POSTLOG(1) General Commands Manual POSTLOG(1)

postlog - Postfix-compatible logging utility


postlog [-iv] [-c config_dir] [-p priority] [-t tag] [text...]

The postlog(1) command implements a Postfix-compatible logging interface for use in, for example, shell scripts.

By default, postlog(1) logs the text given on the command line as one record. If no text is specified on the command line, postlog(1) reads from standard input and logs each input line as one record.

Logging is sent to syslogd(8); when the standard error stream is connected to a terminal, logging is sent there as well.

The following options are implemented:

Read the main.cf configuration file in the named directory instead of the default configuration directory.
Include the process ID in the logging tag.
Specifies the logging severity: info, warn, error, fatal, or panic. With Postfix 3.1 and later, the program will pause for 1 second after reporting a fatal or panic condition, just like other Postfix programs.
Specifies the logging tag, that is, the identifying name that appears at the beginning of each logging record. A default tag is used when none is specified.
Enable verbose logging for debugging purposes. Multiple -v options make the software increasingly verbose.


Directory with the main.cf file.


The following main.cf parameters are especially relevant to this program.

The text below provides only a parameter summary. See postconf(5) for more details including examples.

The default location of the Postfix main.cf and master.cf configuration files.
The list of environment parameters that a privileged Postfix process will import from a non-Postfix parent process, or name=value environment overrides.
The syslog facility of Postfix logging.
A prefix that is prepended to the process name in syslog records, so that, for example, "smtpd" becomes "prefix/smtpd".

postconf(5), configuration parameters
syslogd(8), syslog daemon


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Wietse Venema
IBM T.J. Watson Research
P.O. Box 704
Yorktown Heights, NY 10598, USA
Wietse Venema
Google, Inc.
111 8th Avenue
New York, NY 10011, USA