Why does WinSyslog not write to log files or ODBC?

Created 2001-01-11 by Andre Lorbach.
Updated 2001-10-11 by Rainer Gerhards.

This question most often is related to the client "Realtime Logging" feature. Please don't misunderstand that feature. It is meant to be used for a configuration check and interactive display of the log messages. It does, however, not provide any advanced capabilities like writing to flat files or ODBC data sources. This is done exclusively by the service.

In order to use the advanced features, be sure to start the WinSyslog service. In order to do so successfully, the Real-time logging must be turned off. The reason is that real-time logging starts up it's own syslog server process and there can only be one such server on a given machine at one time. So if the interactive server is running, the service is not able to start up successfully. If you would like to run realtime logging together with the service, a special configuration is necessary. Instructions are available in a separate FAQ entry.

Adiscon has identified the real-time logging feature to be a bit confusing to our customers. We are working on a method to make it easier to use. 

There is also an online seminar available on this topic. It covers the real-time logging and its use and possible problems in more depth. Please visit the Adiscon Seminars Online page to view it.

If the solution provided here does not solve your problem, please see our support area. It is also a good idea to have a look at the NT event log, as WinSyslog logs diagnosis data to it in case of any problem.