This post refers to entries in the SystemOut.log /

When I teach log analysis I spend a few minutes talking about the loggers and which ones to use. Using the loggers inappropriately can create their own problems for support staff.

Loggers generating too much detail

If the logger is set to DEBUG then it could generate a lot of extra information and lead to the logs rolling over quickly.

This can lead to several problems:

• It can be hard to see the key log messages amongst the additional detail
• Important messages can be lost

Think carefully if you have to set one of these loggers to DEBUG in the production environment:

• Java mail
• OSLC - Used by some interfaces and Anywhere
• Integration – Entries providing details of the interface transactions

Hiding the important detail

If the logger is set too high (e.g. FATAL) then you could lose important information.

Some Maximo loggers are shared by multiple components. So changing the level for the crontask logger to FATAL to stop messages from one crontask could prevent others from logging messages. Child loggers can be set to different levels so it is important to set those correctly.

Advice

• Make time to understand what log entries are generated at the different log levels
• Be careful about setting loggers to higher levels as you could lose important data
• Read next week's article where I will give examples of some problems with the content of the log entries