How to create a custom log level using log4Perl

This blog explains how to create a auditlog with a custom log level 'AUDIT'.

 log4perl.rootLogger=TRACE, auditlog  

 log4perl.filter.AUDITFILTER  = Log::Log4perl::Filter::LevelMatch  
 log4perl.filter.AUDITFILTER .LevelToMatch = AUDIT
 log4perl.filter.AUDITFILTER.AcceptOnMatch = true  

 log4perl.appender.auditlog=Log::Log4perl::Appender::File  
 log4perl.appender.auditlog.filename=c:/perl/log-dir/audit.log  
 log4perl.appender.auditlog.mode=append  
 log4perl.appender.auditlog.Filter = AUDITFILTER  
 log4perl.appender.auditlog.layout=Log::Log4perl::Layout::PatternLayout  
 log4perl.appender.auditlog.layout.ConversionPattern=%d{ISO8601}|%C|%m%n  

We have created a custom filter AUDITFILTER  which matches the level AUDIT in the appender.

Now we need to create a custom level which need to be done in code as below.

 use Log::Log4perl;  
  Log::Log4perl::Logger::create_custom_level("AUDIT", "DEBUG");  
   
  Log::Log4perl::init("log4perl.conf");  
  method();  
  sub method {  
  my $logger = Log::Log4perl->get_logger("");  
  $logger->log($AUDIT, "Received an audit message");  
 }  

We have created a custom level 'AUDIT' which is below the level DEBUG. With custom level we need to call another method log() with 2 parameters as below.

$logger->log($AUDIT, "Received an audit message");