| blob | 3d2f91bb16c290ff16fecceacd0b888ce7ee0d59 |
1 .\" syslog.conf - syslogd(8) configuration file
2 .\" Copyright (c) 1995 Martin Schulze <Martin.Schulze@Linux.DE>
3 .\" Modified for Minix porting by G. Falzoni <gfalzoni@inwind.it>
4 .\" $Id$
5 .\"
6 .\" This file is part of the sysklogd package, a kernel and system log daemon.
7 .\"
8 .\" This program is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify
9 .\" it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by
10 .\" the Free Software Foundation; either version 2 of the License, or
11 .\" (at your option) any later version.
12 .\"
13 .\" This program is distributed in the hope that it will be useful,
14 .\" but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of
15 .\" MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the
16 .\" GNU General Public License for more details.
17 .\"
18 .\" You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License
19 .\" along with this program; if not, write to the Free Software
20 .\" Foundation, Inc., 59 Temple Place - Suite 330, Boston, MA 02111, USA.
21 .\"
22 .\" Local macros
23 .de Xr
24 .BR \\$1 (\\$2)\\$3
25 ..
26 .de LB
27 .TP \\$1
28 \\fB\\$2\\fR
29 \\$3
30 ..
31 .de LI
32 .TP \\$1
33 \\fI\\$2\\fR
34 \\$3
35 ..
36 .de LR
37 .TP \\$1
38 \\fR\\$2\\fR
39 \\$3
40 ..
41 .\" end local macros
42 .TH SYSLOG.CONF 5 "1 January 1998"
43 .SH NAME
44 syslog.conf \- syslogd(8) configuration file
45 .SH DESCRIPTION
46 The
47 .I syslog.conf
48 file is the main configuration file for the
49 .Xr syslogd 8
50 which logs system messages on *nix systems. This file specifies rules
51 for logging. For special features see the
52 .Xr syslogd 8
53 manpage.
54 Every rule consists of two fields, a
55 .I selector
56 field and an
57 .I action
58 field. These two fields are separated by one or more tabs.
59 The selector field specifies a pattern of facilities and
60 priorities belonging to the specified action.
61 Lines starting with a hash mark (``#'') and empty lines are ignored.
62 .SH SELECTORS
63 The selector field itself again consists of two parts, a
64 .I facility
65 and a
66 .IR priority ,
67 separated by a period (``.'').
68 Both parts are case insensitive and can also be specified as decimal
69 numbers, but don't do that, you have been warned. Both facilities and
70 priorities are described in
71 .BR syslog (3).
72 The names mentioned below correspond to the similar
73 .BR LOG_ -values
74 in
75 .IR /usr/include/syslog.h .
76 The
77 .I facility
78 is one of the following keywords:
79 .BR auth ", " authpriv ", " cron ", " daemon ", " kern ", " lpr ", "
80 .BR mail ", " mark ", " news ", " security " (same as " auth "), "
81 .BR syslog ", " user ", " uucp " and " local0 " through " local7 .
82 The keyword
83 .B security
84 should not be used anymore and
85 .B mark
86 is only for internal use and therefore should not be used in
87 applications. Anyway, you may want to specify and redirect these
88 messages here. The
89 .I facility
90 specifies the subsystem that produced the message, i.e. all mail
91 programs log with the mail facility
92 .BR "" ( LOG_MAIL )
93 if they log using syslog.
95 The
96 .I priority
97 is one of the following keywords, in ascending order:
98 .BR debug ", " info ", " notice ", " warning ", " warn " (same as "
99 .BR warning "), " err ", " error " (same as " err "), " crit ", "
100 .BR alert ", " emerg ", " panic " (same as " emerg ).
101 The keywords
102 .BR error ", " warn " and " panic
103 are deprecated and should not be used anymore. The
104 .I priority
105 defines the severity of the message
106 .PP
107 The behavior of the original BSD syslogd is that all messages of the
108 specified priority and higher are logged according to the given
109 action. This
110 .BR syslogd (8)
111 behaves the same, but has some extensions.
112 .PP
113 In addition to the above mentioned names the
114 .BR syslogd (8)
115 understands the following extensions:
116 .LB 5 "*" "An asterisk (``*'') before the period stands for all facilities.
117 .LB 5 "none" "The keyword none stands for no priority of the given facility.
118 .PP
119 Multiple selectors may be specified for a single
120 .I action
121 using the semicolon (``;'') separator. Remember that each selector in
122 the
123 .I selector
124 field is capable to overwrite the preceding ones. Using this
125 behavior you can exclude some priorities from the pattern.
126 .SH ACTIONS
127 The action field of a rule describes the abstract term
128 ``logfile''. A ``logfile'' need not to be a real file, btw. The
129 .Xr syslogd 8
130 provides the following actions.
131 .SS Regular File
132 Typically messages are logged to real files. The file has to be
133 specified with full pathname, beginning with a slash ``/''.
134 .SS Terminal and Console
135 If the file you specified is a tty, special tty-handling is done, same
136 with
137 .IR /dev/console .
138 .SS Remote Machine
139 This release does not implement
140 remote logging, i.e. the ability to send messages to a remote host running
141 .Xr syslogd 8 .
142 To forward messages to another host, prepend the hostname
143 with the at sign (``@'').
144 .SS List of Users
145 Usually critical messages are also directed to ``root'' on that
146 machine. You can specify a list of users that shall get the message by
147 simply writing the login. You may specify more than one user by
148 separating them with commas (``,''). If they're logged in they
149 get the message. Don't think a mail would be sent, that might be too
150 late.
151 .SS Everyone logged on
152 Emergency messages often go to all users currently online to notify
153 them that something strange is happening with the system. To specify
154 this
155 .IR wall (1)-feature
156 use an asterisk (``*'').
157 .SH EXAMPLES
158 Here are some example, partially taken from a real existing site and
159 configuration. Hopefully they rub out all questions to the
160 configuration, if not, drop me (Joey) a line.
161 .IP
162 .nf
163 # Store critical stuff in critical
164 #
165 *.crit /var/adm/critical
166 .fi
167 .LP
168 This will store all messages with the priority
169 .B crit
170 in the file
171 .IR /var/adm/critical .
172 .IP
173 .nf
174 # The tcp wrapper loggs with mail.info, we display
175 # all the connections on tty12
176 #
177 mail.info /dev/tty12
178 .fi
179 .LP
180 This directs all messages that uses
181 .BR mail.info " (in source " LOG_MAIL " | " LOG_INFO )
182 to
183 .IR /dev/tty12 ,
184 the 12th console.
185 .IP
186 .nf
187 # Log all mail.info and news.info messages to info
188 #
189 mail,news.info /var/adm/info
190 .fi
191 .LP
192 This will extract all messages that come either with
193 .BR mail.info " or with " news.info
194 and store them in the file
195 .IR /var/adm/info .
196 .IP
197 .nf
198 # Emergency messages will be displayed using wall
199 #
200 *.emerg *
201 .fi
202 .LP
203 This rule tells the
204 .B syslogd
205 to write all emergency messages to all currently logged in users. This
206 is the wall action.
207 .IP
208 .nf
209 # Messages of the priority alert will be directed
210 # to the operator
211 #
212 *.alert root,joey
213 .fi
214 .LP
215 This rule directs all messages with a priority of
216 .B alert
217 or higher to the terminals of the operator, i.e. of the users ``root''
218 and ``joey'' if they're logged in.
219 .IP
220 .nf
221 *.* @finlandia
222 .fi
223 .LP
224 This rule would redirect all messages to a remote host called
225 finlandia. This is useful especially in a cluster of machines where
226 all syslog messages will be stored on only one machine.
227 .SH FILES
228 .I /etc/syslog.conf
229 Configuration file for
230 .B syslogd
231 .SH BUGS
232 The effects of multiple selectors are sometimes not intuitive. For
233 example ``mail.crit,*.err'' will select ``mail'' facility messages at
234 the level of ``err'' or higher, not at the level of ``crit'' or
235 higher.
237 .SH SEE ALSO
238 .BR syslogd (8),
239 .BR logger (1),
240 .BR syslog (3)
241 .SH AUTHORS
242 The
243 .B syslogd
244 is taken from BSD sources, Greg Wettstein (greg@wind.rmcc.com)
245 performed the port to Linux, Martin Schulze (joey@linux.de)
246 made some bugfixes and added some new features.