Server Logs

Creating and Deleting Log Files

Specifying a Time Interval

Filtering Log Records

Searching

Time Stamps and Time Zones

Overflow Markers

All components of the Server store messages in one unified Log. Each record contains a time stamp, the log level, the tag identifying the component that created the record, and the record data itself.

CommuniGate Pro Logs are plain text files, and they can be processed with any text-processing utility.

When sending a support request to Stalker Technical Support, always include a portion of the Log that indicates the problem.

Creating and Deleting Log Files

You can use any Web browser to examine the Logs. Click the Logs button in the Monitor section and the list of the stored Logs appears. The current Log is marked with the asterisk (*) sign.

You should have the "Can Monitor" Server Access Right to view the Logs.

The options on the top of the page allow you to specify when the Logs files are created and deleted:

Log Manager Options

Start New File	Every:	Delete Old Files in:
Start New File	or if Larger than:	Open Active Log showing last:

Start New File: A new file is created automatically every day (at midnight), or more often, according to this setting value.
if Larger than: A new Log file is also created if the current Log file size exceeds the specified limit.

The Log files are created in the SystemLogs subdirectory of the Server base directory.

Delete Old Files: Shortly after a new Log file is created, the Server checks all files in the SystemLogs subdirectory, and removes all files that are older than the time period specified with this setting.

You should have the "CanTuneLoggerSettings" Monitor Access Right to modify the Logs Engine settings.

You can select one or several Logs in the list and then remove them using the Delete Marked Logs button. The active (current) Log file cannot be deleted.

You should have the "CanTuneLoggerSettings" Monitor Access Right to delete Logs.

If there are too many Log files on the Server, you can enter a string in the Filter field and click the Display button: only the Logs with names matching the Filter string will be displayed:

	Filter:		11 selected

	Name	Size
*	2001-04-04	115K
	2001-04-03	204K
	2001-04-02	34K
	2001-04-01	34K
	2001-03-31	34K
	2001-03-30	25K
	2001-03-29	33K
	2001-03-28	35K
	2001-03-27	34K
	2001-03-26	33K
	2001-03-25	33K

Click the Log file name to open the selected Log.

Specifying a Time Interval

When the Log appears in your browser window, all Log records are displayed. Since Logs can have thousands of them, you may want to view only a portion of the Log. Interrupt the Log downloading process and specify the Log Level and the Time Range options:

Only the records with time stamps in the specified interval are displayed.

Note: if you are viewing the current Log and specify "*" in the second field, all records placed in the Log by this moment are displayed.

Note: if you are viewing the current Log and specify some future time in the second field, the Server will keep the browser channel open, sending new Log records as they are placed in the Log. The channel is closed either when the specified time comes, or when the Server starts a new Log.

Filtering Log Records

The CommuniGate Pro Logs can be very big, reaching several hundred megabytes of data on a heavily loaded server or on a server with low-level logging enabled. It can be difficult to examine the entire Log of tha size.

You can set the Level setting to suppress displaying records that are more detailed than the specified value (have a higher level tag), and you can put a filter into the Filter field. Click the Display button to display only the records that contain the specified substring.

Example:: One of your users complains that sometimes his mailer application cannot retrieve messages from your server properly and it displays an error message about some protocol faults.; Since it does not occur often, you should run the POP module with its Log Level set to Low-Level, and this will make the Log very big. Finally, the client contacts you and says that the mailer has displayed the same error.; You open the Log and set the Level to 3 (Problems). Now you may see all the problems with the POP module that occurred today. You find the record that indicates the problem your client is talking about, and that record has a tag POP-12357. So, you type POP-12357 into the Filter field, and change the Log Level to 5 (All Info). As a result, you see a clean log of that particular POP session.

Searching

Use your browser Find command to search for a string in the filtered portion of the CommuniGate Pro Log.

Use the Print command of your Web browser to print the filtered Log.

Time Stamps and Time Zones

Each Log record has a time stamp indicating when the record was created. The time is displayed using the local time ("GMT shift") of the CommuniGate Pro Server used when the Log file was created.

If the Server OS uses the time zone with daylight saving time, the time stamps used in the Log will not change when the local time ("GMT shift") changes. The new local time will be used when the new Log file is created.

Overflow Markers

The CommuniGate Pro Log Manager is designed as high-speed engine capable of processing thousands records per second, without delaying the execution of the Server component that generated the Log records. When some component generates a huge amount of records, (most likely, due to the Log Level set for that component), even the Log Manager may be unable to store all those records in the Log file.

If a new record cannot be placed into the Log due to a Log Manager performance problem, the Log Manager stores a short Overflow Marker instead. The Overflow Marker is a line with three asterisk signs (***).

If you filter the Log, the displayed part of the Log will always contain the OverFlow Markers if they exist in the selected part of the Log. If several sequential Overflow Markers have to be displayed, only the first one is displayed.