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syslog.conf(4B)

configuration file for syslogd system log daemon

From the original Amiga UNIX 2.1 manual. Some things it mentions may not be in this release.

NAME

syslog.conf - configuration file for syslogd system log daemon

SYNOPSIS

/etc/syslog.conf

DESCRIPTION

The file /etc/syslog.conf contains information used by the system log daemon, syslogd(1M), to forward a system message to appropriate log files and/or users. syslog preprocesses this file through m4(1) to obtain the correct information for certain log files. A configuration entry is composed of two TAB-separated fields:

"selector action" The selector field contains a semicolon-separated list of priority specifications of the form:

facility.level [ ; facility.level ] where facility is a system facility, or comma-separated list of facilities, and level is an indication of the severity of the condition being logged. Recognized values for facility include:

user Messages generated by user processes. This is the default priority for messages from programs or facilities not listed in this file.

kern Messages generated by the kernel.

mail The mail system.

daemon    System daemons, such as ftpd(1M), routed(1M), etc.
auth      The  authorization  system:    login(1),   su(1M),
          getty(1M), etc.

lpr The line printer spooling system: lpr(1), lpc(1M), lpd(1M), etc.

news Reserved for the USENET network news system.

uucp Reserved for the UUCP system; it does not currently use the syslog mechanism.

cron      The  cron   /at   facility;   crontab(1),   at(1),
          cron(1M), etc.

local0-7 Reserved for local use.

mark For timestamp messages produced internally by syslogd.

* An asterisk indicates all facilities except for the mark facility. Recognized values for level are (in descending order of severity):

emerg For panic conditions that would normally be broadcast to all users.

alert For conditions that should be corrected immediately, such as a corrupted system database.

crit For warnings about critical conditions, such as hard device errors.

err For other errors.

warning For warning messages.

notice For conditions that are not error conditions, but may require special handling.

info Informational messages.

debug For messages that are normally used only when debugging a program.

none      Do not send messages from the  indicated  facility
          to the selected file.  For example, a selector of
               *.debug;mail.none

          will send all messages except mail messages to the
          selected file.
          The action field indicates where  to  forward  the
          message.   Values  for  this field can have one of
          four forms:

• A filename, beginning with a leading slash, which indicates that messages specified by the selector are to be written to the specified file. The file will be opened in append mode.

• The name of a remote host, prefixed with an @, as with: @server, which indicates that messages specified by the selector are to be forwarded to the syslogd on the named host.

• A comma-separated list of usernames, which indicates that messages specified by the selector are to be written to the named users if they are logged in.

• An asterisk, which indicates that messages specified by the selector are to be written to all logged-in users. Blank lines are ignored. Lines for which the first nonwhite character is a `#' are treated as comments.

EXAMPLE

With the following configuration file:
    *.notice;mail.info     /var/log/notice
    *.crit                 /var/log/critical
    kern,mark.debug        /dev/console
    kern.err               @server
    *.emerg                *
    *.alert                root,operator
    *.alert;auth.warning   /var/log/auth
syslogd will log all mail system messages except debug  mes-
sages  and all notice (or higher) messages into a file named
/var/log/notice.   It  logs  all  critical   messages   into
/var/log/critical,  and  all  kernel  messages and 20-minute
marks onto the system console.
Kernel messages of err (error) severity or higher  are  for-
warded  to the machine named server.  Emergency messages are
forwarded to all users.  The users  root  and  operator  are
informed  of  any  alert  messages.   All  messages from the
authorization system of warning level or higher  are  logged
in the file /var/log/auth.

FILES