6.7

Table Of Contents
Component Location Purpose
vCenter agent log
/var/log/vpxa.log
Contains information about the agent that
communicates with vCenter Server (if the
host is managed by vCenter Server).
Shell log
/var/log/shell.log
Contains a record of all commands typed
into the ESXi Shell as well as shell events
(for example, when the shell was
enabled).
Authentication
/var/log/auth.log
Contains all events related to
authentication for the local system.
System messages
/var/log/syslog.log
Contains all general log messages and
can be used for troubleshooting. This
information was formerly located in the
messages log file.
Virtual machines The same directory as the affected
virtual machine's configuration files,
named vmware.log and vmware*.log. For
example, /vmfs/volumes/datastore/v
irtual machine/vwmare.log
Contains virtual machine power events,
system failure information, tools status
and activity, time sync, virtual hardware
changes, vMotion migrations, machine
clones, and so on.
Configure Log Filtering on ESXi Hosts
The log filtering capability lets you modify the logging policy of the syslog service that is running on an
ESXi host. You can create log filters to reduce the number of repetitive entries in the ESXi logs and to
blacklist specific log events entirely.
Log filters affect all log events that are processed by the ESXi host vmsyslogd daemon, whether they are
recorded to a log directory or to a remote syslog server.
When you create a log filter, you set a maximum number of log entries for the log messages. The logs
messages are generated by one or more specified system components and that match a specified
phrase. You must enable the log filtering capability and reload the syslog daemon to activate the log filters
on the ESXi host.
Important Setting a limit to the amount of logging information, restricts your ability to troubleshoot
potential system failures properly. If a log rotate occurs after the maximum number of log entries is
reached, you might lose all instances of a filtered message.
Procedure
1 Log in to the ESXi Shell as root.
2 In the /etc/vmware/logfilters file, add the following entry to create a log filter.
numLogs | ident | logRegexp
vSphere Monitoring and Performance
VMware, Inc. 206