Environment Variables

Environment variables provide a way to configure Netra without modifying code. This is useful for managing different configurations across environments (development, staging, production) and for keeping sensitive values like API keys out of your codebase.

Netra Environment Variables

These variables are specific to the Netra SDK:

Authentication and Endpoint

Variable	Description	Example
`NETRA_API_KEY`	API key for authenticating with Netra	`ntr_abc123...`
`NETRA_OTLP_ENDPOINT`	OTLP endpoint URL for sending traces	See region endpoints below
`NETRA_HEADERS`	Custom headers in W3C Correlation-Context format	`x-api-key=abc123,x-custom=value`

Use the endpoint that matches your selected data region:

Region	Endpoint
US	`https://api.getnetra.ai/telemetry`
EU	`https://api.eu.getnetra.ai/telemetry`

export NETRA_API_KEY="your-api-key-here"
export NETRA_OTLP_ENDPOINT="https://api.getnetra.ai/telemetry"

export NETRA_API_KEY="your-api-key-here"
export NETRA_OTLP_ENDPOINT="https://api.eu.getnetra.ai/telemetry"

Application Identity

Variable	Description	Example
`NETRA_APP_NAME`	Name of your application	`my-ai-service`
`NETRA_ENV`	Deployment environment	`production`, `staging`, `development`

export NETRA_APP_NAME="my-ai-service"
export NETRA_ENV="production"

Tracing Behavior

Variable	Description	Default
`NETRA_TRACE_CONTENT`	Capture prompt/completion content (`true`/`false`)	`true`
`NETRA_DISABLE_BATCH`	Send spans immediately without batching (`true`/`false`)	`false`
`NETRA_ENABLE_ROOT_SPAN`	Create long-lived root span (`true`/`false`)	`false`
`NETRA_ENABLE_SCRUBBING`	Enable PII scrubbing (Python only) (`true`/`false`)	`false`
`NETRA_DEBUG`	Enable debug logging (`true`/`false`)	`false`
`BLOCKED_URL_PATTERNS`	Block internal request calls by URL pattern matching	`None`

# Production settings
export NETRA_TRACE_CONTENT="true"
export NETRA_DISABLE_BATCH="false"
export NETRA_DEBUG="false"
export BLOCKED_URL_PATTERNS="getnetra.ai"

# Development settings
export NETRA_TRACE_CONTENT="true"
export NETRA_DISABLE_BATCH="true"  # Immediate export for debugging
export NETRA_DEBUG="true"
export BLOCKED_URL_PATTERNS="dev.getnetra.ai"

Attribute Limits

Variable	Description	Default
`NETRA_ATTRIBUTE_MAX_LEN`	Maximum length for span attribute values	`50000`
`NETRA_CONVERSATION_CONTENT_MAX_LEN`	Maximum length for conversation content	`50000`

# Increase limits for verbose applications
export NETRA_ATTRIBUTE_MAX_LEN="100000"
export NETRA_CONVERSATION_CONTENT_MAX_LEN="100000"

Context Propagation

Variable	Description	Default
`NETRA_PROPAGATE_BAGGAGE_HOSTS`	Comma-separated hosts that may receive the W3C `baggage` header (Python only)	None

Netra stores session_id, user_id, and tenant_id as W3C baggage. The Python SDK’s httpx and requests instrumentations remove the baggage header from outbound requests unless the destination host is on this list, so these identifiers are not sent to third-party APIs such as LLM providers. Trace context (traceparent and tracestate) is sent to every host.

# Send session context only to your own services
export NETRA_PROPAGATE_BAGGAGE_HOSTS="mycorp.net,orders.internal"

An entry matches the host itself and its subdomains: mycorp.net matches api.mycorp.net but not notmycorp.net.
Matching is case-insensitive, and a leading dot is ignored (.mycorp.net is the same as mycorp.net).
The variable is read when Netra.init() runs. It has no Netra.init() parameter.

With this variable unset, the baggage header is sent to no host. If a downstream service reads session, user, or tenant IDs from incoming baggage, add its host to NETRA_PROPAGATE_BAGGAGE_HOSTS. The whole header is gated, so a baggage header your own code sets on a request is also removed for hosts that are not on the list.

See Propagating Session Context for how this affects distributed traces.

Resource Attributes

Variable	Description	Example
`NETRA_RESOURCE_ATTRS`	JSON string of custom resource attributes	`{"team":"ml","version":"1.0"}`

export NETRA_RESOURCE_ATTRS='{"deployment.version":"1.2.3","team":"ml-platform"}'

OpenTelemetry Environment Variables

Netra also respects standard OpenTelemetry environment variables. These serve as fallbacks when Netra-specific variables are not set.

Variable	Netra Equivalent	Description
`OTEL_SERVICE_NAME`	`NETRA_APP_NAME`	Service/application name
`OTEL_EXPORTER_OTLP_ENDPOINT`	`NETRA_OTLP_ENDPOINT`	OTLP exporter endpoint
`OTEL_EXPORTER_OTLP_HEADERS`	`NETRA_HEADERS`	OTLP exporter headers
`OTEL_RESOURCE_ATTRIBUTES`	`NETRA_RESOURCE_ATTRS`	Resource attributes

# These work as fallbacks (use endpoint matching your region)
export OTEL_SERVICE_NAME="my-ai-service"
export OTEL_EXPORTER_OTLP_ENDPOINT="https://api.getnetra.ai/telemetry"  # US region
# export OTEL_EXPORTER_OTLP_ENDPOINT="https://api.eu.getnetra.ai/telemetry"  # EU region
export OTEL_EXPORTER_OTLP_HEADERS="x-api-key=your-key"

Configuration Precedence

When the same setting is configured in multiple places, Netra uses this priority order:

Code parameters (highest priority)

Netra.init(app_name="code-value")  # This wins

Netra environment variables

export NETRA_APP_NAME="netra-env-value"

OpenTelemetry environment variables

export OTEL_SERVICE_NAME="otel-env-value"

Default values (lowest priority)

Example

# Environment
export NETRA_APP_NAME="env-app"
export OTEL_SERVICE_NAME="otel-app"

# Code
Netra.init(app_name="code-app")  # Uses "code-app"
Netra.init()                      # Uses "env-app" (NETRA_ takes precedence over OTEL_)

Environment-Specific Configuration

Development

# .env.development
NETRA_API_KEY="dev-api-key"
NETRA_OTLP_ENDPOINT="https://api.getnetra.ai/telemetry"  # Use endpoint matching your region
NETRA_APP_NAME="my-app-dev"
NETRA_ENV="development"
NETRA_DEBUG="true"
NETRA_DISABLE_BATCH="true"
NETRA_TRACE_CONTENT="true"

Staging

# .env.staging
NETRA_API_KEY="staging-api-key"
NETRA_OTLP_ENDPOINT="https://api.getnetra.ai/telemetry"  # Use endpoint matching your region
NETRA_APP_NAME="my-app-staging"
NETRA_ENV="staging"
NETRA_DEBUG="false"
NETRA_DISABLE_BATCH="false"
NETRA_TRACE_CONTENT="true"

Production

# .env.production
NETRA_API_KEY="prod-api-key"
NETRA_OTLP_ENDPOINT="https://api.getnetra.ai/telemetry"  # Use endpoint matching your region
NETRA_APP_NAME="my-app"
NETRA_ENV="production"
NETRA_DEBUG="false"
NETRA_DISABLE_BATCH="false"
NETRA_TRACE_CONTENT="true"
NETRA_ENABLE_SCRUBBING="true"  # Enable PII protection in production

Loading Environment Variables

Python

# Using python-dotenv
from dotenv import load_dotenv
load_dotenv()  # Load from .env file

from netra import Netra
Netra.init()  # Automatically picks up environment variables

TypeScript/Node.js

// Using dotenv
import "dotenv/config";

import { Netra } from "netra-sdk";
await Netra.init({
  appName: process.env.NETRA_APP_NAME || "my-app",
});

Docker and Kubernetes

Docker

# Dockerfile
ENV NETRA_APP_NAME="my-app"
ENV NETRA_ENV="production"

# docker run
docker run -e NETRA_API_KEY="your-key" -e NETRA_ENV="production" my-app

Docker Compose

# docker-compose.yml
services:
  app:
    image: my-app
    environment:
      - NETRA_API_KEY=${NETRA_API_KEY}
      - NETRA_OTLP_ENDPOINT=https://api.getnetra.ai/telemetry  # Use endpoint matching your region
      - NETRA_APP_NAME=my-app
      - NETRA_ENV=production

Kubernetes

# deployment.yaml
apiVersion: apps/v1
kind: Deployment
metadata:
  name: my-app
spec:
  template:
    spec:
      containers:
        - name: my-app
          env:
            - name: NETRA_API_KEY
              valueFrom:
                secretKeyRef:
                  name: netra-secrets
                  key: api-key
            - name: NETRA_OTLP_ENDPOINT
              value: "https://api.getnetra.ai/telemetry"  # Use endpoint matching your region
            - name: NETRA_APP_NAME
              value: "my-app"
            - name: NETRA_ENV
              value: "production"

# secret.yaml
apiVersion: v1
kind: Secret
metadata:
  name: netra-secrets
type: Opaque
stringData:
  api-key: "your-netra-api-key"

Complete Reference

Variable	Type	Default	Description
`NETRA_API_KEY`	string	-	API key for authentication
`NETRA_OTLP_ENDPOINT`	string	-	OTLP endpoint URL
`NETRA_HEADERS`	string	-	Custom headers (W3C format)
`NETRA_APP_NAME`	string	-	Application name
`NETRA_ENV`	string	`default`	Environment name
`NETRA_TRACE_CONTENT`	boolean	`true`	Capture prompt/completion content
`NETRA_DISABLE_BATCH`	boolean	`false`	Disable span batching
`NETRA_ENABLE_ROOT_SPAN`	boolean	`false`	Enable root span
`NETRA_ENABLE_SCRUBBING`	boolean	`false`	Enable PII scrubbing (Python)
`NETRA_DEBUG`	boolean	`false`	Enable debug logging
`NETRA_ATTRIBUTE_MAX_LEN`	integer	`50000`	Max attribute length
`NETRA_CONVERSATION_CONTENT_MAX_LEN`	integer	`50000`	Max conversation length
`NETRA_RESOURCE_ATTRS`	JSON string	`{}`	Custom resource attributes
`NETRA_PROPAGATE_BAGGAGE_HOSTS`	string	-	Hosts that receive the `baggage` header (Python)

Next Steps

Initialization - Programmatic configuration
Instrumentation Selection - Control which libraries are traced
Custom Exporters - Send traces to custom backends

Get Started

Observability

Insights

Evaluations

Simulations

Evaluators

Red Teaming

Prompt Management

Monitoring & Dashboard

Account settings

Migrations

Environment Variables

Netra Environment Variables

Authentication and Endpoint

Application Identity

Tracing Behavior

Attribute Limits

Context Propagation

Resource Attributes

OpenTelemetry Environment Variables

Configuration Precedence

Example

Environment-Specific Configuration

Development

Staging

Production

Loading Environment Variables

Python

TypeScript/Node.js

Docker and Kubernetes

Docker

Docker Compose

Kubernetes

Complete Reference

Next Steps

​Netra Environment Variables

​Authentication and Endpoint

​Application Identity

​Tracing Behavior

​Attribute Limits

​Context Propagation

​Resource Attributes

​OpenTelemetry Environment Variables

​Configuration Precedence

​Example

​Environment-Specific Configuration

​Development

​Staging

​Production

​Loading Environment Variables

​Python

​TypeScript/Node.js

​Docker and Kubernetes

​Docker

​Docker Compose

​Kubernetes

​Complete Reference

​Next Steps

Netra Environment Variables

Authentication and Endpoint

Application Identity

Tracing Behavior

Attribute Limits

Context Propagation

Resource Attributes

OpenTelemetry Environment Variables

Configuration Precedence

Example

Environment-Specific Configuration

Development

Staging

Production

Loading Environment Variables

Python

TypeScript/Node.js

Docker and Kubernetes

Docker

Docker Compose

Kubernetes

Complete Reference

Next Steps