[jboss-dev] My logging ultimatum

[Adrian Brock]

You still miss the point. I'm not wrong. :-)

Forcing people to use the JDK api (broken)
because you don't like 3 jars (working)
isn't a solution to the problem.

The deadlocking problems can only get worse
in the delegating LogManager solution.
You now have competing synchronization
strategies, e.g. jdk and log4j

Conclusion: An unstable server is not a valid
trade-off to fix some aethestic considersation
about distributing a few small jars.

On Wed, 2007-12-12 at 08:04 -0600, David M. Lloyd wrote:
> On Wed, 12 Dec 2007 12:31:52 +0100
> Adrian Brock <abrock at redhat.com> wrote:
> 
> > Why do we keep having this thread over and over again
> > with ever new developer?
> 
> Because you're wrong? ;-)  J/K, but read on.
> 
> > 1) Use the jboss logger
> > 
> > JBoss has a very simple wrapper, as Jason and Scott explained.
> 
> Great.  Now my project requires the jboss wrapper.  But my project's
> two dependencies require slf4j and log4j, making three different JARs
> in total, just for logging. Problem solved!
> 
> > The logic is
> > if (system property set)
> >    use implementation of system property
> > else if (log4j in classpath)
> >    use log4j
> > else
> >    don't log
> > 
> > Advantages:
> > * You can choose log4j, jdk logging or implement a wrapper
> > to your own logging framework
> 
> This choice is purely illusion.  It seems like I have such a choice,
> but the reality is that I'm locked in to requiring a dependency -
> the jboss-common-logging jar.  How is this better than using slf4j?
> 
> On the other hand, if I use JUL then the problem is reduced - now the
> user need only include slf4j and log4j JARs.  I think I've convinced
> Clebert to switch to JUL for jboss-serialization (though I bet he'll
> want to see what the outcome of this discussion is first), so that would
> get rid of the log4j - then it's just down to slf4j in MINA, which I'm
> currently lobbying on their mailing list.  If I succeed in my efforts,
> the user will have *no* external logging JARs needed for MINA, JBoss
> Serialization, *or* Remoting.
> 
> > * You can choose not to log at all, e.g. in a client
> > where you don't control the logging configuration at all
> > * It is very small
> > 
> > $ du -h jboss-common-logging-spi-2.0.5-SNAPSHOT.jar 
> > 16K     jboss-common-logging-spi-2.0.5-SNAPSHOT.jar
> 
> This is good for things running within the container, but in the
> standalone case it's no different (to the user) than if I required
> commons-logging or slf4j myself.  Except that nobody else on the planet
> (well, outside of JBoss) would ever depend on jboss-common-logging.
> 
> The fact is, zero JARs is better than one, no matter how small it is.
> 
> > 2) There are many thirdparty components using different logging
> > frameworks. Even things like Hibernate and JGroups use clogging.
> > 
> > Unless we are going to fork them to fix the logging
> > we're always going to have to deal with many logging frameworks.
> > (Most of them are from Apache - let a thousand WEEDS bloom :-)
> 
> Gotta start somewhere.  If I can convince MINA, perhaps other Apache
> projects will also see reason. :-)
> 
> Just because few people hold this viewpoint today doesn't mean that
> more won't tomorrow.
> 
> > 3) JDK logging is broken/useless
> > 
> > There are many bugs in the JDK logging that lead to deadlocks,
> > memory leaks or just broken behaviour, we have workarounds
> > for some of them (as usual a spec written for JavaSE
> > doesn't anticipate the needs of JavaEE :-)
> > And as has been already said, there are no useful appenders.
> > Maybe with JDK7 we can fix/mitigate these problems?
> 
> Waiting for JDK7 to fix anything is... well, let's not do that.  I'm
> with Trustin on this - let's do a JBoss.org project for adding support
> to JDK logging to make it useful.  A LogManager to delegate to popular
> logging frameworks would be a great start - as would a collection of
> useful appenders.  This basically makes JDK logging into a built-in
> commons-logging of sorts - it becomes the user's choice what logging
> backend to use.
> 
> It would be my hope that the log4j/logback/etc of the world would
> integrate code to provide a LogManager of their own that would
> intercept JDK logging and handle it properly.  I think if we initiate
> this effort, they will follow.
> 
> In any case, by using JDK logging in these middle pieces, the user
> can just include JARs for the logging backend/API that they like.  This
> is the real crux of the whole issue.
> 
> > I'm sure this thread will appear again in 6 months when
> > the next new developer joins the project. 
> 
> When they run into the same problem and get frustrated by the lack of a
> good solution?  Sure.
> 
> > Logging always seems to be one of those flamebait topics,
> > I don't see why, it really isn't that interesting. :-)
> 
> If "interesting" were the only criteria...
> 
> - DML
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-- 
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Adrian Brock
Chief Scientist
JBoss, a division of Red Hat
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