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Questions to ask when you shop for a J2EE logging system

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Application servers provide logging systems. But they are very basic. When you shop for a logging system, ask the following questions:

• Can you dynamically reconfigure all the attributes of the logging system?

  Configuration includes: log threshold, filter unwanted messages and other attributes. If you need to reboot the server to make new values effective, it is not good enough.

• Does the configuration process synchronize logging behavior among the clustering environment?

In a clustering environment, each copy of application server runs its own JVM or JVMs. When you reconfigure the logging system, all copies of server should be reconfigured. If you change logging attributes on one copy of servers only, the whole system is not synchronized. 

 

• Is there a back door open for changing the attributes within one JVM and leave the system un-synchronized?

The API which changes logging attributes should not be available for general public. Otherwise, some one will accidentally, or un-intently change log attribute on one JVM only. It is very difficult to find this kind of potential problems.

 

• Is a GUI tool available to reconfigure the system?

There should be a GUI tool to reconfigure the logging system.

 

• Do all log messages go to one central place?

If log messages spread all over different machines, it would be very difficult to read them.

 

• Is the logging system chronological?

This is not a joke. JMS (Java Message Services) based logging system is not chronological. JMS guarantees delivery, but does not guarantee timing. If the order is not chronological, it is useless.

• Is there any email notification if anything goes wrong?

If anything goes wrong at system level, an alert notification should be sent out to system administrators. If anything is abnormal at application level, alarm notification should be sent out to assigned people.

 

• Is it easy to use?

If you need to go through a few steps before logging, it is too complicated and it is prone to errors. Bugs in logging area are more difficult to find until too late.