentStop`
CLI	`.github/hooks/hooks.json`	`sessionStart`, `userPromptSubmitted`, `preToolUse`, `postToolUse`, `errorOccurred`, `sessionEnd`

Native OpenTelemetry export

Copilot Chat emits its own OpenTelemetry traces following the OTel GenAI semantic conventions, with no hooks and no installer. Arize AX normalizes gen_ai.* spans into OpenInference on ingestion, so you can point Copilot straight at the Arize AX OTLP endpoint. Enabling OTel instruments every agent type at once: the foreground agent, Copilot CLI sessions, Claude agent sessions, and any subagents, with trace context propagated across them.

Set up a single developer

In settings.json:

{
  "github.copilot.chat.otel.enabled": true,
  "github.copilot.chat.otel.otlpEndpoint": "https://otlp.arize.com",
  "github.copilot.chat.otel.captureContent": true
}

There is no user-level setting for OTLP headers, so credentials and project routing go through environment variables:

export OTEL_EXPORTER_OTLP_HEADERS="space_id=<your-space-id>,api_key=<your-api-key>"
export OTEL_RESOURCE_ATTRIBUTES="openinference.project.name=copilot"

Without openinference.project.name, spans have no project to land in. OTEL_SERVICE_NAME does not route them.

The exported URL must resolve to https://otlp.arize.com/v1/traces. VS Code appends /v1/traces to the endpoint you configure, the same way it does for the http://localhost:4318 collector default. If no spans arrive, set otlpEndpoint to the full path instead. Posting to the bare host returns an HTTP success and silently discards the spans.

Leave captureContent off and you get metadata only: model names, token counts, durations, and tool names, but no prompts, responses, or tool arguments.

Roll out across an enterprise

Administrators can mandate the whole configuration through the telemetry block in Copilot managed settings, delivered by MDM (Intune, Jamf, Group Policy), server-managed settings from your .github-private repository, or a file-based managed-settings.json. Developers configure nothing.

{
  "telemetry": {
    "enabled": true,
    "endpoint": "https://otlp.arize.com",
    "protocol": "http/protobuf",
    "captureContent": true,
    "lockCaptureContent": true,
    "resourceAttributes": {
      "openinference.project.name": "copilot"
    },
    "headers": {
      "space_id": "<your-space-id>",
      "api_key": "<your-api-key>"
    }
  }
}

A managed value always wins, taking precedence over environment variables and user settings. lockCaptureContent prevents developers from changing whether prompt and tool content is captured.

Managed telemetry.headers are applied only to the Copilot Chat extension’s exporter and are deliberately never passed through environment variables, so an API key cannot leak into the tool subprocesses the agent host spawns. As a consequence, managed headers do not currently reach the agent host, so Copilot CLI terminal sessions still need OTEL_EXPORTER_OTLP_HEADERS set in the environment.

Spans Captured

Copilot’s operation names normalize to OpenInference span kinds as follows:

Copilot span	`gen_ai.operation.name`	Arize AX span kind
`invoke_agent`	`invoke_agent`	`AGENT`
`chat`	`chat`	`LLM`
`execute_tool`	`execute_tool`	`TOOL`
`execute_hook`	`execute_hook`	Unclassified

On the agent and chat spans you get prompts and responses as llm.input_messages and llm.output_messages, token counts, model name, and computed cost. Tool spans carry tool.name, tool.parameters, and the tool result as output.value. gen_ai.conversation.id becomes session.id, so turns group into sessions. The raw gen_ai.*, github.copilot.*, and copilot_chat.* attributes are all preserved on the span, so you can still filter on things like github.copilot.git.branch.

What does not carry over

Hook spans are unclassified. execute_hook is not a recognized GenAI operation, so those spans arrive with no span kind. Their github.copilot.hook.* attributes are preserved and still queryable.
Metrics and events are dropped. Arize AX ingests traces. The copilot_chat.* metrics (edit acceptance, edit survival, time to first token) and the OTel events are not spans and are not stored.
The provider stays unmapped. gen_ai.provider.name is github, which is not in the provider table, so it passes through to llm.system unchanged and llm.provider is left unset.

Reference

For the full list of environment variables, default file paths, and troubleshooting steps, see the Copilot tracing README. For the native export, see Monitor agent usage with OpenTelemetry in the VS Code documentation.

Uninstall

Run from the project root where you installed the hooks:

curl -sSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/Arize-ai/coding-harness-tracing/main/install.sh | bash -s -- uninstall copilot

To turn off the native export, set github.copilot.chat.otel.enabled to false, or set telemetry.enabled to false in managed settings.

OpenTelemetry

LLM Providers

Agent Frameworks

Coding Agents

Platforms

Orchestration

Evaluation

Choose an approach

Launch Arize AX

Install

Curl installer

Local clone

Setup walkthrough

1. Backend selection

2. Credentials

3. Project name

4. User ID (optional)

5. Content logging

Install flags

Non-interactive install

Check what’s installed

Keep it up to date

Configuration

Redaction controls

Observe

Hooks Captured

Native OpenTelemetry export

Set up a single developer

Roll out across an enterprise

Spans Captured

What does not carry over

Reference

Uninstall

Resources

Arize Coding Harness Tracing

OpenInference

GitHub Copilot

​Choose an approach

​Launch Arize AX

​Install

​Curl installer

​Local clone

​Setup walkthrough

​1. Backend selection

​2. Credentials

​3. Project name

​4. User ID (optional)

​5. Content logging

​Install flags

​Non-interactive install

​Check what’s installed

​Keep it up to date

​Configuration

​Redaction controls

​Observe

​Hooks Captured

​Native OpenTelemetry export

​Set up a single developer

​Roll out across an enterprise

​Spans Captured

​What does not carry over

​Reference

​Uninstall

​Resources

Arize Coding Harness Tracing

OpenInference

GitHub Copilot

Choose an approach

Launch Arize AX

Install

Curl installer

Local clone

Setup walkthrough

1. Backend selection

2. Credentials

3. Project name

4. User ID (optional)

5. Content logging

Install flags

Non-interactive install

Check what’s installed

Keep it up to date

Configuration

Redaction controls

Observe

Hooks Captured

Native OpenTelemetry export

Set up a single developer

Roll out across an enterprise

Spans Captured

What does not carry over

Reference

Uninstall

Resources