Creating log files

Now that we’ve taken a deep look at the system views provided by PostgreSQL, it’s time to configure logging. Fortunately, PostgreSQL provides us with an easy way to work with log files and helps people set up a good configuration easily.

Collecting logs is important because it can point to errors and potential database problems. In this section, you’ll learn how to configure logging properly.

The postgresql.conf file contains all the parameters you need so that you’re provided with all the necessary information.

In this section, we’ll go through some of the most important entries in the postgresql.conf file that we can use to configure logging and see how logging can be used most beneficially.

Before we get started, I want to say a few words about logging in PostgreSQL in general. On Unix systems, PostgreSQL will send log information to stderr by default. However, stderr isn’t a good place for logs to go because...