Table of Contents

Apache - Logs - Use vlogger to split Apache logs

Vlogger is a program that handles large amounts of virtualhost logs and splits it to separate files.

This is a short HOWTO to configure it using Apache.

Install vlogger

sudo apt install vlogger

Make sure you have working Apache server

Configuring vlogger

Change the LogFormat line (there are multiple LogFormat lines – in this example we will change the one that is named combined) in /etc/apache2/apache2.conf. 

sudo vi /etc/apache2/apache2.conf

Add the string %v at the beginning of it.

/etc/apache2/apache2.conf
#LogFormat “%h %l %u %t \”%r\” %>s %b \”%{Referer}i\” \”%{User-Agent}i\”" combined
LogFormat “%v %h %l %u %t \”%r\” %>s %b \”%{Referer}i\” \”%{User-Agent}i\”" combined

Add the following CustomLog line to the same file (you can put it directly after the LogFormat line) 

sudo vi /etc/apache2/apache2.conf
/etc/apache2/apache2.conf
CustomLog “| /usr/sbin/vlogger -s access.log /var/log/apache2″ combined

NOTE: Only one CustomLog directive is neededd in the entire Apache configuration.

  • Please disable all other CustomLog directives, especially in any virtual host configurations.

Restart Apache

sudo /etc/init.d/apache2 restart

NOTE: Vlogger will now create subdirectories in the /var/log/apache2 directory, one per virtual host, and create access logs that contain the current date in the file name.

  • It will also create a symlink called access.log that points to the current log file.

Result

Assuming there are two virtual hosts, www.example1.com and www.example2.com.

Then this is how the /var/log/apache2 directory will look like: 

ls /var/log/apache2/

returns: 

www.example1.com/
09022008-access.log
09012008-access.log
access.log -> 09022008-access.log
www.example2.com/
09022008-access.log
09012008-access.log
access.log -> 09022008-access.log