Add "Sunsetting OpenCensus" blog post (open-telemetry#2629)

content/en/blog/2023/sunsetting-opencensus.md

@@ -0,0 +1,100 @@
+---
+title: Sunsetting OpenCensus
+linkTitle: Sunsetting OpenCensus
+date: 2023-05-01
+author: '[Aaron Abbott](https://github.com/aabmass) (Google)'
+---
+
+In 2019, we announced that OpenTracing and OpenCensus would be merging to form
+the OpenTelemetry project. From the start, we considered OpenTelemetry
+[to be the next major version of both OpenTracing and OpenCensus](https://www.cncf.io/blog/2019/05/21/a-brief-history-of-opentelemetry-so-far/).
+
+We are excited to announce that OpenTelemetry has reached feature parity with
+OpenCensus in C++, .NET, Go, Java, JavaScript, PHP and Python.
+[Stable releases](/docs/instrumentation/#status-and-releases) of both the
+Tracing and Metrics SDKs are available in most of these languages with Go and
+PHP soon to follow. This means that OpenTelemetry can collect and export
+telemetry data with the same level of functionality as OpenCensus. Beyond that,
+OpenTelemetry offers a [richer ecosystem](/ecosystem) of instrumentation
+libraries and exporters, and an
+[active open source community](https://www.cncf.io/blog/2023/01/11/a-look-at-the-2022-velocity-of-cncf-linux-foundation-and-top-30-open-source-projects/).
+
+As a result, we will be archiving all OpenCensus GitHub repositories (with the
+exception of [census-instrumentation/opencensus-python][][^python-timeline]) on
+July 31st, 2023. We are excited to see the
+[long term plan for OpenTelemetry](https://medium.com/opentracing/a-roadmap-to-convergence-b074e5815289)
+coming to fruition and encourage all users of OpenCensus to migrate to
+OpenTelemetry.
+
+## How to Migrate to OpenTelemetry
+
+One of the
+[key goals](https://medium.com/opentracing/merging-opentracing-and-opencensus-f0fe9c7ca6f0)
+of the OpenTelemetry project is to provide backward compatibility with
+OpenCensus and a migration story for existing users.
+
+To help ease the migration path, we have provided backward compatibility bridges
+in [Go][go shim], [Java][java shim], [JavaScript][js shim][^shim-next-release],
+and [Python][python shim][^shim-next-release]. Installing these bridges allows
+OpenCensus and OpenTelemetry instrumentation to smoothly interoperate, with all
+of your telemetry flowing out of OpenTelemetry exporters. This lets OpenCensus
+users incrementally transition all of their instrumentation from OpenCensus to
+OpenTelemetry, and finally remove OpenCensus libraries from their
+applications[^shim-support].
+
+While OpenTelemetry was never intended to be a strict superset of OpenCensus,
+most of the APIs and data models are compatible. Migration should be considered
+a "major version bump" and you may notice some changes in your telemetry.
+
+More details on what to expect and some suggested workflows for migration are
+outlined in the
+[OpenCensus Compatibility specification](/docs/reference/specification/compatibility/opencensus#migration-path)[^spec-next-release].
+
+## What to Expect After July 31st, 2023
+
+After July 31st, 2023, the OpenCensus project will no longer be maintained. This
+means that there will be no new features added to the project, and any security
+vulnerabilities that are found will not be patched.
+
+However, the OpenCensus repositories will remain archived on GitHub. This means
+users will still be able to download the OpenCensus code and use it in their
+projects. Existing releases of OpenCensus will remain available in public
+package repositories like NPM and PyPI. **We encourage all OpenCensus users to
+begin planning your migration to OpenTelemetry now.**
+
+One exception to this is the
+[census-instrumentation/opencensus-python][][^python-timeline] repo.
+
+[go shim]:
+  https://github.com/open-telemetry/opentelemetry-go/tree/main/bridge/opencensus
+[java shim]:
+  https://github.com/open-telemetry/opentelemetry-java/tree/main/opencensus-shim
+[python shim]:
+  https://github.com/open-telemetry/opentelemetry-python/tree/main/shim/opentelemetry-opencensus-shim
+[js shim]:
+  https://github.com/open-telemetry/opentelemetry-js/tree/main/experimental/packages/opentelemetry-shim-opencensus
+[census-instrumentation/opencensus-python]:
+  https://github.com/census-instrumentation/opencensus-python
+
+[^python-timeline]:
+    A number of projects within this repository are still being used as
+    recommended production solutions. These projects will continue to be
+    maintained. Please reach out to the individual maintainers for details
+    regarding maintenance timeline, next steps for migration and general support
+    questions.
+
+[^shim-next-release]:
+    Python and JavaScript shim packages are currently unreleased but will be
+    available in future releases.
+
+[^spec-next-release]:
+    The
+    [OpenCensus Compatability specification](https://opentelemetry.io/docs/reference/specification/compatibility/opencensus/)
+    is marked stable for the next specification release.
+
+[^shim-support]:
+    These shims implement the stable
+    [OpenCensus Compatibility specification](/docs/reference/specification/compatibility/opencensus#migration-path)[^spec-next-release]
+    and will be supported for at least one year following
+    [OpenTelemetry's long term support](https://opentelemetry.io/docs/reference/specification/versioning-and-stability/#long-term-support)
+    guidelines.

static/refcache.json

@@ -1419,6 +1419,10 @@
     "StatusCode": 200,
     "LastSeen": "2023-02-20T07:43:37.8719-05:00"
   },
+  "https://github.com/aabmass": {
+    "StatusCode": 200,
+    "LastSeen": "2023-04-24T16:54:54.131842195Z"
+  },
   "https://github.com/aishyandapalli": {
     "StatusCode": 200,
     "LastSeen": "2023-02-20T08:12:22.870564-05:00"
@@ -1499,6 +1503,10 @@
     "StatusCode": 200,
     "LastSeen": "2023-02-20T08:02:57.433517-05:00"
   },
+  "https://github.com/census-instrumentation/opencensus-python": {
+    "StatusCode": 200,
+    "LastSeen": "2023-04-24T16:54:55.217650606Z"
+  },
   "https://github.com/census-instrumentation/opencensus-specs": {
     "StatusCode": 200,
     "LastSeen": "2023-02-20T08:00:55.574495-05:00"
@@ -3111,6 +3119,14 @@
     "StatusCode": 200,
     "LastSeen": "2023-02-16T17:17:36.925688-05:00"
   },
+  "https://medium.com/opentracing/a-roadmap-to-convergence-b074e5815289": {
+    "StatusCode": 200,
+    "LastSeen": "2023-04-24T16:54:55.28743128Z"
+  },
+  "https://medium.com/opentracing/merging-opentracing-and-opencensus-f0fe9c7ca6f0": {
+    "StatusCode": 200,
+    "LastSeen": "2023-04-24T16:54:55.343964078Z"
+  },
   "https://medium.com/p/42337e994b63": {
     "StatusCode": 200,
     "LastSeen": "2023-02-16T17:15:39.339631-05:00"
@@ -3915,10 +3931,18 @@
     "StatusCode": 206,
     "LastSeen": "2023-02-18T13:37:44.838318-05:00"
   },
+  "https://www.cncf.io/blog/2019/05/21/a-brief-history-of-opentelemetry-so-far/": {
+    "StatusCode": 206,
+    "LastSeen": "2023-04-24T16:54:54.215591367Z"
+  },
   "https://www.cncf.io/blog/2021/08/26/opentelemetry-becomes-a-cncf-incubating-project/": {
     "StatusCode": 206,
     "LastSeen": "2023-02-18T13:37:50.760488-05:00"
   },
+  "https://www.cncf.io/blog/2023/01/11/a-look-at-the-2022-velocity-of-cncf-linux-foundation-and-top-30-open-source-projects/": {
+    "StatusCode": 206,
+    "LastSeen": "2023-04-24T16:54:54.873649488Z"
+  },
   "https://www.cncf.io/projects/": {
     "StatusCode": 206,
     "LastSeen": "2023-02-18T13:34:56.607908-05:00"