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syslog-ng Open Source Edition 3.18 - Administration Guide

Preface Introduction to syslog-ng The concepts of syslog-ng Installing syslog-ng The syslog-ng OSE quick-start guide The syslog-ng OSE configuration file source: Read, receive, and collect log messages
How sources work default-network-drivers: Receive and parse common syslog messages internal: Collecting internal messages file: Collecting messages from text files wildcard-file: Collecting messages from multiple text files linux-audit: Collecting messages from Linux audit logs network: Collecting messages using the RFC3164 protocol (network() driver) nodejs: Receiving JSON messages from nodejs applications mbox: Converting local e-mail messages to log messages osquery: Collect and parse osquery result logs pipe: Collecting messages from named pipes pacct: Collecting process accounting logs on Linux program: Receiving messages from external applications python: writing server-style Python sources python-fetcher: writing fetcher-style Python sources snmptrap: Read Net-SNMP traps sun-streams: Collecting messages on Sun Solaris syslog: Collecting messages using the IETF syslog protocol (syslog() driver) system: Collecting the system-specific log messages of a platform systemd-journal: Collecting messages from the systemd-journal system log storage systemd-syslog: Collecting systemd messages using a socket tcp, tcp6, udp, udp6: Collecting messages from remote hosts using the BSD syslog protocol— OBSOLETE unix-stream, unix-dgram: Collecting messages from UNIX domain sockets stdin: Collecting messages from the standard input stream
destination: Forward, send, and store log messages
amqp: Publishing messages using AMQP elasticsearch: Sending messages directly to Elasticsearch version 1.x (DEPRECATED) elasticsearch2: Sending logs directly to Elasticsearch and Kibana 2.0 or higher file: Storing messages in plain-text files graphite: Sending metrics to Graphite Sending logs to Graylog hdfs: Storing messages on the Hadoop Distributed File System (HDFS) Posting messages over HTTP http: Posting messages over HTTP without Java kafka: Publishing messages to Apache Kafka loggly: Using Loggly logmatic: Using Logmatic.io mongodb: Storing messages in a MongoDB database network: Sending messages to a remote log server using the RFC3164 protocol (network() driver) osquery: Sending log messages to osquery's syslog table pipe: Sending messages to named pipes program: Sending messages to external applications pseudofile() python: writing custom Python destinations redis: Storing name-value pairs in Redis riemann: Monitoring your data with Riemann smtp: Generating SMTP messages (e-mail) from logs Splunk: Sending log messages to Splunk sql: Storing messages in an SQL database stomp: Publishing messages using STOMP syslog: Sending messages to a remote logserver using the IETF-syslog protocol syslog-ng: Forwarding messages and tags to another syslog-ng node tcp, tcp6, udp, udp6: Sending messages to a remote log server using the legacy BSD-syslog protocol (tcp(), udp() drivers) Telegram: Sending messages to Telegram unix-stream, unix-dgram: Sending messages to UNIX domain sockets usertty: Sending messages to a user terminal: usertty() destination Write your own custom destination in Java or Python Client-side failover
log: Filter and route log messages using log paths, flags, and filters Global options of syslog-ng OSE TLS-encrypted message transfer template and rewrite: Format, modify, and manipulate log messages parser: Parse and segment structured messages db-parser: Process message content with a pattern database (patterndb) Correlating log messages Enriching log messages with external data Statistics of syslog-ng Multithreading and scaling in syslog-ng OSE Troubleshooting syslog-ng Best practices and examples The syslog-ng manual pages Third-party contributions Creative Commons Attribution Non-commercial No Derivatives (by-nc-nd) License About us

multi-line-mode()

Type: indented|regexp
Default: empty string

Description: Use the multi-line-mode() option when processing multi-line messages. The syslog-ng OSE application provides the following methods to process multi-line messages:

  • The indented mode can process messages where each line that belongs to the previous line is indented by whitespace, and the message continues until the first non-indented line. For example, the Linux kernel (starting with version 3.5) uses this format for /dev/log, as well as several applications, like Apache Tomcat.

    Example: Processing indented multi-line messages
    source s_tomcat {
    file("/var/log/tomcat/xxx.log" multi-line-mode(indented));
};

  • The prefix-garbage mode uses a string or regular expression (set in multi-line-prefix()) that matches the beginning of the log messages, ignores newline characters from the source until a line matches the regular expression again, and treats the lines between the matching lines as a single message. For details on using multi-line-mode(prefix-garbage), see the multi-line-prefix() and multi-line-garbage() options.

  • The prefix-suffix mode uses a string or regular expression (set in multi-line-prefix()) that matches the beginning of the log messages, ignores newline characters from the source until a line matches the regular expression set in multi-line-suffix(), and treats the lines between multi-line-prefix() and multi-line-suffix() as a single message. Any other lines between the end of the message and the beginning of a new message (that is, a line that matches the multi-line-prefix() expression) are discarded. For details on using multi-line-mode(prefix-suffix), see the multi-line-prefix() and multi-line-suffix() options.

    The prefix-suffix mode is similar to the prefix-garbage mode, but it appends the garbage part to the message instead of discarding it.

 TIP:

  • To make multi-line messages more readable when written to a file, use a template in the destination and instead of the ${MESSAGE} macro, use the following: $(indent-multi-line ${MESSAGE}). This expression inserts a tab after every newline character (except when a tab is already present), indenting every line of the message after the first. For example:

    destination d_file {
    file ("/var/log/messages"
        template("${ISODATE} ${HOST} $(indent-multi-line ${MESSAGE})\n")
    );
};

    For details on using templates, see Templates and macros.

  • To actually convert the lines of multi-line messages to single line (by replacing the newline characters with whitespaces), use the flags(no-multi-line) option in the source.

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