rotatelogs
Apache HTTP Server Version 2.4
rotatelogs - Piped logging program to rotate Apache logs
Available Languages: en | fr | ko | tr
rotatelogs is a simple program for use in conjunction with Apache's piped logfile feature. It supports rotation based on a time interval or maximum size of the log.
- Synopsis
- Options
- Examples
- Portability
- Comments
Synopsis
rotatelogs [ -l ] [ -L linkname ] [ -p program ] [ -f ] [ -v ] [ -e ] [ -c ] [ -n number-of-files ] logfilerotationtime|filesize(B|K|M|G) [ offset ]
Options
-
-l -
Causes the use of local time rather than GMT as the base for the interval or for
strftime(3)formatting with size-based rotation. -
-Llinkname -
Causes a hard link to be made from the current logfile to the specified link name. This can be used to watch the log continuously across rotations using a command like
tail -F linkname. -
-pprogram -
If given,
rotatelogswill execute the specified program every time a new log file is opened. The filename of the newly opened file is passed as the first argument to the program. If executing after a rotation, the old log file is passed as the second argument.rotatelogsdoes not wait for the specified program to terminate before continuing to operate, and will not log any error code returned on termination. The spawned program uses the same stdin, stdout, and stderr as rotatelogs itself, and also inherits the environment. -
-f -
Causes the logfile to be opened immediately, as soon as
rotatelogsstarts, instead of waiting for the first logfile entry to be read (for non-busy sites, there may be a substantial delay between when the server is started and when the first request is handled, meaning that the associated logfile does not "exist" until then, which causes problems from some automated logging tools) -
-t - Causes the logfile to be truncated instead of rotated. This is useful when a log is processed in real time by a command like tail, and there is no need for archived data. No suffix will be added to the filename, however format strings containing '%' characters will be respected.
-
-v - Produce verbose output on STDERR. The output contains the result of the configuration parsing, and all file open and close actions.
-
-e - Echo logs through to stdout. Useful when logs need to be further processed in real time by a further tool in the chain.
-
-c - Create log file for each interval, even if empty.
-
-n number-of-files - Use a circular list of filenames without timestamps. With -n 3, the series of log files opened would be "logfile", "logfile.1", "logfile.2", then overwriting "logfile". Available in 2.4.5 and later.
-
logfile -
The path plus basename of the logfile. If logfile includes any '%' characters, it is treated as a format string for
strftime(3). Otherwise, the suffix .nnnnnnnnnn is automatically added and is the time in seconds (unless the -t option is used). Both formats compute the start time from the beginning of the current period. For example, if a rotation time of 86400 is specified, the hour, minute, and second fields created from thestrftime(3)format will all be zero, referring to the beginning of the current 24-hour period (midnight).When using
strftime(3)filename formatting, be sure the log file format has enough granularity to produce a different file name each time the logs are rotated. Otherwise rotation will overwrite the same file instead of starting a new one. For example, if logfile was/var/log/errorlog.%Y-%m-%dwith log rotation at 5 megabytes, but 5 megabytes was reached twice in the same day, the same log file name would be produced and log rotation would keep writing to the same file. -
rotationtime - The time between log file rotations in seconds. The rotation occurs at the beginning of this interval. For example, if the rotation time is 3600, the log file will be rotated at the beginning of every hour; if the rotation time is 86400, the log file will be rotated every night at midnight. (If no data is logged during an interval, no file will be created.)
-
filesize(B|K|M|G) -
The maximum file size in followed by exactly one of the letters
B(Bytes),K(KBytes),M(MBytes) orG(GBytes).When time and size are specified, the size must be given after the time. Rotation will occur whenever either time or size limits are reached.
-
offset -
The number of minutes offset from UTC. If omitted, zero is assumed and UTC is used. For example, to use local time in the zone UTC -5 hours, specify a value of
-300for this argument. In most cases,-lshould be used instead of specifying an offset.
Examples
CustomLog "|bin/rotatelogs /var/log/logfile 86400" common
This creates the files /var/log/logfile.nnnn where nnnn is the system time at which the log nominally starts (this time will always be a multiple of the rotation time, so you can synchronize cron scripts with it). At the end of each rotation time (here after 24 hours) a new log is started.
CustomLog "|bin/rotatelogs -l /var/log/logfile.%Y.%m.%d 86400" common
This creates the files /var/log/logfile.yyyy.mm.dd where yyyy is the year, mm is the month, and dd is the day of the month. Logging will switch to a new file every day at midnight, local time.
CustomLog "|bin/rotatelogs /var/log/logfile 5M" common
This configuration will rotate the logfile whenever it reaches a size of 5 megabytes.
ErrorLog "|bin/rotatelogs /var/log/errorlog.%Y-%m-%d-%H_%M_%S 5M"
This configuration will rotate the error logfile whenever it reaches a size of 5 megabytes, and the suffix to the logfile name will be created of the form errorlog.YYYY-mm-dd-HH_MM_SS.
CustomLog "|bin/rotatelogs -t /var/log/logfile 86400" common
This creates the file /var/log/logfile, truncating the file at startup and then truncating the file once per day. It is expected in this scenario that a separate process (such as tail) would process the file in real time.
Portability
The following logfile format string substitutions should be supported by all strftime(3) implementations, see the strftime(3) man page for library-specific extensions.
%A |
full weekday name (localized) |
%a |
3-character weekday name (localized) |
%B |
full month name (localized) |
%b |
3-character month name (localized) |
%c |
date and time (localized) |
%d |
2-digit day of month |
%H |
2-digit hour (24 hour clock) |
%I |
2-digit hour (12 hour clock) |
%j |
3-digit day of year |
%M |
2-digit minute |
%m |
2-digit month |
%p |
am/pm of 12 hour clock (localized) |
%S |
2-digit second |
%U |
2-digit week of year (Sunday first day of week) |
%W |
2-digit week of year (Monday first day of week) |
%w |
1-digit weekday (Sunday first day of week) |
%X |
time (localized) |
%x |
date (localized) |
%Y |
4-digit year |
%y |
2-digit year |
%Z |
time zone name |
%% |
literal `%' |
Available Languages: en | fr | ko | tr
Comments
This is not a Q&A section. Comments placed here should be pointed towards suggestions on improving the documentation or server, and may be removed again by our moderators if they are either implemented or considered invalid/off-topic. Questions on how to manage the Apache HTTP Server should be directed at either our IRC channel, #httpd, on Freenode, or sent to our mailing lists.
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Sandy 84 days ago Rating: 0 (register an account in order to rate comments)
How to use the -p program option. Is there any example available?
Simon Fuchs 121 days ago Rating: 0 (register an account in order to rate comments)
wtf why "/var/logs" and not "/var/log"?
thumbs 121 days ago Rating: 0 (register an account in order to rate comments)
Technically, every linux distribution is free to configure logging to their own location.In that light, /var/logs is just as valid as /var/log, albeit far less common.
Michal Rakoczy 823 days ago Rating: 0 (register an account in order to rate comments)
On Windows OS path to rotatelogs have to contains .exe file extension to not produce error "could not open reliable pipe to" in error log.Example :CustomLog "|bin/rotatelogs.exe logs/access 15M" common