AI engineering glossary · Agents tools MCP
What is tracing?
Tracing: Recording the full path of a request through a system as nested timed steps called spans. In LLM applications it captures each prompt, response and tool call so slow or faulty steps can be located.
Tracing: an example
A trace shows a request took 9 s, of which 6 s was one slow database tool call.
Related terms
More Agents tools MCP terms
- Trajectory evaluation
- Verifier
- Voyager
- Web search tool
- Workflow versus agent
- Action
- Action space
- Agent autonomy level
Where you learn it
Tracing is part of the AI Engineering Program, which teaches it with notes, a hands-on lab and an exam. The first lesson is free.