xref: /dragonfly/usr.sbin/syslogd/syslogd.8 (revision a563ca70)
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28.\"     @(#)syslogd.8	8.1 (Berkeley) 6/6/93
29.\" $FreeBSD: src/usr.sbin/syslogd/syslogd.8,v 1.64 2008/12/07 18:45:30 trhodes Exp $
30.\" $DragonFly: src/usr.sbin/syslogd/syslogd.8,v 1.5 2006/05/26 19:39:41 swildner Exp $
31.\"
32.Dd May 13, 2008
33.Dt SYSLOGD 8
34.Os
35.Sh NAME
36.Nm syslogd
37.Nd log systems messages
38.Sh SYNOPSIS
39.Nm
40.Op Fl 468ACcdknosuv
41.Op Fl a Ar allowed_peer
42.Op Fl b Ar bind_address
43.Op Fl f Ar config_file
44.Op Fl l Oo Ar mode : Oc Ns Ar path
45.Op Fl m Ar mark_interval
46.Op Fl P Ar pid_file
47.Op Fl p Ar log_socket
48.Sh DESCRIPTION
49The
50.Nm
51utility reads and logs messages to the system console, log files, other
52machines and/or users as specified by its configuration file.
53.Pp
54The options are as follows:
55.Bl -tag -width indent
56.It Fl 4
57Force
58.Nm
59to use IPv4 addresses only.
60.It Fl 6
61Force
62.Nm
63to use IPv6 addresses only.
64.It Fl 8
65Tells
66.Nm
67not to interfere with 8-bit data.  Normally
68.Nm
69will replace C1 control characters
70.Pq ISO 8859 and Unicode characters
71with their
72.Dq M- Ns Em x
73equivalent.
74Note, this option does not change the way
75.Nm
76alters control characters
77.Pq see Xr iscntrl 3 .
78They will always be replaced with their
79.Dq ^ Ns Em x
80equivalent.
81.It Fl A
82Ordinarily,
83.Nm
84tries to send the message to only one address
85even if the host has more than one A or AAAA record.
86If this option is specified,
87.Nm
88tries to send the message to all addresses.
89.It Fl a Ar allowed_peer
90Allow
91.Ar allowed_peer
92to log to this
93.Nm
94using UDP datagrams.
95Multiple
96.Fl a
97options may be specified.
98.Pp
99The
100.Ar allowed_peer
101option may be any of the following:
102.Bl -tag -width "ipaddr/masklen[:service]XX"
103.It Xo
104.Sm off
105.Ar ipaddr
106.No / Ar masklen
107.Op : Ar service
108.Sm on
109.Xc
110Accept datagrams from
111.Ar ipaddr
112(in the usual dotted quad notation) with
113.Ar masklen
114bits being taken into account when doing the address comparison.
115.Ar ipaddr
116can be also IPv6 address by enclosing the address with
117.Ql \&[
118and
119.Ql \&] .
120If specified,
121.Ar service
122is the name or number of an UDP service (see
123.Xr services 5 )
124the source packet must belong to.
125A
126.Ar service
127of
128.Ql \&*
129allows packets being sent from any UDP port.
130The default
131.Ar service
132is
133.Ql syslog .
134If
135.Ar ipaddr
136is IPv4 address, a missing
137.Ar masklen
138will be substituted by the historic class A or class B netmasks if
139.Ar ipaddr
140belongs into the address range of class A or B, respectively, or
141by 24 otherwise.
142If
143.Ar ipaddr
144is IPv6 address, a missing
145.Ar masklen
146will be substituted by 128.
147.It Xo
148.Sm off
149.Ar domainname Op : Ar service
150.Sm on
151.Xc
152Accept datagrams where the reverse address lookup yields
153.Ar domainname
154for the sender address.
155The meaning of
156.Ar service
157is as explained above.
158.It Xo
159.Sm off
160.No * Ar domainname Op : Ar service
161.Sm on
162.Xc
163Same as before, except that any source host whose name
164.Em ends
165in
166.Ar domainname
167will get permission.
168.El
169.Pp
170The
171.Fl a
172options are ignored if the
173.Fl s
174option is also specified.
175.It Fl b Ar bind_address
176Specify one specific IP address or hostname to bind to.
177If a hostname is specified,
178the IPv4 or IPv6 address which corresponds to it is used.
179.It Fl C
180Create log files that do not exist (permission is set to
181.Li 0600 ) .
182.It Fl c
183Disable the compression of repeated instances of the same line
184into a single line of the form
185.Dq Li "last message repeated N times"
186when the output is a pipe to another program.
187If specified twice, disable this compression in all cases.
188.It Fl d
189Put
190.Nm
191into debugging mode.
192This is probably only of use to developers working on
193.Nm .
194.It Fl f
195Specify the pathname of an alternate configuration file;
196the default is
197.Pa /etc/syslog.conf .
198.It Fl k
199Disable the translation of
200messages received with facility
201.Dq kern
202to facility
203.Dq user .
204Usually the
205.Dq kern
206facility is reserved for messages read directly from
207.Pa /dev/klog .
208.It Fl m
209Select the number of minutes between
210.Dq mark
211messages; the default is 20 minutes.
212.It Fl n
213Disable dns query for every request.
214.It Fl o
215Prefix kernel messages with the full kernel boot file as determined by
216.Xr getbootfile 3 .
217Without this, the kernel message prefix is always
218.Dq Li kernel: .
219.It Fl p
220Specify the pathname of an alternate log socket to be used instead;
221the default is
222.Pa /var/run/log .
223.It Fl P
224Specify an alternative file in which to store the process ID.
225The default is
226.Pa /var/run/syslog.pid .
227.It Fl S
228Specify the pathname of an alternate log socket for privileged
229applications to be used instead; the default is
230.Pa /var/run/logpriv .
231.It Fl l
232Specify a location where
233.Nm
234should place an additional log socket.
235The primary use for this is to place additional log sockets in
236.Pa /var/run/log
237of various chroot filespaces.
238File permissions for socket can be specified in octal representation
239before socket name, delimited with a colon.
240Path to socket location must be absolute.
241.It Fl s
242Operate in secure mode.
243Do not log messages from remote machines.
244If
245specified twice, no network socket will be opened at all, which also
246disables logging to remote machines.
247.It Fl T
248Always use the local time and date for messages received from the network,
249instead of the timestamp field supplied in the message by the remote host.
250This is useful if some of the originating hosts can't keep time properly
251or are unable to generate a correct timestamp.
252.It Fl u
253Unique priority logging.
254Only log messages at the specified priority.
255Without this option, messages at the stated priority or higher are logged.
256This option changes the default comparison from
257.Dq =>
258to
259.Dq = .
260.It Fl v
261Verbose logging.
262If specified once, the numeric facility and priority are
263logged with each locally-written message.
264If specified more than once,
265the names of the facility and priority are logged with each locally-written
266message.
267.El
268.Pp
269The
270.Nm
271utility reads its configuration file when it starts up and whenever it
272receives a hangup signal.
273For information on the format of the configuration file,
274see
275.Xr syslog.conf 5 .
276.Pp
277The
278.Nm
279utility reads messages from the
280.Ux
281domain sockets
282.Pa /var/run/log
283and
284.Pa /var/run/logpriv ,
285from an Internet domain socket specified in
286.Pa /etc/services ,
287and from the special device
288.Pa /dev/klog
289(to read kernel messages).
290.Pp
291The
292.Nm
293utility creates its process ID file,
294by default
295.Pa /var/run/syslog.pid ,
296and stores its process
297ID there.
298This can be used to kill or reconfigure
299.Nm .
300.Pp
301The message sent to
302.Nm
303should consist of a single line.
304The message can contain a priority code, which should be a preceding
305decimal number in angle braces, for example,
306.Sq Aq 5 .
307This priority code should map into the priorities defined in the
308include file
309.In sys/syslog.h .
310.Pp
311For security reasons,
312.Nm
313will not append to log files that do not exist (unless
314.Fl C
315option is specified);
316therefore, they must be created manually before running
317.Nm .
318.Pp
319The date and time are taken from the received message.
320If the format of the timestamp field is incorrect,
321time obtained from the local host is used instead.
322This can be overriden by the
323.Fl T
324flag.
325.Sh FILES
326.Bl -tag -width /var/run/syslog.pid -compact
327.It Pa /etc/syslog.conf
328configuration file
329.It Pa /var/run/syslog.pid
330default process ID file
331.It Pa /var/run/log
332name of the
333.Ux
334domain datagram log socket
335.It Pa /var/run/logpriv
336.Ux
337socket for privileged applications
338.It Pa /dev/klog
339kernel log device
340.El
341.Sh SEE ALSO
342.Xr logger 1 ,
343.Xr syslog 3 ,
344.Xr services 5 ,
345.Xr syslog.conf 5 ,
346.Xr newsyslog 8
347.Sh HISTORY
348The
349.Nm
350utility appeared in
351.Bx 4.3 .
352.Pp
353The
354.Fl a ,
355.Fl s ,
356.Fl u ,
357and
358.Fl v
359options are
360.Fx 2.2
361extensions.
362.Sh BUGS
363The ability to log messages received in UDP packets is equivalent to
364an unauthenticated remote disk-filling service, and should probably be
365disabled by default.
366Some sort of
367.No inter- Ns Nm syslogd
368authentication mechanism ought to be worked out.
369To prevent the worst
370abuse, use of the
371.Fl a
372option is therefore highly recommended.
373.Pp
374The
375.Fl a
376matching algorithm does not pretend to be very efficient; use of numeric
377IP addresses is faster than domain name comparison.
378Since the allowed
379peer list is being walked linearly, peer groups where frequent messages
380are being anticipated from should be put early into the
381.Fl a
382list.
383.Pp
384The log socket was moved from
385.Pa /dev
386to ease the use of a read-only root file system.
387This may confuse
388some old binaries so that a symbolic link might be used for a
389transitional period.
390