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Phase 11

LangSmith

~2 min read

Concept & How It Works

    Why Does It Exist?

    LangGraph/LangChain apps need first-class debugging. LangSmith shows every node input/output, lets you annotate failures, and runs regression evals in CI.

    Real-World Analogy

    LangSmith is a flight recorder plus test lab for your LangChain apps — replay crashes and run simulations before passengers board.
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    Visual Workflows

    What is LangSmith?

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    Example

    Scenario

    Upload 50 support tickets as a dataset; run agent v2; LLM-as-judge scores resolution quality; block deploy if score drops >5%.

    Solution

    In Agent Evaluation & Observability, apply LangSmith to this scenario: Upload 50 support tickets as a dataset; run agent v2; LLM-as-judge scores resolution quality; block deploy if score drops >5%. Identify the inputs, run the technique, validate the output, and note one thing you would monitor in production.

    Practice Task

    Do this before moving to the next module — reading alone is not enough.

    Open the Code Walkthrough below and run it locally. Change one parameter related to LangSmith (e.g. model, temperature, top_k, or tool name), observe the difference in output, and write 2–3 sentences explaining what changed.

    Code Walkthrough

    Highlighted lines show where LangSmith happens in the code.

    LangSmith
    1import langsmith as ls  # import dependencies2from langsmith.evaluation import evaluate  # import dependencies3
    4@ls.testing.traceable5def my_agent(inputs):  # define a reusable function6    return app.invoke(inputs)  # return the result7
    8results = evaluate(my_agent, data="support-golden-set", evaluators=[correctness])

    Commands to Remember

    Commands to Remember

    • pip install langsmith # trace and evaluate LLM runs
    • pip install arize-phoenix # open-source LLM observability
    • pip install opentelemetry-api opentelemetry-sdk # distributed tracing

    Common Mistakes

    • Treating LangSmith as a black box without evaluation
    • Ignoring cost and latency in production
    • Skipping error handling for langsmith

    Cheat Sheet

    Quick recap — the most important points from this module.

    Cheat Sheet

    quick ref
    • LangSmith
    • Datasets
    • Evaluators
    • traceable