For stable operational environments where centralized logging is required syslog is appropriate. For environments where log output is frequently required for diagnostics and debugging, individual server instance or virtual server logs may be more manageable.
All logged data for the server instance and administration server in one file may prove difficult to read and debug. It is recommended that you use the syslog master log file only for deployed applications that are running smoothly.
Logged message are intermixed with all other logs from the Solaris daemon applications.
By using the syslog log file, in conjunction with the syslogd, and the system log daemon, you can configure the syslog.conf file to:
Log messages to the appropriate system log
Write messages to the system console
Forward logged messages to a list of users, or forward logged messages to another the syslogd on another host over the network
Since logging to the syslog means, logs from Sun Java System Web Server, and other daemon applications are collected in the same file, logged messages are enhanced with the following information to identify Sun Java System Web Server-specific messages from the particular server or virtual server instance:
Unique message ID
Timestamp
Instancename
Program name (webservd or webserv-wdog)
Process ID (PID of the webserv process)
Thread ID (optional)
Server ID
The LOG element can be configured for both the administration server and the server instance in the server.xml file.
For more information on the syslog logging mechanism used in the UNIX operating environment, use the following man commands at a terminal prompt:
man syslog man syslogd man syslog.conf