System event logging
The system event logging facility of IBM® WebSphere® Portal enables the recording of information about the operation of WebSphere Portal.
Event logs provide administrators with information about important or abnormal events, especially errors that occur during the operation of the product. In addition, event logs gather debugging information that helps IBM support to resolve problems.
WebSphere Portal provides two types of logging: logging of messages and logging of debugging messages called traces.
For information about how to use log files and a list of trace logger strings refer to the topic about WebSphere Portal logs.
Message logging
- SystemOut.log
- Contains information that is useful to monitor the health of the WebSphere Portal server and all running processes.
- System.err
- Contains exception stack trace information that is useful when problem analysis is done.
Trace logging
WebSphere Portal provides the logging of debugging messages called traces. These traces are useful for fixing problems. However, to save system resources, they are turned off by default.
- Temporary
- Traces can be set for a temporary period by using the administration
portlet Enable Tracing or the WebSphere Integrated Solutions Console. To set traces by
using the portlet, complete the following steps:
- Log in as the administrator.
- Click the Administration menu icon. Then, click . The Enable Tracing portlet displays.
- Type the required trace string into the field Append these trace settings: For example, this string can be com.ibm.wps.command.credentialvault.*=finest
- Click the Add icon. Enable Tracing updates the Current trace settings field.
Note: Restarting WebSphere Portal removes traces that were set by using the Enable Tracing Administration portlet.To disable tracing, use either of the following methods:- Select the current trace settings under Current trace settings: and click the Remove icon. For example, the current setting can be com.ibm.wps.command.credentialvault.*=finest.
- Type the trace string *=info into the field Append these trace settings: and click the Add icon. This trace string overwrites all settings that are listed under Current trace settings: and resets it to the default.
- Extended
- To enable trace settings for a longer period, that is, for more
than one session, switch them on in the WebSphere Application
Server configuration.
Proceed by the following steps:
- Access the WebSphere Integrated Solutions Console by using this URL: http://hostname:port_number/ibm/console
- Go to .
- Select the application server.
- Click .
- Specify the required trace settings. For example, this setting can be com.ibm.wps.command.credentialvault.*=finest
- Save your updates.
- Restart the WebSphere_Portal server.
- To disable tracing, specify tracestring: *=info and restart the WebSphere_Portal server.
Changing the log file name and location
You can change the locations of the log files by configuring them in the WebSphere Integrated Solutions Console. Go to and select the logger type that you want to change. In the configuration dialog, change the path for the log file as required.
Changing the language used in the log file
By default, information in the log file is written in the language that was used for the WebSphere Portal installation. However, because WebSphere Portal supports a number of languages, you can choose to have the log file information that is written in a language other than that language used during installation.
- AIX® HP-UX Linux Solaris: wp_profile_root/PortalServer/config/config
- IBM i: wp_profile_root/PortalServer/config/config
- Windows: wp_profile_root\PortalServer\config\config
locale=xx
locale=en
Reference: Log file format
If the logs are written to the log file of WebSphere Portal and not redirected to the logging facility WebSphere Application Server, the log file consists of a sequence log records that are separated by blank lines.
timestamp classification classname method threadID
messagecode: logmessage
- The timestamp is the time (to the millisecond) when the log record was created.
- The classification is
one of the following letters:
- E
- For error messages
- W
- For warning messages
- I
- For informational messages
- l
- For traces (low details)
- m
- For traces (medium details)
- h
- For traces (high details)
- The classname is the Java class that contains the code that triggered the log event.
- The method is the name of the Java method that contains the code that triggered the log event.
- The messagecode is
a unique identifier for this message, to uniquely identify the specific
message and refer to it when you are consulting documentation or support.
The message code is only available for error, warning, or informational
messages, and not for traces. It consists of:
- A four-character identifier for the component that defines the message.
- A four-digit number that identifies the message in the component.
- A one-letter classification code, which can be E, W, or I.
- The logmessage is the actual log message that describes the logged event. Error, warning, and informational messages are translated into the system locale. Trace messages are not translated.
- The threadID is the identification of the thread that triggered the log event.
- Traces are written only if the specific tracing facility is enabled; all other messages are written unconditionally.
- The system locale is part of the general globalization features of WebSphere Portal and can be configured by using LocalizerService. For more information, see the topics about Setting service configuration properties and about the Portal configuration services.
2011.05.16 13:36:14.449 W com.ibm.wps.services.datastore.DataStoreServiceImpl init 0000003a
DSTO0063W: The transaction isolation level is not set to READ_COMMITTED.
The current value is TRANSACTION_REPEATABLE_READ.