Observe Opaque Services With OpenTelemetry eBPF + proxymock

The guide presents a Kubernetes lab for investigating opaque services without modifying source code, combining OpenTelemetry eBPF Instrumentation (OBI) for kernel-level HTTP endpoint discovery, RED metrics, and distributed tracing with proxymock for recording and replaying real inbound and outbound traffic. Using a Go application with an undocumented-looking `/api/stats` route that calls `/v1/projects`, the lab shows how to capture request boundaries, preserve machine-generated query time windows, query Prometheus and Tempo through MCP tools, and determine that most observed request latency is spent in the downstream dependency. It emphasizes that telemetry attributes where time is spent, while recorded traffic establishes the concrete request-response contract and enables functional and load replay independently of telemetry. The workflow uses functional replay as a correctness gate before a 100-request load replay, clarifies that faster mocked replay reflects dependency isolation rather than application optimization, and recommends adding targeted source instrumentation only when boundary-level evidence cannot explain internal delays. It also outlines required tooling, pinned component versions, security and platform constraints for eBPF, and limitations involving kernels, encrypted or non-HTTP/1.1 traffic, Prometheus counter interpretation, and replay performance measurements.

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