Loggers

Loggers provide the interface for logging in Log4r. To create a logger, first come up with a name for it. Good choices include the name of the class using it, a service name, or the name of the file.

To create a logger named 'mylog':

  Logger.new('mylog')

After creating a logger, it is stashed in a repository. You may retrieve the logger transparently at any time by using a hash method call:

  Logger['mylog']              # get mylog back

It will return nil if the logger is not found. Try this if you want to get an Exception for nonexistant loggers:

  Logger.get('boguslog')       # raises NameError

Manipulating a Logger's Outputters

Loggers start out with no outputters. You can set and manipulate outputters like so:

  mylog = Logger['mylog']

  # assume we've created Outputters out1 through out4
  mylog.outputters = out1, out2
  mylog.add(out3, out4)
  mylog.each_outputter {|o| o.flush}

  # assume out5 through out7 have names 'out5' through 'out7' resp.
  mylog.outputters = 'out5', 'out6'
  mylog.add('out7')
  mylog.remove('out5','out7')

Please see log4r/outputter/outputter.rb and Log4r::Outputter for more about outputters.

Logging Methods

To log something at a certain priority, use the logging method named after the lowercased priority level name:

  mylog.warn "This is a message with priority WARN"
  mylog.fatal "A FATAL message"

You can log a block instead:

  mylog.warn {"This is also a message with priority WARN"}
  mylog.debug do
    # some complicated string magic
    return result
  end

The primary difference is that the block doesn't get called unless the Logger can log at that level.

Query Methods

You can ask Log4r whether it is capable of logging a certain level:

  mylog.warn?   # are we logging WARN?
  mylog.fatal?  # how about FATAL?

Query methods and blocks accomplish the same thing:

  mylog.warn "don't evaluate unless WARN is on" if mylog.warn?
  mylog.warn {"don't evaluate unless WARN is on"}

What About the Special Levels?

ALL and OFF can be querried, but not logged:

  log.off?                    # true iff level is OFF
  log.all?                    # true iff level is ALL
  log.all "Try to log"        => Method not defined. (NameError)

Custom Levels and Method Names

Suppose we've set up Log4r with the custom levels:

  Foo < Bar < Baz

As you might expect, the logging methods are named after them:

  log.bar "something"        # log at custom level Bar
  log.bar?                   # are we logging at level Bar?

Logger Inheritance

Normally, when a logger is created, its parent is set to RootLogger. If a Logger's level isn't specified at creation, it will inherit the level of its parent.

To specify an ancestors of a logger besides RootLogger, include the names of the ancestors in order of ancestry and delimited by Log4r::Log4rConfig::LoggerPathDelimiter. For example, if the delimiter is the default ::, our logger is 'me' and its ancestors are 'cain', 'grandpa', and 'pa', we create the logger like so:

  Logger.new('cain::grandpa::pa::me')

This string is split into three compontents which can be used by a Formatter to avoid parsing the name:

Logger#fullname:	The whole enchilada: 'cain::grandpa::pa::me'
Logger#name:	Just 'me'

To get this logger back from the repository,

  Logger['cain::grandpa::pa::me']

Outputter Additivity

By default, Logger Outputters are additive. This means that a log event will also be sent to all of a logger's ancestors. To stop this behavior, set a logger's additive to false.

  Logger['foo'].additive = false

A Logger's level, additivity and trace can be changed dynamically, but this is an expensive operation as the logging methods have to be redefined.

RootLogger

Log4r::RootLogger is the ancestor of all loggers. Its level defines the global logging threshold. Any loggers created after RootLogger's level is set will not log below that level. By default, RootLogger's level is set to ALL

RootLogger is a singleton which gets created automatically. You can retrieve it transparently with Logger.root, Logger.global, Logger['root'] or Logger['global'].

Global Level

Suppose we want everything to ignore events less than FATAL. We can accomplish this easily:

  Logger.global.level = FATAL

Just be sure to set this before any other Loggers or Outputters are defined.

RootLogger Does Nothing

RootLogger itself behaves as if its level were permanently set to OFF, thus making it a sort of null object. Hence, you can replace a logger with RootLogger instead of setting that logger to OFF. This is handy at times.

XML Configuration

Please see log4r/configurator.rb for an overview of XML configuratoin.

It's easy to configure a Logger in XML. The following example should be sufficient:

    ...
    <logger name="papa::mylog" level="DEBUG" trace="true">
      <additive>false</additive>
      <outputter>stdout</outputter>
      <outputters>stderr, dancer, doner, blitzen</outputters>
    </logger>
    <logger name="papa" outputters="stderr, stdout"/>
    ...

The element outputter can occur multiple times, but cannot be an attribute of logger. That is, it is not an XML directive. However, the element outputters is an XML directive, as are all the others.

For more examples, check the examples directory in the Log4r package.

Other Info

Version:	$Id: logger.rb,v 1.22 2002/01/28 17:54:44 cepheus Exp $
Author:	Leon Torres <leon@ugcs.caltech.edu>