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.TH "ROTATELOGS" 8 "2010-11-01" "Apache HTTP Server" "rotatelogs"
.SH NAME
rotatelogs \- Piped logging program to rotate Apache logs
.SH "SYNOPSIS"
.PP
\fBrotatelogs\fR [ -\fBl\fR ] [ -\fBL\fR \fIlinkname\fR ] [ -\fBf\fR ] [ -\fBv\fR ] \fIlogfile\fR \fIrotationtime\fR|\fIfilesize\fR(B|K|M|G) [ \fIoffset\fR ]
.SH "SUMMARY"
.PP
rotatelogs is a simple program for use in conjunction with Apache's piped logfile feature\&. It supports rotation based on a time interval or maximum size of the log\&.
.SH "OPTIONS"
.TP
-l
Causes the use of local time rather than GMT as the base for the interval or for strftime(3) formatting with size-based rotation\&.
.TP
-L \fIlinkname\fR
Causes a hard link to be made from the current logfile to the specified link name\&. This can be used to watch the log continuously across rotations using a command like tail -F linkname\&.
.TP
-f
Causes the logfile to be opened immediately, as soon as rotatelogs starts, instead of waiting for the first logfile entry to be read (for non-busy sites, there may be a substantial delay between when the server is started and when the first request is handled, meaning that the associated logfile does not "exist" until then, which causes problems from some automated logging tools)
.TP
-t
Causes the logfile to be truncated instead of rotated\&. This is useful when a log is processed in real time by a command like tail, and there is no need for archived data\&. No suffix will be added to the filename, however format strings containing '%' characters will be respected\&.
.TP
-v
Produce verbose output on STDERR\&. The output contains the result of the configuration parsing, and all file open and close actions\&.
.TP
\fIlogfile\fR
.PP The path plus basename of the logfile\&. If \fIlogfile\fR includes any '%' characters, it is treated as a format string for strftime(3)\&. Otherwise, the suffix \fI\&.nnnnnnnnnn\fR is automatically added and is the time in seconds (unless the -t option is used)\&. Both formats compute the start time from the beginning of the current period\&. For example, if a rotation time of 86400 is specified, the hour, minute, and second fields created from the strftime(3) format will all be zero, referring to the beginning of the current 24-hour period (midnight)\&. .PP When using strftime(3) filename formatting, be sure the log file format has enough granularity to produce a different file name each time the logs are rotated\&. Otherwise rotation will overwrite the same file instead of starting a new one\&. For example, if \fIlogfile\fR was /var/logs/errorlog\&.%Y-%m-%d with log rotation at 5 megabytes, but 5 megabytes was reached twice in the same day, the same log file name would be produced and log rotation would keep writing to the same file\&.
.TP
\fIrotationtime\fR
The time between log file rotations in seconds\&. The rotation occurs at the beginning of this interval\&. For example, if the rotation time is 3600, the log file will be rotated at the beginning of every hour; if the rotation time is 86400, the log file will be rotated every night at midnight\&. (If no data is logged during an interval, no file will be created\&.)
.TP
\fIfilesize\fR(B|K|M|G)
The maximum file size in followed by exactly one of the letters B (Bytes), K (KBytes), M (MBytes) or G (GBytes)\&. .PP When time and size are specified, the size must be given after the time\&. Rotation will occur whenever either time or size limits are reached\&.
.TP
\fIoffset\fR
The number of minutes offset from UTC\&. If omitted, zero is assumed and UTC is used\&. For example, to use local time in the zone UTC -5 hours, specify a value of -300 for this argument\&. In most cases, -l should be used instead of specifying an offset\&.
.SH "EXAMPLES"
.nf
CustomLog "|bin/rotatelogs /var/logs/logfile 86400" common
.fi
.PP
This creates the files /var/logs/logfile\&.nnnn where nnnn is the system time at which the log nominally starts (this time will always be a multiple of the rotation time, so you can synchronize cron scripts with it)\&. At the end of each rotation time (here after 24 hours) a new log is started\&.
.nf
CustomLog "|bin/rotatelogs -l /var/logs/logfile\&.%Y\&.%m\&.%d 86400" common
.fi
.PP
This creates the files /var/logs/logfile\&.yyyy\&.mm\&.dd where yyyy is the year, mm is the month, and dd is the day of the month\&. Logging will switch to a new file every day at midnight, local time\&.
.nf
CustomLog "|bin/rotatelogs /var/logs/logfile 5M" common
.fi
.PP
This configuration will rotate the logfile whenever it reaches a size of 5 megabytes\&.
.nf
ErrorLog "|bin/rotatelogs /var/logs/errorlog\&.%Y-%m-%d-%H_%M_%S 5M"
.fi
.PP
This configuration will rotate the error logfile whenever it reaches a size of 5 megabytes, and the suffix to the logfile name will be created of the form errorlog\&.YYYY-mm-dd-HH_MM_SS\&.
.nf
CustomLog "|bin/rotatelogs -t /var/logs/logfile 86400" common
.fi
.PP
This creates the file /var/logs/logfile, truncating the file at startup and then truncating the file once per day\&. It is expected in this scenario that a separate process (such as tail) would process the file in real time\&.
.SH "PORTABILITY"
.PP
The following logfile format string substitutions should be supported by all strftime(3) implementations, see the strftime(3) man page for library-specific extensions\&.
.Ip "\(bu \s-1%A\s0 \- full weekday name (localized)
.Ip "\(bu \s-1%a\s0 \- 3-character weekday name (localized)
.Ip "\(bu \s-1%B\s0 \- full month name (localized)
.Ip "\(bu \s-1%b\s0 \- 3-character month name (localized)
.Ip "\(bu \s-1%c\s0 \- date and time (localized)
.Ip "\(bu \s-1%d\s0 \- 2-digit day of month
.Ip "\(bu \s-1%H\s0 \- 2-digit hour (24 hour clock)
.Ip "\(bu \s-1%I\s0 \- 2-digit hour (12 hour clock)
.Ip "\(bu \s-1%j\s0 \- 3-digit day of year
.Ip "\(bu \s-1%M\s0 \- 2-digit minute
.Ip "\(bu \s-1%m\s0 \- 2-digit month
.Ip "\(bu \s-1%p\s0 \- am/pm of 12 hour clock (localized)
.Ip "\(bu \s-1%S\s0 \- 2-digit second
.Ip "\(bu \s-1%U\s0 \- 2-digit week of year (Sunday first day of week)
.Ip "\(bu \s-1%W\s0 \- 2-digit week of year (Monday first day of week)
.Ip "\(bu \s-1%w\s0 \- 1-digit weekday (Sunday first day of week)
.Ip "\(bu \s-1%X\s0 \- time (localized)
.Ip "\(bu \s-1%x\s0 \- date (localized)
.Ip "\(bu \s-1%Y\s0 \- 4-digit year
.Ip "\(bu \s-1%y\s0 \- 2-digit year
.Ip "\(bu \s-1%Z\s0 \- time zone name
.Ip "\(bu \s-1%%\s0 \- literal `%'
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