HP-UX Reference (11i v2 03/08) - 1M System Administration Commands N-Z (vol 4)

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syslogd(1M) syslogd(1M)
syslogd configures itself when it starts up and whenever it receives a hangup signal. Lines in the
configuration file consist of a selector to determine the message priorities to which the line applies and
an action. The action field is separated from the selector by one or more tabs.
Selectors are semicolon separated lists of priority specifiers. Each priority has a facility indicating the
subsystem that generated the message, a dot, and a level indicating the severity of the message. Sym-
bolic names can be used. An asterisk selects all facilities. All messages of the specified level or higher
(greater severity) are selected. More than one facility can be selected, using commas to separate them.
For example:
*.emerg;mail,daemon.crit
selects all facilities at the emerg level and the
mail and daemon facilities at the crit level.
The known facilities and levels recognized by
syslogd are those listed in syslog(3C) converted to lower-
case without the leading
LOG_. The additional facility
mark has a message at priority LOG_INFO sent
to it every 20 minutes (this can be changed with the
-m flag). The mark facility is not enabled by a facil-
ity field containing an asterisk. The level
none can be used to disable a particular facility. For example,
*.debug;mail.none
selects all messages except mail messages.
The second part of each line describes where the message is to be logged if this line is selected. There are
four forms:
• A file name (beginning with a leading slash). The file is opened in append mode. If the file does
not exist, it is created.
• A host name preceded by an @ character. Selected messages are forwarded to the syslogd
on
the named host.
• A comma-separated list of users. Selected messages are written to those users’ terminals if they
are logged in.
• An asterisk. Selected messages are written to the terminals of all logged-in users.
Blank lines and lines beginning with a
# character are ignored.
For example, the configuration file:
kern,mark.debug /dev/console
mail.debug /var/adm/syslog/mail.log
*.info;mail.none /var/adm/syslog/syslog.log
*.alert /dev/console
*.alert root,eric,kridle
*.emerg *
*.emerg @admin
logs all kernel messages and 20 minute marks onto the system console, all mail system messages to
/var/adm/syslog/mail.log, and all messages at info and above, except mail messages, to the file
/var/adm/syslog/syslog.log. Messages at alert and above are logged to the console and to the
users root, eric, and kridle if they are logged in. emerg messages are written to all logged-in users’
terminals, and forwarded to the host admin.
Only a superuser can invoke
syslogd.
WARNINGS
A configuration file selector selects all messages at the specified level or higher. The configuration lines:
user.debug /tmp/logfile
user.info /tmp/logfile
cause the logfile to get two copies of all user messages at level info and above.
Kernel panic messages are not sent to
syslogd.
All HP-UX kernel messages are treated as if they had the
crit priority level.
If
syslogd is invoked with the -D option and syslogd terminates abnormally, kernel messages will
not appear on the system console. In that case, reinvoke syslogd without the -D option to enable the
kernel to send its messages to the system console.
Section 1M−−800 Hewlett-Packard Company − 2 − HP-UX 11i Version 2: August 2003