From KubeCon EU to KubeCon NA: Bindplane’s OpenTelemetry Contributions and Highlights (Mar–Oct 2025)

Bindplane engineers have stayed deeply involved in the OpenTelemetry community this summer. With KubeCon+CloudNativeCon North America in Atlanta coming up I wanted to dive into all the work that has been done and give the engineers a well deserved shoutout.

Here’s what we built, fixed, and contributed since KubeCon+CloudNativeCon Europe in London this March.

Control Plane: OpAMP Supervisor Enhancements

The Open Agent Management Protocol (OpAMP) defines how collectors are remotely managed, configured, and monitored.

This summer, Bindplane engineers shipped a series of upstream improvements to the OpAMP Supervisor, making large collector fleets more reliable and predictable.

Highlights

• Persistent RemoteConfig state to survive restarts
• Heartbeat support for lightweight collector health checks
• Smarter apply logic to prevent redundant updates
• Startup reporting improvements for cleaner state transitions

Together, these changes harden the same foundation that powers Bindplane’s collector management capability at enterprise scale.

Upstream PRs

• #42497 – Fix supervisor ignoring RemoteConfig messages
• #39500 – Only report applying if config is changed
• #40233 – Report RemoteConfigStatus on startup if present
• #40467 – Store RemoteConfigStatus in persistent state
• #40632 – Remove errant binary
• #42533 – Add support for OpAMP heartbeats

Huge shoutout to Dakota for leading the charge and being an influential ambassador for the growth of the OpAMP Supervisor. 💪

Bindplane UI example

We’re launching Fleets at KubeCon NA 2025 in Atlanta next week! This example below shows how Bindplane’s OpAMP contributions are reflected in the new feature for managing collectors at enterprise scale.

Data Transformation: The Unroll Processor

Logs often arrive as arrays. Multiple logical events are bundled inside a single record.

Parsing logs like these would require complex OTTL transformations, but they were still unreliable. The new unrollprocessor, Keith contributed upstream, makes unrolling (pun intended) nested logs native to the OpenTelemetry Collector.

What it does

Iterates through array-like fields (e.g. JSON lists) and emits each element as its own log record while preserving attributes and timestamps.

Why it matters

Simplifies structured-log handling at scale, especially in Kubernetes and cloud environments where batched payloads are common.

Config example

1processors:
2  unroll:
3    field: body

Bindplane UI example

What’s going on here? This example below shows a log body with 3 log messages delimited with a comma “,”. The log.body string is first Split into an array and then unrolled to 3 separate log lines.

Upstream PR

• #42500 – processor/unroll: upstream unroll processor

Read more about this story

Keith has also opened a PR for the OpenTelemetry Blog to explain the full story behind his intention to upstream the unrollprocessor from the BDOT Collector. I’ll make sure to share it once it’s live. 🤝😎

Data Collection: Receiver Reliability and Features

Bindplane collectors process billions of records per day, so upstream reliability benefits everyone.

This summer, the team contributed fixes and new capabilities across a wide range of receivers — from AWS and Azure to Windows, vCenter, and NetFlow.

Highlights

• AWS CloudWatch: handle deleted log groups + pattern-based filtering
• Windows Event Log: domain-authenticated collection + optional raw body inclusion
• vCenter: resolve nil-pointer exceptions in VM metrics
• NetFlow: add TCP-flag parsing and raw log forwarding
• SQL Query: split datasource into separate connection fields
• Azure Event Hub: support new SDK, default consumer group, and simplified setup

Upstream PRs

AWS CloudWatch

• #40571 – AWS CloudWatch: fix polling of deleted log group
• #40981 – AWS CloudWatch: add pattern filter option for log groups
• #41261 – AWS CloudWatch: ensure close on opened storage clients

Windows Event Log

• #41947 – Windows Event Log: pass remote.domain to EvtRPCLogin
• #40367 – Windows Event Log: add IncludeLogRecordOriginal

vCenter

• #41701 – vCenter: fix NPE on VM metrics
• #42102 – vCenter: fix potential NPE on VM metrics collection

Azure Event Hub

• #42034 – Azure Event Hub: feature flag for new SDK
• #43051 – Azure Event Hub: use $Default consumer group
• #43052 – Azure Event Hub: omit storage client setup if not configured
• #42269 – Azure Event Hub: Add dyl10s as codeowner

NetFlow

• #40743 – NetFlow: add tcp_flags field
• #38832 – NetFlow: add send_raw option for unparsed logs

Misc

• #39762 – SQL Query: split datasource parameter
• #39268 – MongoDB: update driver library to v2
• #38312 – Routing connector: add standard converter functions

Growing the Maintainer Footprint

Open source is about stewardship as much as code.

This summer, four of our own Bindplaners officially joined the OpenTelemetry Collector Contrib project as codeowners.

Highlights

• Cole Laven (colelaven) — Apache & NGINX receivers
• Daniel Kuiper (kuiperda) — AES Provider
• Justin Voss (justinianvoss22) — MongoDB receivers
• Dylan Strohschein (dyl10s) — Azure Event Hub receiver

Upstream PRs

• #40129 – Add colelaven (Apache & NGINX)
• #40133 – Add kuiperda (AES Provider)
• #40131 – Add justinianvoss22 (MongoDB receivers)
• #42269 – Add dyl10s (Azure Event Hub receiver)

Their ongoing maintenance will make sure these components remain healthy long-term. The whole Bindplane team is incredibly proud to see them take on this responsibility and help the community push the OpenTelemetry project forward. 🥹

Why It Matters

Every contribution, from OpAMP improvements to the unroll processor, strengthens the foundation of OpenTelemetry-native observability.

• For operators: smoother rollouts and real-time fleet visibility
• For developers: richer transformation tools out of the box
• For the community: more stable, actively maintained components

Bindplane’s mission is to make telemetry simpler, faster, and open.

Looking Ahead

As we head into KubeCon North America, our focus turns to giving back even more by contributing new receivers, processors, and exporters built to help Bindplane customers and ultimately upstreamed to the OpenTelemetry project.

Our goal is simple. Innovate more, upstream more. Our community benefits.

Come talk to us about all things OpenTelemetry in Atlanta. Find the Bindplane team at Booth #1142. 👋

Appendix: PR Summary

OpAMP

• #42497 — Fix supervisor ignoring RemoteConfig messages
• #39500 — Only report applying if config changed
• #40233 — Report RemoteConfigStatus on startup
• #40467 — Store RemoteConfigStatus persistently
• #40632 — Remove errant binary
• #42533 — Add OpAMP heartbeats

Processor

• #42500 — Upstream unrollprocessor

AWS CloudWatch

• #40571 — Fix deleted log group polling
• #40981 — Add pattern filter option
• #41261 — Ensure close on opened storage clients

Windows Event Log

• #40367 — Add IncludeLogRecordOriginal
• #41947 — Pass remote.domain to EvtRPCLogin

vCenter

• #41701 — Fix NPE on VM metrics
• #42102 — Fix potential NPE on VM metrics collection

Azure Event Hub

• #42034 — Feature flag for new SDK
• #43051 — Use $Default consumer group
• #43052 — Omit storage client setup

NetFlow

• #40743 — Add tcp_flags field
• #38832 — Add send_raw option

SQL Query

• #39762 — Split datasource parameter

MongoDB (lib)

• #39268 — Update driver library to v2

Routing Connector

• #38312 — Add standard converter functions

Codeowners

• #40129 — Add colelaven (Apache & NGINX)
• #40133 — Add kuiperda (AES Provider)
• #40131 — Add justinianvoss22 (MongoDB)
• #42269 — Add dyl10s (Azure Event Hub)