Thread: Log line prefix on win32
On my german Windows XP Professional, %t in log_line_prefix produces 2004-09-18 14:23:26 Westeuropäische Sommerzeit This is rather long and ugly. It is already on the open item list: * shorten timezone for %t log_line_prefix Additionally I would suggest something like %z. Most of the time, time zone information is irrelevant for me in server logs. Best Regards, Michael Paesold
I am still trying to figure out a good way to fix this. On unix my log shows EDT but Win32 shows US/Eastern and some zones are much longer. Should we add %z and not print the timezone information for %t? That seems like the only reasonable solution. --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Michael Paesold wrote: > On my german Windows XP Professional, %t in log_line_prefix produces > 2004-09-18 14:23:26 Westeurop?ische Sommerzeit > > This is rather long and ugly. It is already on the open item list: > > * shorten timezone for %t log_line_prefix > > Additionally I would suggest something like %z. Most of the time, time zone > information is irrelevant for me in server logs. > > Best Regards, > Michael Paesold > > > ---------------------------(end of broadcast)--------------------------- > TIP 3: if posting/reading through Usenet, please send an appropriate > subscribe-nomail command to majordomo@postgresql.org so that your > message can get through to the mailing list cleanly > -- Bruce Momjian | http://candle.pha.pa.us pgman@candle.pha.pa.us | (610) 359-1001+ If your life is a hard drive, | 13 Roberts Road + Christ can be your backup. | Newtown Square, Pennsylvania19073
Bruce Momjian wrote: > I am still trying to figure out a good way to fix this. On unix my log > shows EDT but Win32 shows US/Eastern and some zones are much longer. "W. Europe Daylight Time" on my system. > > Should we add %z and not print the timezone information for %t? That > seems like the only reasonable solution. +1 vote from me. IMHO TZ information which is constant on the machine anyway can safely be omitted. Regards, Andreas
Andreas Pflug wrote: > Bruce Momjian wrote: > >> I am still trying to figure out a good way to fix this. On unix my log >> shows EDT but Win32 shows US/Eastern and some zones are much longer. > > "W. Europe Daylight Time" on my system. > >> >> Should we add %z and not print the timezone information for %t? That >> seems like the only reasonable solution. > > > +1 vote from me. IMHO TZ information which is constant on the machine > anyway can safely be omitted. > > Another possibility would be to have alternatives for %t and %s which used UTC rather than local time (and so of course didn't use a timezone). Or maybe we could do both. cheers andrew
Bruce Momjian <pgman@candle.pha.pa.us> writes:
> I am still trying to figure out a good way to fix this. On unix my log
> shows EDT but Win32 shows US/Eastern and some zones are much longer.
> Should we add %z and not print the timezone information for %t? That
> seems like the only reasonable solution.
%z is not standard --- you won't find it in the SUS spec for instance.
Or were you thinking of exposing this problem at the API level by making
people write a separate log_line_prefix item to get the timezone? I'm
not thrilled about institutionalizing such a fix for a platform-specific
issue that might go away later (if we switch to using our own timezone
code here, for instance).
I'd be inclined to #ifdef elog's strftime calls so that the zone is
omitted on Windows but not elsewhere. Kinda ugly but it's a localized
fix that we can easily improve later.
regards, tom lane
Tom Lane wrote: > Bruce Momjian <pgman@candle.pha.pa.us> writes: > > I am still trying to figure out a good way to fix this. On unix my log > > shows EDT but Win32 shows US/Eastern and some zones are much longer. > > Should we add %z and not print the timezone information for %t? That > > seems like the only reasonable solution. > > %z is not standard --- you won't find it in the SUS spec for instance. > Or were you thinking of exposing this problem at the API level by making > people write a separate log_line_prefix item to get the timezone? I'm I was thinking of adding %z as an option to log_line prefix, so to get the current output you would do '%t %z'. I was not suggesting changing the %Z passed to strftime if they ask for timezone. > not thrilled about institutionalizing such a fix for a platform-specific > issue that might go away later (if we switch to using our own timezone > code here, for instance). Right. > I'd be inclined to #ifdef elog's strftime calls so that the zone is > omitted on Windows but not elsewhere. Kinda ugly but it's a localized > fix that we can easily improve later. Yes, we could go that way too. The decision is a platform-specific change or omitting it for all outputs. -- Bruce Momjian | http://candle.pha.pa.us pgman@candle.pha.pa.us | (610) 359-1001+ If your life is a hard drive, | 13 Roberts Road + Christ can be your backup. | Newtown Square, Pennsylvania19073
Bruce Momjian <pgman@candle.pha.pa.us> writes:
> I was thinking of adding %z as an option to log_line prefix, so to get
> the current output you would do '%t %z'. I was not suggesting changing
> the %Z passed to strftime if they ask for timezone.
I think this is a bad idea, mainly because you couldn't easily get the
same output. It would be almost the same, except when you crossed a DST
boundary in between the two calls to strftime; in which case you'd get a
completely misleading result.
I believe that in the long run we will stop using the platform-specific
strftime at all, and go over to using just our own code, which makes
this not a permanent problem but just an artifact of the fact that we
haven't completely finished the process of absorbing src/timezone/.
So I'd rather not invent an API element simply because Windows' strftime
sucks.
regards, tom lane
Tom Lane wrote: > Bruce Momjian <pgman@candle.pha.pa.us> writes: > > I was thinking of adding %z as an option to log_line prefix, so to get > > the current output you would do '%t %z'. I was not suggesting changing > > the %Z passed to strftime if they ask for timezone. > > I think this is a bad idea, mainly because you couldn't easily get the > same output. It would be almost the same, except when you crossed a DST > boundary in between the two calls to strftime; in which case you'd get a > completely misleading result. > > I believe that in the long run we will stop using the platform-specific > strftime at all, and go over to using just our own code, which makes > this not a permanent problem but just an artifact of the fact that we > haven't completely finished the process of absorbing src/timezone/. > So I'd rather not invent an API element simply because Windows' strftime > sucks. Agreed, and the daylight savings time is a good reason to keep the timezone. However, I actually prefer the mail header style of timezone to EST/EDT anyway: Fri, 08 Oct 2004 12:37:52 -0400 Ours would change from: 2004-10-08 11:29:30 EDT LOG: database system was shut down at to2004-10-08 11:29:30 -0400 LOG: database system was shut down at Is that better? -- Bruce Momjian | http://candle.pha.pa.us pgman@candle.pha.pa.us | (610) 359-1001+ If your life is a hard drive, | 13 Roberts Road + Christ can be your backup. | Newtown Square, Pennsylvania19073
Tom Lane wrote: > Bruce Momjian <pgman@candle.pha.pa.us> writes: > >>I was thinking of adding %z as an option to log_line prefix, so to get >>the current output you would do '%t %z'. I was not suggesting changing >>the %Z passed to strftime if they ask for timezone. > > > I think this is a bad idea, mainly because you couldn't easily get the > same output. It would be almost the same, except when you crossed a DST > boundary in between the two calls to strftime; in which case you'd get a > completely misleading result. > > I believe that in the long run we will stop using the platform-specific > strftime at all, and go over to using just our own code, which makes > this not a permanent problem but just an artifact of the fact that we > haven't completely finished the process of absorbing src/timezone/. > So I'd rather not invent an API element simply because Windows' strftime > sucks. However tz is implemented, I'd like to see a log_line_prefix option which simply omits the TZ, which is noise for me. Regards, Andreas
Bruce Momjian <pgman@candle.pha.pa.us> writes:
> However, I actually prefer the mail header style of timezone to EST/EDT
> anyway:
Agreed, but AFAIK there's no portable way to ask strftime for that,
so you're still stuck with a compatibility problem. We could teach
pg_strftime to do it, but that's something for 8.1 or beyond.
regards, tom lane
Andreas Pflug wrote: > "W. Europe Daylight Time" on my system. With my german system it is "Westeuropäische Sommerzeit". which is longer then the actual timestamp: 2004-09-26 11:56:55 Westeuropäische Sommerzeit Any fix is appreciated! Best Regards, Michael Paesold