Try with Demo App

Try Kopai with the OpenTelemetry Astronomy Shop, a pre-instrumented microservices demo with 10+ services generating traces, metrics, and logs, all routed to Kopai running locally.

Prerequisites

Docker and Docker Compose
Node.js v22.5.0+

Step 1: Start Kopai

npx @kopai/app start

Step 2: Clone & Start the Demo

In a separate terminal:

git clone https://github.com/kopai-app/opentelemetry-demo.git
cd opentelemetry-demo
make start-kopai

Step 3: Generate Traffic

Open http://localhost:8080 and browse the Astronomy Shop — add items to cart, place orders, etc. This generates telemetry across all services.

Step 4: Query Telemetry

Use the Kopai CLI to explore what’s been collected:

# Recent traces
npx @kopai/cli traces search --limit 5

# Logs from a specific service
npx @kopai/cli logs search --service cart --fields Timestamp,Body --sort ASC

# Discover available metrics
npx @kopai/cli metrics discover

Step 5: Open the Dashboard

View your telemetry visually at http://localhost:8000.

Step 6: Stop the Demo

make stop-kopai

How It Works

All OpenTelemetry signals from the demo’s collector are routed to Kopai via OTLP/HTTP:

┌────────────────────────────────────────────────┐
│  Docker Compose Network                        │
│                                                │
│  ┌─────────────────────────────┐               │
│  │   Astronomy Shop Demo       │               │
│  │   (10+ microservices)       │               │
│  │                             │               │
│  │   All services instrumented │               │
│  │   with OpenTelemetry        │               │
│  └────────────┬────────────────┘               │
│               │                                │
│               │ OTLP (traces, metrics, logs)   │
│               ▼                                │
│  ┌─────────────────────────────┐               │
│  │   OTel Collector            │               │
│  │   (in Docker)               │               │
│  └────────────┬────────────────┘               │
│               │                                │
│               │ OTLP/HTTP                      │
│               ▼                                │
│       host.docker.internal:4318                │
└───────────────┬────────────────────────────────┘
                │
                ▼
┌────────────────────────────────────┐
│   @kopai/app (on host machine)     │
│                                    │
│   OTel collector: localhost:4318   │
│   Dashboard:      localhost:8000   │
└────────────────────────────────────┘

Learn More

For details on the collector config and Docker Compose setup, see the full README on GitHub.