Is the demo/http app ready to export tracing to OTEL_EXPORTER_OTLP_ENDPOINT?

[brightzheng100]

Describe the bug

The current demo/http app may not be ready to make it end-to-end yet, I guess, as there is no role for otel CLI to play with.

So, based on my understanding, I've updated the procedure to compile it with otel involved, but nothing has happened: no tracing at least based on my observation.

Environment

• OS: iOS, Linux
• Go Version:

$ go version
go version go1.25.5 darwin/arm64

• Version: latest in main branch, as of 6 Jan 2026.

To Reproduce

1. To compile it with otel CLI, for both of my testing envs:

For Server:

env GOOS=darwin GOARCH=arm64 otel go build -o server-darwin-arm64 .
env GOOS=linux GOARCH=arm64 otel go build -o server-linux-arm64 .

For Client:

env GOOS=darwin GOARCH=arm64 otel go build -o client-darwin-arm64 .
env GOOS=linux GOARCH=arm64 otel go build -o client-linux-arm64 .

Then run it with OTEL_EXPORTER_OTLP_ENDPOINT exported for collecting the tracing:

export OTEL_EXPORTER_OTLP_ENDPOINT="http://localhost:4318"

But, nothing had happened: no tracing was observed based on my experiments.

Expected behavior

Tracing should be observed and collected.

[kakkoyun]

This is a potentially a configuration bug. I will try to have a look at it when I have some free cycles.

In the meanwhile, have you check if the demo with docker-compose works? https://github.com/open-telemetry/opentelemetry-go-compile-instrumentation/blob/main/demo/infrastructure/docker-compose/docker-compose.yml

Also make quickstart-http a good place to start

opentelemetry-go-compile-instrumentation/demo/infrastructure/docker-compose/Makefile

Line 385 in e64d6ba

quickstart-http: prereqs ports start-http health urls ## HTTP-only quickstart

[txabman42]

Thats strange, thats the approach I followed in e2e tests and its working fine, it points to collector.URL:

	t.Setenv("OTEL_SERVICE_NAME", "test-service")
	t.Setenv("OTEL_TRACES_EXPORTER", "otlp")
	t.Setenv("OTEL_EXPORTER_OTLP_ENDPOINT", collector.URL)
	t.Setenv("OTEL_EXPORTER_OTLP_PROTOCOL", "http/protobuf")

opentelemetry-go-compile-instrumentation/test/e2e/http_test.go

Line 61 in e64d6ba

func TestHttp(t *testing.T) {