[receiver/file] logs and traces are not supported

[andrzej-stencel]

Component(s)

receiver/file

What happened?

Description

The README (and the metadata) claims that the File receiver supports logs, metrics and traces, but it looks like it currently only supports metrics.

Steps to Reproduce

Run collector with the below config

Expected Result

Debug exporter reports logs.

Actual Result

Error: failed to build pipelines: failed to create "file" receiver for data type "logs": telemetry type is not supported

Same thing happens with traces.

Collector version

v0.87.0

Environment information

No response

OpenTelemetry Collector configuration

receivers:
  file:
    path: ./logs-in-otlp-json-format-from-file-exporter.json

exporters:
  debug:

service:
  pipelines:
    logs:
      exporters:
      - debug
      receivers:
      - file

Log output

$ otelcol-contrib-0.87.0-linux_amd64 --config config.yaml 
2023-10-16T13:43:21.728+0200    info    service@v0.87.0/telemetry.go:84 Setting up own telemetry...
2023-10-16T13:43:21.729+0200    info    service@v0.87.0/telemetry.go:201        Serving Prometheus metrics      {"address": ":8888", "level": "Basic"}
2023-10-16T13:43:21.729+0200    info    exporter@v0.87.0/exporter.go:275        Development component. May change in the future.        {"kind": "exporter", "data_type": "logs", "name": "debug"}
2023-10-16T13:43:21.729+0200    info    receiver@v0.87.0/receiver.go:296        Stability level of component is undefined       {"kind": "receiver", "name": "file", "data_type": "logs"}
Error: failed to build pipelines: failed to create "file" receiver for data type "logs": telemetry type is not supported
2023/10/16 13:43:21 collector server run finished with error: failed to build pipelines: failed to create "file" receiver for data type "logs": telemetry type is not supported

Additional context

I wonder what the roadmap for this receiver is: is it supposed to be superseded by a regular file reading receiver like Filelog receiver and the encoding extensions?

[github-actions]

Pinging code owners:

• receiver/file: @pmcollins @djaglowski

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[crobert-1]

Regarding this issue
Agreed this is a valid issue, it's clear from the NewFactory implementation.

Some more investigation, it looks like the original plan was to support metrics, traces and logs. The original PR (#16827) introducing the receiver skeleton also indicated the plan was to support all 3 (in the README's support table).

However, the text of the README from the original PR is still in place today, and seems to indicate that metrics are the only ones supported, so the README conflicts internally.

I think for now the best option is to update the metadata.yaml to properly indicate logs and traces aren't supported, with the understanding that maybe some day support would be added.

Regarding additional comments
It looks like the original intention of this was purely for consuming the output of the fileexporter, but I'm not sure how it fits in with other components now. I'll let someone else with more context weigh in there.