newrelic/newrelic-java-agent
Mar 2025 – Mar 2026
13 Months active
Languages Used
GradleJavaMarkdownPropertiesShellBashYAMLGroovy
Technical Skills
Agent DevelopmentBuild AutomationClass LoadingCompatibilityJavaJava Development
Kate Anderson
PROFILE
Kate Anderson
Over a 13-month period, contributed to the newrelic/newrelic-java-agent repository by designing and implementing distributed tracing, adaptive sampling, and Redis instrumentation features. Leveraging Java, Gradle, and Docker, delivered enhancements such as granular sampling controls, selective instrumentation, and robust log forwarding with denylist support. Refactored core agent components for maintainability, improved test coverage, and automated CI/CD workflows using GitHub Actions. Addressed compatibility with evolving Java versions and integrated new observability metrics for auto-named applications. The work emphasized reliability, configurability, and performance, resulting in reduced tracing overhead, streamlined release automation, and improved monitoring fidelity for distributed systems in production environments.
Overall Statistics
Feature vs Bugs
82%Features
Repository Contributions
102Total
Bugs
6
Commits
102
Features
27
Lines of code
1,238,687
Activity Months13
Your Network
20 peopleWork History
March 2026
6 Commits • 3 Features
Mar 1, 2026March 2026 performance summary for newrelic/newrelic-java-agent focused on delivering measurable business value through improved instrumentation, reliability, and release automation. Highlights include substantial refactors to sampling components, enhanced test coverage, and expanded observability for auto-named applications, accompanied by CI/testing framework enhancements to streamline builds and releases.
6 Commits • 3 Features
Mar 1, 2026March 2026 performance summary for newrelic/newrelic-java-agent focused on delivering measurable business value through improved instrumentation, reliability, and release automation. Highlights include substantial refactors to sampling components, enhanced test coverage, and expanded observability for auto-named applications, accompanied by CI/testing framework enhancements to streamline builds and releases.
March 2026
February 2026
11 Commits • 3 Features
Feb 1, 2026February 2026: Delivered key observability and robustness improvements in newrelic-java-agent. Features include log level denylist for log forwarding and granular sampling control; major bug fix to safely handle malformed payloads; build configuration cleanup for flexible version management. These changes reduce noise, improve configurability and resilience, and streamline maintenance, contributing to higher performance monitoring fidelity and faster developer onboarding.
February 2026
11 Commits • 3 Features
Feb 1, 2026February 2026: Delivered key observability and robustness improvements in newrelic-java-agent. Features include log level denylist for log forwarding and granular sampling control; major bug fix to safely handle malformed payloads; build configuration cleanup for flexible version management. These changes reduce noise, improve configurability and resilience, and streamline maintenance, contributing to higher performance monitoring fidelity and faster developer onboarding.
January 2026
8 Commits • 3 Features
Jan 1, 2026January 2026 monthly summary for newrelic/newrelic-java-agent focused on strengthening observability, startup reliability, and CI/test infrastructure. Delivered targeted feature work across distributed tracing, adaptive sampling, startup hygiene, and selective instrumentation, with improvements in test coverage and automation. These initiatives enhance customer observability, reduce startup overhead, and accelerate safe releases through more stable tests and streamlined workflows.
8 Commits • 3 Features
Jan 1, 2026January 2026 monthly summary for newrelic/newrelic-java-agent focused on strengthening observability, startup reliability, and CI/test infrastructure. Delivered targeted feature work across distributed tracing, adaptive sampling, startup hygiene, and selective instrumentation, with improvements in test coverage and automation. These initiatives enhance customer observability, reduce startup overhead, and accelerate safe releases through more stable tests and streamlined workflows.
January 2026
December 2025
9 Commits • 3 Features
Dec 1, 2025Month: 2025-12 — Focused on enhancing tracing observability, reliability, and compatibility in the Java agent. Delivered distributed tracing sampling enhancements with enum-driven core refactors, improved test coverage aligned with current sampling behavior, and WebLogic compatibility updates. All changes emphasize business value through more accurate traces, higher test confidence, and smoother deployment across environments. No critical bugs fixed this month; the emphasis was on feature delivery and quality improvements.
December 2025
9 Commits • 3 Features
Dec 1, 2025Month: 2025-12 — Focused on enhancing tracing observability, reliability, and compatibility in the Java agent. Delivered distributed tracing sampling enhancements with enum-driven core refactors, improved test coverage aligned with current sampling behavior, and WebLogic compatibility updates. All changes emphasize business value through more accurate traces, higher test confidence, and smoother deployment across environments. No critical bugs fixed this month; the emphasis was on feature delivery and quality improvements.
November 2025
16 Commits • 3 Features
Nov 1, 2025November 2025 monthly highlights for newrelic-java-agent: delivered major distributed tracing enhancements, refined instrumentation site extensions, and automated compatibility docs workflows. Improved observability, reliability, and developer workflow with focused test improvements and log clarity, enabling faster releases and safer rollouts.
16 Commits • 3 Features
Nov 1, 2025November 2025 monthly highlights for newrelic-java-agent: delivered major distributed tracing enhancements, refined instrumentation site extensions, and automated compatibility docs workflows. Improved observability, reliability, and developer workflow with focused test improvements and log clarity, enabling faster releases and safer rollouts.
November 2025
October 2025
16 Commits • 3 Features
Oct 1, 2025October 2025 performance summary for the newrelic/newrelic-java-agent focused on stabilizing distributed tracing behavior, improving sampling observability, and simplifying adaptive sampling configuration. Key work spanned a refactor of priority calculation for distributed tracing, removal of deprecated AdaptiveSampling, and enabling reservoir logging to better understand sampling and transaction events. These changes deliver clearer trace priorities, more reliable sampling decisions, and stronger observability with reduced maintenance burden.
October 2025
16 Commits • 3 Features
Oct 1, 2025October 2025 performance summary for the newrelic/newrelic-java-agent focused on stabilizing distributed tracing behavior, improving sampling observability, and simplifying adaptive sampling configuration. Key work spanned a refactor of priority calculation for distributed tracing, removal of deprecated AdaptiveSampling, and enabling reservoir logging to better understand sampling and transaction events. These changes deliver clearer trace priorities, more reliable sampling decisions, and stronger observability with reduced maintenance burden.
September 2025
2 Commits • 1 Features
Sep 1, 20252025-09 Monthly Summary for newrelic/newrelic-java-agent: Focused on delivering adaptive distributed tracing sampling enhancements and laying the groundwork for more efficient tracing in distributed environments. Key work includes groundwork for an adaptive sampler with adaptive, always-on, and always-off modes, plus refactoring of the sampling logic to improve efficiency and accuracy by adjusting sampling rates based on traffic and configuration. Initiated testing and implementation with two commits to progress the feature. No major bug fixes reported this period. The work increases observability with lower overhead, enabling better visibility into distributed systems while preserving performance.
2 Commits • 1 Features
Sep 1, 20252025-09 Monthly Summary for newrelic/newrelic-java-agent: Focused on delivering adaptive distributed tracing sampling enhancements and laying the groundwork for more efficient tracing in distributed environments. Key work includes groundwork for an adaptive sampler with adaptive, always-on, and always-off modes, plus refactoring of the sampling logic to improve efficiency and accuracy by adjusting sampling rates based on traffic and configuration. Initiated testing and implementation with two commits to progress the feature. No major bug fixes reported this period. The work increases observability with lower overhead, enabling better visibility into distributed systems while preserving performance.
September 2025
August 2025
5 Commits • 1 Features
Aug 1, 2025Month: 2025-08. Delivered Jedis 6.0.0 Redis instrumentation for the New Relic Java agent, enabling monitoring of Redis operations including Pub/Sub. This work included build/config updates, robust connection handling, and a refactored instrumentation layer to improve maintainability. Minor code hygiene improvements (import cleanup, removal of no-op weave methods) and license header updates were completed. Overall, this increases observability for Redis workloads, enabling faster issue diagnosis, more accurate performance analytics, and data-driven optimization decisions. Technologies demonstrated: Java, Java agent instrumentation, Redis/Jedis, build tooling, refactoring, license compliance.
August 2025
5 Commits • 1 Features
Aug 1, 2025Month: 2025-08. Delivered Jedis 6.0.0 Redis instrumentation for the New Relic Java agent, enabling monitoring of Redis operations including Pub/Sub. This work included build/config updates, robust connection handling, and a refactored instrumentation layer to improve maintainability. Minor code hygiene improvements (import cleanup, removal of no-op weave methods) and license header updates were completed. Overall, this increases observability for Redis workloads, enabling faster issue diagnosis, more accurate performance analytics, and data-driven optimization decisions. Technologies demonstrated: Java, Java agent instrumentation, Redis/Jedis, build tooling, refactoring, license compliance.
July 2025
9 Commits • 1 Features
Jul 1, 2025Monthly summary for 2025-07 - newrelic/newrelic-java-agent: In July 2025, the team delivered core instrumentation improvements and bug fixes across Redis-related features, improving observability accuracy and deployment reliability. Focus areas included Lettuce 6.5 instrumentation compatibility, Redis URI parsing, and snapshot artifact publishing. Key business outcomes include more accurate tracing for Redis operations, reliable snapshot deployments to staging, and reduced maintenance burden through test cleanup.
9 Commits • 1 Features
Jul 1, 2025Monthly summary for 2025-07 - newrelic/newrelic-java-agent: In July 2025, the team delivered core instrumentation improvements and bug fixes across Redis-related features, improving observability accuracy and deployment reliability. Focus areas included Lettuce 6.5 instrumentation compatibility, Redis URI parsing, and snapshot artifact publishing. Key business outcomes include more accurate tracing for Redis operations, reliable snapshot deployments to staging, and reduced maintenance burden through test cleanup.
July 2025
June 2025
2 Commits • 1 Features
Jun 1, 2025June 2025 focused on stabilizing release automation for the Java agent and aligning artifact publishing with Sonatype. Delivered centralized Sonatype release workflow integration and fixed a namespace publishing issue to ensure artifacts publish under the correct namespace. These changes reduce release friction, improve security, and provide better governance and traceability across environments.
June 2025
2 Commits • 1 Features
Jun 1, 2025June 2025 focused on stabilizing release automation for the Java agent and aligning artifact publishing with Sonatype. Delivered centralized Sonatype release workflow integration and fixed a namespace publishing issue to ensure artifacts publish under the correct namespace. These changes reduce release friction, improve security, and provide better governance and traceability across environments.
May 2025
9 Commits • 2 Features
May 1, 2025May 2025 monthly summary for newrelic/newrelic-java-agent focused on reducing tracing overhead while strengthening release automation. Delivered end-to-end changes for leaf exclusion in tracing and improved CI/CD publishing pipelines, with robust test coverage and documentation clarifications.
9 Commits • 2 Features
May 1, 2025May 2025 monthly summary for newrelic/newrelic-java-agent focused on reducing tracing overhead while strengthening release automation. Delivered end-to-end changes for leaf exclusion in tracing and improved CI/CD publishing pipelines, with robust test coverage and documentation clarifications.
May 2025
April 2025
6 Commits • 3 Features
Apr 1, 2025April 2025 focused on stabilizing runtime behavior and expanding configurable controls in the newrelic-java-agent. Delivered four items in newrelic/newrelic-java-agent: a Return Stack Processing Feature Flag with inline checks and a system-property toggle to address runtime errors during method node return stack processing; a defensive fix for Class Transformation AIOOBE adding a catch block, a warning, and removal of unused return stack processing code; a Scala 2.12 IllegalAccessError fix guarded by a feature flag with a precomputed IS_SCALA_212 flag to improve reliability of class version handling; and the New Relic Java Agent 8.21.0 release introducing CRaC, JDK24 support, sampling options, Undertow and Couchbase Client integrations, plus Netty and AWS Docker ID fetching fixes with a version bump. These changes collectively improve runtime stability, configurability, and release readiness, reducing customer incidents and expanding platform support.
April 2025
6 Commits • 3 Features
Apr 1, 2025April 2025 focused on stabilizing runtime behavior and expanding configurable controls in the newrelic-java-agent. Delivered four items in newrelic/newrelic-java-agent: a Return Stack Processing Feature Flag with inline checks and a system-property toggle to address runtime errors during method node return stack processing; a defensive fix for Class Transformation AIOOBE adding a catch block, a warning, and removal of unused return stack processing code; a Scala 2.12 IllegalAccessError fix guarded by a feature flag with a precomputed IS_SCALA_212 flag to improve reliability of class version handling; and the New Relic Java Agent 8.21.0 release introducing CRaC, JDK24 support, sampling options, Undertow and Couchbase Client integrations, plus Netty and AWS Docker ID fetching fixes with a version bump. These changes collectively improve runtime stability, configurability, and release readiness, reducing customer incidents and expanding platform support.
March 2025
3 Commits
Mar 1, 2025March 2025: Java 24 compatibility stabilization and test adjustments for newrelic/newrelic-java-agent. Implemented targeted fixes to address VerifyError in class loading by enhancing PatchedClassWriter's Throwable/Exception handling for newer ClassLoader changes; removed conditional Java security manager setting from JMS tests to align with Artemis/Java 8 compatibility; disabled ActiveMQ test for Java 24+ due to removal of Java Security Manager and evolving compatibility, pending resolution or migration to Java 8 baseline.
3 Commits
Mar 1, 2025March 2025: Java 24 compatibility stabilization and test adjustments for newrelic/newrelic-java-agent. Implemented targeted fixes to address VerifyError in class loading by enhancing PatchedClassWriter's Throwable/Exception handling for newer ClassLoader changes; removed conditional Java security manager setting from JMS tests to align with Artemis/Java 8 compatibility; disabled ActiveMQ test for Java 24+ due to removal of Java Security Manager and evolving compatibility, pending resolution or migration to Java 8 baseline.
March 2025
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Quality Metrics
Correctness91.6%
Maintainability90.0%
Architecture88.2%
Performance85.6%
AI Usage22.0%
Skills & Technologies
Programming Languages
BashGradleGroovyJSONJavaMarkdownPropertiesScalaShellYAML
Technical Skills
API DesignAPI DevelopmentAPI IntegrationAWSAgent DevelopmentAgent InstrumentationBackend DevelopmentBuild AutomationBuild ConfigurationBytecode ManipulationCI/CDClass LoadingClassloadingCode CleanupCode Documentation
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