Logging Best Practices

logging-best-practices.md

Logging Best Practices

This assumes you have a fast memory logging system.

Use 4 logging levels

• error - Log critical system errors only (not user errors)
• warn - Log things that are potential errors or can become errors
• info(default) - Logs info about events in the system
• debug - Log more detailed info about debugging

Application Logging

Request Logging

• Log every request from any API(REST/Kafka/Queues/etc) at info level
  • eg request to create a person in your system
• Log all useful unique identifier(Database IDs/kafka offsets)
• Don't log any sensitive data unless approved
• Consider http logging and don't add redundant logging
  • If http logging captures everything to debug any issue don't add anything

Event Logging

• Log the outcome of every request at info level
  • eg if a resource was created/merged/scheduled/completed/not completed
  • Identifiers should already be logged when the request came in, but add them if needed
• Log every cron job that gets triggered
  • Log all useful identifiers and the task being done
  • Log the outcome of the cron job
    • eg records processed

Detailed/Debug logging

• Optional detailed/debug logging should be at debug level
  • eg request/response payloads/every step of a workflow

Related

Error Handling Best Practices