19.8. Error Reporting and Logging #

19.8.1. Where to Log
19.8.2. When to Log
19.8.3. What to Log
19.8.4. Using CSV-Format Log Output
19.8.5. Using JSON-Format Log Output
19.8.6. Separate Log File for Extension
19.8.7. Process Title

19.8.1. Where to Log #

log_destination (string) #

PostgreSQL supports several methods for logging server messages, including stderr, csvlog, jsonlog, and syslog. On Windows, eventlog is also supported. Set this parameter to a list of desired log destinations separated by commas. The default is to log to stderr only. This parameter can only be set in the postgresql.conf file or on the server command line.

If csvlog is included in log_destination, log entries are output in comma separated value (CSV) format, which is convenient for loading logs into programs. See Section 19.8.4 for details. logging_collector must be enabled to generate CSV-format log output.

If jsonlog is included in log_destination, log entries are output in JSON format, which is convenient for loading logs into programs. See Section 19.8.5 for details. logging_collector must be enabled to generate JSON-format log output.

When either stderr, csvlog or jsonlog are included, the file current_logfiles is created to record the location of the log file(s) currently in use by the logging collector and the associated logging destination. This provides a convenient way to find the logs currently in use by the instance. Here is an example of this file's content:

stderr log/postgresql.log
csvlog log/postgresql.csv
jsonlog log/postgresql.json

current_logfiles is recreated when a new log file is created as an effect of rotation, and when log_destination is reloaded. It is removed when none of stderr, csvlog or jsonlog are included in log_destination, and when the logging collector is disabled.

Note

On most Unix systems, you will need to alter the configuration of your system's syslog daemon in order to make use of the syslog option for log_destination. PostgreSQL can log to syslog facilities LOCAL0 through LOCAL7 (see syslog_facility), but the default syslog configuration on most platforms will discard all such messages. You will need to add something like:

local0.*    /var/log/postgresql

to the syslog daemon's configuration file to make it work.

On Windows, when you use the eventlog option for log_destination, you should register an event source and its library with the operating system so that the Windows Event Viewer can display event log messages cleanly. See Section 18.12 for details.

logging_collector (boolean) #

This parameter enables the logging collector, which is a background process that captures log messages sent to stderr and redirects them into log files. This approach is often more useful than logging to syslog, since some types of messages might not appear in syslog output. (One common example is dynamic-linker failure messages; another is error messages produced by scripts such as archive_command.) This parameter can only be set at server start.

Note

It is possible to log to stderr without using the logging collector; the log messages will just go to wherever the server's stderr is directed. However, that method is only suitable for low log volumes, since it provides no convenient way to rotate log files. Also, on some platforms not using the logging collector can result in lost or garbled log output, because multiple processes writing concurrently to the same log file can overwrite each other's output.

Note

The logging collector is designed to never lose messages. This means that in case of extremely high load, server processes could be blocked while trying to send additional log messages when the collector has fallen behind. In contrast, syslog prefers to drop messages if it cannot write them, which means it may fail to log some messages in such cases but it will not block the rest of the system.

log_directory (string) #

When logging_collector is enabled, this parameter determines the directory in which log files will be created. It can be specified as an absolute path, or relative to the cluster data directory. This parameter can only be set in the postgresql.conf file or on the server command line. The default is log.

log_filename (string) #

When logging_collector is enabled, this parameter sets the file names of the created log files. The value is treated as a strftime pattern, so %-escapes can be used to specify time-varying file names. (Note that if there are any time-zone-dependent %-escapes, the computation is done in the zone specified by log_timezone.) The supported %-escapes are similar to those listed in the Open Group's strftime specification. Note that the system's strftime is not used directly, so platform-specific (nonstandard) extensions do not work. The default is postgresql-%Y-%m-%d_%H%M%S.log.

If you specify a file name without escapes, you should plan to use a log rotation utility to avoid eventually filling the entire disk. In releases prior to 8.4, if no % escapes were present, PostgreSQL would append the epoch of the new log file's creation time, but this is no longer the case.

If CSV-format output is enabled in log_destination, .csv will be appended to the timestamped log file name to create the file name for CSV-format output. (If log_filename ends in .log, the suffix is replaced instead.)

If JSON-format output is enabled in log_destination, .json will be appended to the timestamped log file name to create the file name for JSON-format output. (If log_filename ends in .log, the suffix is replaced instead.)

If you require further processing of the log messages instead of writing them to a file, you can create a named pipe instead of the regular file before you start the server. For example:

mkfifo postgresql.log

Caution

For each named pipe make sure that the application responsible for reading the log messages is running before you start the server. Otherwise the logging collector will not be able to write the messages and the server will block. In particular, such an application should automatically re-open the pipe for reading if the other end was closed by the logging collector during server restart. You might want to consider using the pg_syslog application.

Caution

If there are multiple destinations specified in log_destination, and if any one log file (*.log, *.csv or *.json) is a named pipe, rotation will be disabled for all the files, even if the other ones are regular files. In such a case you can end up with a full disk. Therefore it's recommended that either all the logs are regular files or all the logs are named pipes.

Also note that the strftime pattern is not recommended if named pipe is used. The point is that, regardless the log rotation settings, the file name can change during restart. If there is no named pipe for the new file name, the logging collector will create a regular file and write the messages into it. Again, this can make your disk full because log rotation is likely to be disabled whenever you intend to use the named pipe.

This parameter can only be set in the postgresql.conf file or on the server command line.

log_file_mode (integer) #

On Unix systems this parameter sets the permissions for log files when logging_collector is enabled. (On Microsoft Windows this parameter is ignored.) The parameter value is expected to be a numeric mode specified in the format accepted by the chmod and umask system calls. (To use the customary octal format the number must start with a 0 (zero).)

The default permissions are 0600, meaning only the server owner can read or write the log files. The other commonly useful setting is 0640, allowing members of the owner's group to read the files. Note however that to make use of such a setting, you'll need to alter log_directory to store the files somewhere outside the cluster data directory. In any case, it's unwise to make the log files world-readable, since they might contain sensitive data.

This parameter can only be set in the postgresql.conf file or on the server command line.

log_rotation_age (integer) #

When logging_collector is enabled, this parameter determines the maximum amount of time to use an individual log file, after which a new log file will be created. If this value is specified without units, it is taken as minutes. The default is 24 hours. Set to zero to disable time-based creation of new log files. This parameter can only be set in the postgresql.conf file or on the server command line.

log_rotation_size (integer) #

When logging_collector is enabled, this parameter determines the maximum size of an individual log file. After this amount of data has been emitted into a log file, a new log file will be created. If this value is specified without units, it is taken as kilobytes. The default is 10 megabytes. Set to zero to disable size-based creation of new log files. This parameter can only be set in the postgresql.conf file or on the server command line.

log_truncate_on_rotation (boolean) #

When logging_collector is enabled, this parameter will cause PostgreSQL to truncate (overwrite), rather than append to, any existing log file of the same name. However, truncation will occur only when a new file is being opened due to time-based rotation, not during server startup or size-based rotation. When off, pre-existing files will be appended to in all cases. For example, using this setting in combination with a log_filename like postgresql-%H.log would result in generating twenty-four hourly log files and then cyclically overwriting them. This parameter can only be set in the postgresql.conf file or on the server command line.

Example: To keep 7 days of logs, one log file per day named server_log.Mon, server_log.Tue, etc., and automatically overwrite last week's log with this week's log, set log_filename to server_log.%a, log_truncate_on_rotation to on, and log_rotation_age to 1440.

Example: To keep 24 hours of logs, one log file per hour, but also rotate sooner if the log file size exceeds 1GB, set log_filename to server_log.%H%M, log_truncate_on_rotation to on, log_rotation_age to 60, and log_rotation_size to 1000000. Including %M in log_filename allows any size-driven rotations that might occur to select a file name different from the hour's initial file name.

syslog_facility (enum) #

When logging to syslog is enabled, this parameter determines the syslog facility to be used. You can choose from LOCAL0, LOCAL1, LOCAL2, LOCAL3, LOCAL4, LOCAL5, LOCAL6, LOCAL7; the default is LOCAL0. See also the documentation of your system's syslog daemon. This parameter can only be set in the postgresql.conf file or on the server command line.

syslog_ident (string) #

When logging to syslog is enabled, this parameter determines the program name used to identify PostgreSQL messages in syslog logs. The default is postgres. This parameter can only be set in the postgresql.conf file or on the server command line.

syslog_sequence_numbers (boolean) #

When logging to syslog and this is on (the default), then each message will be prefixed by an increasing sequence number (such as [2]). This circumvents the --- last message repeated N times --- suppression that many syslog implementations perform by default. In more modern syslog implementations, repeated message suppression can be configured (for example, $RepeatedMsgReduction in rsyslog), so this might not be necessary. Also, you could turn this off if you actually want to suppress repeated messages.

This parameter can only be set in the postgresql.conf file or on the server command line.

syslog_split_messages (boolean) #

When logging to syslog is enabled, this parameter determines how messages are delivered to syslog. When on (the default), messages are split by lines, and long lines are split so that they will fit into 1024 bytes, which is a typical size limit for traditional syslog implementations. When off, PostgreSQL server log messages are delivered to the syslog service as is, and it is up to the syslog service to cope with the potentially bulky messages.

If syslog is ultimately logging to a text file, then the effect will be the same either way, and it is best to leave the setting on, since most syslog implementations either cannot handle large messages or would need to be specially configured to handle them. But if syslog is ultimately writing into some other medium, it might be necessary or more useful to keep messages logically together.

This parameter can only be set in the postgresql.conf file or on the server command line.

event_source (string) #

When logging to event log is enabled, this parameter determines the program name used to identify PostgreSQL messages in the log. The default is PostgreSQL. This parameter can only be set in the postgresql.conf file or on the server command line.

19.8.2. When to Log #

log_min_messages (enum) #

Controls which message levels are written to the server log. Valid values are DEBUG5, DEBUG4, DEBUG3, DEBUG2, DEBUG1, INFO, NOTICE, WARNING, ERROR, LOG, FATAL, and PANIC. Each level includes all the levels that follow it. The later the level, the fewer messages are sent to the log. The default is WARNING. Note that LOG has a different rank here than in client_min_messages. Only superusers and users with the appropriate SET privilege can change this setting.

log_min_error_statement (enum) #

Controls which SQL statements that cause an error condition are recorded in the server log. The current SQL statement is included in the log entry for any message of the specified severity or higher. Valid values are DEBUG5, DEBUG4, DEBUG3, DEBUG2, DEBUG1, INFO, NOTICE, WARNING, ERROR, LOG, FATAL, and PANIC. The default is ERROR, which means statements causing errors, log messages, fatal errors, or panics will be logged. To effectively turn off logging of failing statements, set this parameter to PANIC. Only superusers and users with the appropriate SET privilege can change this setting.

log_min_duration_statement (integer) #

Causes the duration of each completed statement to be logged if the statement ran for at least the specified amount of time. For example, if you set it to 250ms then all SQL statements that run 250ms or longer will be logged. Enabling this parameter can be helpful in tracking down unoptimized queries in your applications. If this value is specified without units, it is taken as milliseconds. Setting this to zero prints all statement durations. -1 (the default) disables logging statement durations. Only superusers and users with the appropriate SET privilege can change this setting.

This overrides log_min_duration_sample, meaning that queries with duration exceeding this setting are not subject to sampling and are always logged.

For clients using extended query protocol, durations of the Parse, Bind, and Execute steps are logged independently.

Note

When using this option together with log_statement, the text of statements that are logged because of log_statement will not be repeated in the duration log message. If you are not using syslog, it is recommended that you log the PID or session ID using log_line_prefix so that you can link the statement message to the later duration message using the process ID or session ID.

log_min_duration_sample (integer) #

Allows sampling the duration of completed statements that ran for at least the specified amount of time. This produces the same kind of log entries as log_min_duration_statement, but only for a subset of the executed statements, with sample rate controlled by log_statement_sample_rate. For example, if you set it to 100ms then all SQL statements that run 100ms or longer will be considered for sampling. Enabling this parameter can be helpful when the traffic is too high to log all queries. If this value is specified without units, it is taken as milliseconds. Setting this to zero samples all statement durations. -1 (the default) disables sampling statement durations. Only superusers and users with the appropriate SET privilege can change this setting.

This setting has lower priority than log_min_duration_statement, meaning that statements with durations exceeding log_min_duration_statement are not subject to sampling and are always logged.

Other notes for log_min_duration_statement apply also to this setting.

log_statement_sample_rate (floating point) #

Determines the fraction of statements with duration exceeding log_min_duration_sample that will be logged. Sampling is stochastic, for example 0.5 means there is statistically one chance in two that any given statement will be logged. The default is 1.0, meaning to log all sampled statements. Setting this to zero disables sampled statement-duration logging, the same as setting log_min_duration_sample to -1. Only superusers and users with the appropriate SET privilege can change this setting.

log_transaction_sample_rate (floating point) #

Sets the fraction of transactions whose statements are all logged, in addition to statements logged for other reasons. It applies to each new transaction regardless of its statements' durations. Sampling is stochastic, for example 0.1 means there is statistically one chance in ten that any given transaction will be logged. log_transaction_sample_rate can be helpful to construct a sample of transactions. The default is 0, meaning not to log statements from any additional transactions. Setting this to 1 logs all statements of all transactions. Only superusers and users with the appropriate SET privilege can change this setting.

Note

Like all statement-logging options, this option can add significant overhead.

log_startup_progress_interval (integer) #

Sets the amount of time after which the startup process will log a message about a long-running operation that is still in progress, as well as the interval between further progress messages for that operation. The default is 10 seconds. A setting of 0 disables the feature. If this value is specified without units, it is taken as milliseconds. This setting is applied separately to each operation. This parameter can only be set in the postgresql.conf file or on the server command line.

For example, if syncing the data directory takes 25 seconds and thereafter resetting unlogged relations takes 8 seconds, and if this setting has the default value of 10 seconds, then a messages will be logged for syncing the data directory after it has been in progress for 10 seconds and again after it has been in progress for 20 seconds, but nothing will be logged for resetting unlogged relations.

Table 19.2 explains the message severity levels used by PostgreSQL. If logging output is sent to syslog or Windows' eventlog, the severity levels are translated as shown in the table.

Table 19.2. Message Severity Levels

SeverityUsagesyslogeventlog
DEBUG1 .. DEBUG5Provides successively-more-detailed information for use by developers.DEBUGINFORMATION
INFOProvides information implicitly requested by the user, e.g., output from VACUUM VERBOSE.INFOINFORMATION
NOTICEProvides information that might be helpful to users, e.g., notice of truncation of long identifiers.NOTICEINFORMATION
WARNINGProvides warnings of likely problems, e.g., COMMIT outside a transaction block.NOTICEWARNING
ERRORReports an error that caused the current command to abort.WARNINGERROR
LOGReports information of interest to administrators, e.g., checkpoint activity.INFOINFORMATION
FATALReports an error that caused the current session to abort.ERRERROR
PANICReports an error that caused all database sessions to abort.CRITERROR

19.8.3. What to Log #

Note

What you choose to log can have security implications; see Section 24.3.

application_name (string) #

The application_name can be any string of less than NAMEDATALEN characters (64 characters in a standard build). It is typically set by an application upon connection to the server. The name will be displayed in the pg_stat_activity view and included in CSV log entries. It can also be included in regular log entries via the log_line_prefix parameter. Only printable ASCII characters may be used in the application_name value. Other characters are replaced with C-style hexadecimal escapes.

debug_print_parse (boolean)
debug_print_rewritten (boolean)
debug_print_plan (boolean) #

These parameters enable various debugging output to be emitted. When set, they print the resulting parse tree, the query rewriter output, or the execution plan for each executed query. These messages are emitted at LOG message level, so by default they will appear in the server log but will not be sent to the client. You can change that by adjusting client_min_messages and/or log_min_messages. These parameters are off by default.

debug_pretty_print (boolean) #

When set, debug_pretty_print indents the messages produced by debug_print_parse, debug_print_rewritten, or debug_print_plan. This results in more readable but much longer output than the compact format used when it is off. It is on by default.

log_autovacuum_min_duration (integer) #

Causes each action executed by autovacuum to be logged if it ran for at least the specified amount of time. Setting this to zero logs all autovacuum actions. -1 disables logging autovacuum actions. If this value is specified without units, it is taken as milliseconds. For example, if you set this to 250ms then all automatic vacuums and analyzes that run 250ms or longer will be logged. In addition, when this parameter is set to any value other than -1, a message will be logged if an autovacuum action is skipped due to a conflicting lock or a concurrently dropped relation. The default is 10min. Enabling this parameter can be helpful in tracking autovacuum activity. This parameter can only be set in the postgresql.conf file or on the server command line; but the setting can be overridden for individual tables by changing table storage parameters.

log_checkpoints (boolean) #

Causes checkpoints and restartpoints to be logged in the server log. Some statistics are included in the log messages, including the number of buffers written and the time spent writing them. This parameter can only be set in the postgresql.conf file or on the server command line. The default is on.

log_connections (boolean) #

Causes each attempted connection to the server to be logged, as well as successful completion of both client authentication (if necessary) and authorization. Only superusers and users with the appropriate SET privilege can change this parameter at session start, and it cannot be changed at all within a session. The default is off.

Note

Some client programs, like psql, attempt to connect twice while determining if a password is required, so duplicate connection received messages do not necessarily indicate a problem.

log_disconnections (boolean) #

Causes session terminations to be logged. The log output provides information similar to log_connections, plus the duration of the session. Only superusers and users with the appropriate SET privilege can change this parameter at session start, and it cannot be changed at all within a session. The default is off.

log_duration (boolean) #

Causes the duration of every completed statement to be logged. The default is off. Only superusers and users with the appropriate SET privilege can change this setting.

For clients using extended query protocol, durations of the Parse, Bind, and Execute steps are logged independently.

Note

The difference between enabling log_duration and setting log_min_duration_statement to zero is that exceeding log_min_duration_statement forces the text of the query to be logged, but this option doesn't. Thus, if log_duration is on and log_min_duration_statement has a positive value, all durations are logged but the query text is included only for statements exceeding the threshold. This behavior can be useful for gathering statistics in high-load installations.

log_error_verbosity (enum) #

Controls the amount of detail written in the server log for each message that is logged. Valid values are TERSE, DEFAULT, and VERBOSE, each adding more fields to displayed messages. TERSE excludes the logging of DETAIL, HINT, QUERY, and CONTEXT error information. VERBOSE output includes the SQLSTATE error code (see also Appendix A) and the source code file name, function name, and line number that generated the error. Only superusers and users with the appropriate SET privilege can change this setting.

log_hostname (boolean) #

By default, connection log messages only show the IP address of the connecting host. Turning this parameter on causes logging of the host name as well. Note that depending on your host name resolution setup this might impose a non-negligible performance penalty. This parameter can only be set in the postgresql.conf file or on the server command line.

log_line_prefix (string) #

This is a printf-style string that is output at the beginning of each log line. % characters begin escape sequences that are replaced with status information as outlined below. Unrecognized escapes are ignored. Other characters are copied straight to the log line. Some escapes are only recognized by session processes, and will be treated as empty by background processes such as the main server process. Status information may be aligned either left or right by specifying a numeric literal after the % and before the option. A negative value will cause the status information to be padded on the right with spaces to give it a minimum width, whereas a positive value will pad on the left. Padding can be useful to aid human readability in log files.

This parameter can only be set in the postgresql.conf file or on the server command line. The default is '%m [%p] ' which logs a time stamp and the process ID.

EscapeEffectSession only
%aApplication nameyes
%uUser nameyes
%dDatabase nameyes
%rRemote host name or IP address, and remote portyes
%hRemote host name or IP addressyes
%bBackend typeno
%pProcess IDno
%PProcess ID of the parallel group leader, if this process is a parallel query workerno
%tTime stamp without millisecondsno
%mTime stamp with millisecondsno
%nTime stamp with milliseconds (as a Unix epoch)no
%iCommand tag: type of session's current commandyes
%eSQLSTATE error codeno
%cSession ID: see belowno
%lNumber of the log line for each session or process, starting at 1no
%sProcess start time stampno
%vVirtual transaction ID (procNumber/localXID); see Section 68.1no
%xTransaction ID (0 if none is assigned); see Section 68.1no
%qProduces no output, but tells non-session processes to stop at this point in the string; ignored by session processesno
%QQuery identifier of the current query. Query identifiers are not computed by default, so this field will be zero unless compute_query_id parameter is enabled or a third-party module that computes query identifiers is configured.yes
%%Literal %no

The backend type corresponds to the column backend_type in the view pg_stat_activity, but additional types can appear in the log that don't show in that view.

The %c escape prints a quasi-unique session identifier, consisting of two 4-byte hexadecimal numbers (without leading zeros) separated by a dot. The numbers are the process start time and the process ID, so %c can also be used as a space saving way of printing those items. For example, to generate the session identifier from pg_stat_activity, use this query:

SELECT to_hex(trunc(EXTRACT(EPOCH FROM backend_start))::integer) || '.' ||
       to_hex(pid)
FROM pg_stat_activity;

Tip

If you set a nonempty value for log_line_prefix, you should usually make its last character be a space, to provide visual separation from the rest of the log line. A punctuation character can be used too.

Tip

Syslog produces its own time stamp and process ID information, so you probably do not want to include those escapes if you are logging to syslog.

Tip

The %q escape is useful when including information that is only available in session (backend) context like user or database name. For example:

log_line_prefix = '%m [%p] %q%u@%d/%a '

Note

The %Q escape always reports a zero identifier for lines output by log_statement because log_statement generates output before an identifier can be calculated, including invalid statements for which an identifier cannot be calculated.

log_lock_waits (boolean) #

Controls whether a log message is produced when a session waits longer than deadlock_timeout to acquire a lock. This is useful in determining if lock waits are causing poor performance. The default is off. Only superusers and users with the appropriate SET privilege can change this setting.

log_recovery_conflict_waits (boolean) #

Controls whether a log message is produced when the startup process waits longer than deadlock_timeout for recovery conflicts. This is useful in determining if recovery conflicts prevent the recovery from applying WAL.

The default is off. This parameter can only be set in the postgresql.conf file or on the server command line.

log_parameter_max_length (integer) #

If greater than zero, each bind parameter value logged with a non-error statement-logging message is trimmed to this many bytes. Zero disables logging of bind parameters for non-error statement logs. -1 (the default) allows bind parameters to be logged in full. If this value is specified without units, it is taken as bytes. Only superusers and users with the appropriate SET privilege can change this setting.

This setting only affects log messages printed as a result of log_statement, log_duration, and related settings. Non-zero values of this setting add some overhead, particularly if parameters are sent in binary form, since then conversion to text is required.

log_parameter_max_length_on_error (integer) #

If greater than zero, each bind parameter value reported in error messages is trimmed to this many bytes. Zero (the default) disables including bind parameters in error messages. -1 allows bind parameters to be printed in full. If this value is specified without units, it is taken as bytes.

Non-zero values of this setting add overhead, as PostgreSQL will need to store textual representations of parameter values in memory at the start of each statement, whether or not an error eventually occurs. The overhead is greater when bind parameters are sent in binary form than when they are sent as text, since the former case requires data conversion while the latter only requires copying the string.

log_statement (enum) #

Controls which SQL statements are logged. Valid values are none (off), ddl, mod, and all (all statements). ddl logs all data definition statements, such as CREATE, ALTER, and DROP statements. mod logs all ddl statements, plus data-modifying statements such as INSERT, UPDATE, DELETE, TRUNCATE, and COPY FROM. PREPARE, EXECUTE, and EXPLAIN ANALYZE statements are also logged if their contained command is of an appropriate type. For clients using extended query protocol, logging occurs when an Execute message is received, and values of the Bind parameters are included (with any embedded single-quote marks doubled).

The default is none. Only superusers and users with the appropriate SET privilege can change this setting.

Note

Statements that contain simple syntax errors are not logged even by the log_statement = all setting, because the log message is emitted only after basic parsing has been done to determine the statement type. In the case of extended query protocol, this setting likewise does not log statements that fail before the Execute phase (i.e., during parse analysis or planning). Set log_min_error_statement to ERROR (or lower) to log such statements.

Logged statements might reveal sensitive data and even contain plaintext passwords.

log_replication_commands (boolean) #

Causes each replication command and walsender process's replication slot acquisition/release to be logged in the server log. See Section 55.4 for more information about replication command. The default value is off. Only superusers and users with the appropriate SET privilege can change this setting.

log_temp_files (integer) #

Controls logging of temporary file names and sizes. Temporary files can be created for sorts, hashes, and temporary query results. If enabled by this setting, a log entry is emitted for each temporary file, with the file size specified in bytes, when it is deleted. A value of zero logs all temporary file information, while positive values log only files whose size is greater than or equal to the specified amount of data. If this value is specified without units, it is taken as kilobytes. The default setting is -1, which disables such logging. Only superusers and users with the appropriate SET privilege can change this setting.

log_timezone (string) #

Sets the time zone used for timestamps written in the server log. Unlike TimeZone, this value is cluster-wide, so that all sessions will report timestamps consistently. The built-in default is GMT, but that is typically overridden in postgresql.conf; initdb will install a setting there corresponding to its system environment. See Section 8.5.3 for more information. This parameter can only be set in the postgresql.conf file or on the server command line.

19.8.4. Using CSV-Format Log Output #

Including csvlog in the log_destination list provides a convenient way to import log files into a database table. This option emits log lines in comma-separated-values (CSV) format, with these columns: time stamp with milliseconds, user name, database name, process ID, client host:port number, session ID, per-session line number, command tag, session start time, virtual transaction ID, regular transaction ID, error severity, SQLSTATE code, error message, error message detail, hint, internal query that led to the error (if any), character count of the error position therein, error context, user query that led to the error (if any and enabled by log_min_error_statement), character count of the error position therein, location of the error in the PostgreSQL source code (if log_error_verbosity is set to verbose), application name, backend type, process ID of parallel group leader, and query id. Here is a sample table definition for storing CSV-format log output:

CREATE TABLE postgres_log
(
  log_time timestamp(3) with time zone,
  user_name text,
  database_name text,
  process_id integer,
  connection_from text,
  session_id text,
  session_line_num bigint,
  command_tag text,
  session_start_time timestamp with time zone,
  virtual_transaction_id text,
  transaction_id bigint,
  error_severity text,
  sql_state_code text,
  message text,
  detail text,
  hint text,
  internal_query text,
  internal_query_pos integer,
  context text,
  query text,
  query_pos integer,
  location text,
  application_name text,
  backend_type text,
  leader_pid integer,
  query_id bigint,
  PRIMARY KEY (session_id, session_line_num)
);

To import a log file into this table, use the COPY FROM command:

COPY postgres_log FROM '/full/path/to/logfile.csv' WITH csv;

It is also possible to access the file as a foreign table, using the supplied file_fdw module.

There are a few things you need to do to simplify importing CSV log files:

  1. Set log_filename and log_rotation_age to provide a consistent, predictable naming scheme for your log files. This lets you predict what the file name will be and know when an individual log file is complete and therefore ready to be imported.

  2. Set log_rotation_size to 0 to disable size-based log rotation, as it makes the log file name difficult to predict.

  3. Set log_truncate_on_rotation to on so that old log data isn't mixed with the new in the same file.

  4. The table definition above includes a primary key specification. This is useful to protect against accidentally importing the same information twice. The COPY command commits all of the data it imports at one time, so any error will cause the entire import to fail. If you import a partial log file and later import the file again when it is complete, the primary key violation will cause the import to fail. Wait until the log is complete and closed before importing. This procedure will also protect against accidentally importing a partial line that hasn't been completely written, which would also cause COPY to fail.

19.8.5. Using JSON-Format Log Output #

Including jsonlog in the log_destination list provides a convenient way to import log files into many different programs. This option emits log lines in JSON format.

String fields with null values are excluded from output. Additional fields may be added in the future. User applications that process jsonlog output should ignore unknown fields.

Each log line is serialized as a JSON object with the set of keys and their associated values shown in Table 19.3.

Table 19.3. Keys and Values of JSON Log Entries

Key nameTypeDescription
timestampstringTime stamp with milliseconds
userstringUser name
dbnamestringDatabase name
pidnumberProcess ID
remote_hoststringClient host
remote_portnumberClient port
session_idstringSession ID
line_numnumberPer-session line number
psstringCurrent ps display
session_startstringSession start time
vxidstringVirtual transaction ID
txidstringRegular transaction ID
error_severitystringError severity
state_codestringSQLSTATE code
messagestringError message
detailstringError message detail
hintstringError message hint
internal_querystringInternal query that led to the error
internal_positionnumberCursor index into internal query
contextstringError context
statementstringClient-supplied query string
cursor_positionnumberCursor index into query string
func_namestringError location function name
file_namestringFile name of error location
file_line_numnumberFile line number of the error location
application_namestringClient application name
backend_typestringType of backend
leader_pidnumberProcess ID of leader for active parallel workers
query_idnumberQuery ID

19.8.6. Separate Log File for Extension #

An extension can write its messages into a separate file. In order to do so, it needs to call the get_log_stream function from the _PG_init function of the extension library. The function signature is as follows:

extern int get_log_stream(char *id, LogStream **stream_p);

Here id points to a string that uniquely identifies the extension and stream_p is an output argument that receives a pointer to the LogStream structure (see below). The extension can use this structure to control various properties of the stream, including log file path. The function returns a stream identifier that the extension should use in its calls of the ereport function.

The structure definition looks like:

        typedef struct LogStream
        {
                /*
                 * The following variables can take their value from the related GUCs.
                 */
                int                     verbosity;
                int                     destination;
                char       *directory;
                char       *filename;
                int                     file_mode;
                int                     rotation_age;
                int                     rotation_size;
                bool            truncate_on_rotation;
                char       *line_prefix;

                /* More fields for internal use only ... */
        } LogStream;

The extension can assign specific values to these fields. For example, if log_stream variable is defined like this

        static LogStream *log_stream;

and if the stream was initialized this way

        log_stream_id = get_log_stream("pgaudit", &log_stream);

then the extension can adjust log filename by calling the appropriate DefineCustom...Variable function from the _PG_init function of the extension library:

        DefineCustomStringVariable(
                "pgaudit.log_filename",

                "Sets the file name pattern for log files.",
                NULL,

                &log_stream->filename,
                "pgaudit-%Y-%m-%d_%H%M%S.log",
                PGC_SIGHUP,
                GUC_NOT_IN_SAMPLE,
                NULL, NULL, NULL);

In this case, to make sure that particular error message gets written to the file specified by the pgaudit.log_filename variable, the extension needs to specify its stream using the errstream expression:

        ereport(auditLogClient ? auditLogLevel : LOG_SERVER_ONLY,
                (errmsg("%s," INT64_FORMAT "," INT64_FORMAT ",%s,%s",
                        stackItem->auditEvent.granted ?
                        AUDIT_TYPE_OBJECT : AUDIT_TYPE_SESSION,
                        stackItem->auditEvent.statementId,
                        stackItem->auditEvent.substatementId,
                        className,
                        auditStr.data),
                        errhidestmt(true),
                        errhidecontext(true),
                        errstream(log_stream_id)));

Pleas see the Cybertec fork of the pgaudit extension for details how to use the log streams.

19.8.7. Process Title #

These settings control how process titles of server processes are modified. Process titles are typically viewed using programs like ps or, on Windows, Process Explorer. See Section 27.1 for details.

cluster_name (string) #

Sets a name that identifies this database cluster (instance) for various purposes. The cluster name appears in the process title for all server processes in this cluster. Moreover, it is the default application name for a standby connection (see synchronous_standby_names.)

The name can be any string of less than NAMEDATALEN characters (64 characters in a standard build). Only printable ASCII characters may be used in the cluster_name value. Other characters are replaced with C-style hexadecimal escapes. No name is shown if this parameter is set to the empty string '' (which is the default). This parameter can only be set at server start.

update_process_title (boolean) #

Enables updating of the process title every time a new SQL command is received by the server. This setting defaults to on on most platforms, but it defaults to off on Windows due to that platform's larger overhead for updating the process title. Only superusers and users with the appropriate SET privilege can change this setting.