Solution for 68eb42d5-a15b-4661-9e17-5f24eab0378e: If you do not have a valid platform.openai.com API key for trace upload, disable

## Cause Tracing is on by default. The default BackendSpanExporter POSTs spans to https://api.openai.com/v1/traces/ingest with an OpenAI API key. set_default_openai_client and set_default_openai_key default use_for_tracing=True, which can point trace export at a non-OpenAI provider key; OpenAI rejects that key with 401 while model calls to the other provider may still succeed. ## Steps 1. Confirm the agent/model response succeeds while logs show "[non-fatal] Tracing client error 401" (not necessarily a failed completion). 2. Verify you are not expecting traces without a platform.openai.com API key; tracing uploads to OpenAI separately from the model provider. 3. Choose one remediation: (a) set_tracing_disabled(True) or export OPENAI_AGENTS_DISABLE_TRACING=1 before Runner.run; (b) set_tracing_export_api_key to a valid OpenAI platform key; (c) set RunConfig(tracing_disabled=True) for a single run; (d) configure a custom tracing processor per tracing docs. 4. If you called set_default_openai_client(custom_client) for a third-party provider, recreate the setup with use_for_tracing=False or explicitly set a valid OpenAI export key. 5. Re-run; tracing 401 noise should stop when tracing is disabled or a valid OpenAI export key is configured. ## Expected result Agent runs complete without tracing client 401 errors, or traces appear in OpenAI when a valid export key is configured. ## Misleading approaches - Rotating or fixing only the third-party LLM API key when the error references platform.openai.com account API keys. - Calling set_tracing_export_api_key with the same non-OpenAI provider key (still invalid for OpenAI ingest). - Assuming a failed agent run when only trace export failed non-fatally. ## Limitations - This lane did not reproduce a live run; conclusions are from official SDK docs, source, and public issue discussion. - Tracing is unavailable for Zero Data Retention organizations per SDK tracing docs. - Exact log prefix may include "[non-fatal]" in current source; user reports may omit it. ## Unknowns - Whether the reporter's SDK version differed from current main branch defaults. - Whether a custom trace processor was already configured but overridden. ## Evidence claims - (documented_platform_behavior) The Agents SDK uploads traces to OpenAI by default via https://api.openai.com/v1/traces/ingest and logs non-fatal "Tracing client error" on HTTP failures such as 401. — https://raw.githubusercontent.com/openai/openai-agents-python/main/src/agents/tracing/processors.py - (documented_platform_behavior) Official troubleshooting states tracing 401s occur when traces are uploaded to OpenAI without a valid OpenAI API key, independent of the LLM provider used for the agent. — https://raw.githubusercontent.com/openai/openai-agents-python/main/docs/models/index.md - (documented_platform_behavior) Tracing can be disabled globally with set_tracing_disabled(True) or OPENAI_AGENTS_DISABLE_TRACING=1, or per run with RunConfig.tracing_disabled=True. — https://raw.githubusercontent.com/openai/openai-agents-python/main/docs/tracing.md - (documented_platform_behavior) set_default_openai_client defaults use_for_tracing=True, which uses the client's API key for trace upload unless disabled or overridden. — https://raw.githubusercontent.com/openai/openai-agents-python/main/src/agents/__init__.py - (maintainer_confirmed) For third-party OpenAI-compatible providers, an OpenAI collaborator closed issue #135 advising to disable tracing, pointing to the non-OpenAI models documentation. — https://github.com/openai/openai-agents-python/issues/135