Plan-specific log files

You can access an individual log file specific to each Automation Plan that you run. This provides you with a useful tool to easily analyze or debug any issues that occurred during plan execution.

When the Server Automation system starts, it creates a custom site called Server Automation Plan Log Files (if this site was not created previously). Plan-specific log files are available from this site. As the number of plan-specific log files in the site expands over time, it is good practice to remove unwanted log files.

How it works

When you submit a plan for execution and the plan begins to run, a log file is generated in the <BES Server>/Applications/Logs directory. The plan name is <Plan_Action_ID>.log.txt. On plan completion, this file is automatically uploaded to the Server Automation Plan Log Files custom site. For information about using and viewing site files, see Viewing site files.

Key points

  • This feature is enabled by default and you do not need to perform any configuration to enable it.
  • You can preview log files that are 200 KB or smaller.
  • To view log files larger than 200 KB, you must use the REST API. If a log file is larger than 200 KB, you see a The log file is too large to be previewed message in the Preview.
Complete the following steps to download log files larger than 200 KB through the REST API:
  1. Enter the following URL in a browser:
    https://<server-host>:<server-port>/api/site/custom/Server%20Automation%20Plan%20Log%20Files/files
    This returns something similar to the following, in this example there is one plan log in the site:
    <BESAPI xsi:noNamespaceSchemaLocation="BESAPI.xsd">   
      <SiteFile Resource="http://<server-host>:<server-port>/api/site/custom/Server%20Automation%20Plan%20Log%20Files/file/1215">
        <Name>1189.log.txt</Name>
        <ID>1215</ID>
        <LastModified>Mon, 23 Feb 2015 12:03:04 +0000</LastModified>    
        <FileSize>322113</FileSize>
        <IsClientFile>0</IsClientFile>
     </SiteFile>
    </BESAPI>
  2. When prompted, enter your IBM® BigFix operator credentials.
  3. Use the URL in the Resource attribute returned in the output to download the plan-specific log file, as follows:
    http://<server-host>:<server-port>/api/site/custom/Server%20Automation%20Plan%20Log%20Files/file/1215