Log4j JDK Logging Adapter

The JDK Logging Adapter is a custom implementation of java.util.logging.LogManager that uses Log4j. This adapter can be used with either the Log4j API or Log4j Core. When used with the API, there are a couple features of JUL that aren't supported. However, this does allow any other Log4j Provider besides the Core provider to be used with JUL.

Requirements

The JDK Logging Adapter is dependent on the Log4j API and optionally Log4j Core. For more information, see Runtime Dependencies.

Usage

To use the JDK Logging Adapter, you must set the system property java.util.logging.manager to org.apache.logging.log4j.jul.LogManager.

This must be done either through the command line (i.e., using the -Djava.util.logging.manager=org.apache.logging.log4j.jul.LogManager argument) or by using System.setProperty() before any calls are made to LogManager or Logger.

Compatibility

The use of a java.util.logging.Filter is supported on a per-Logger basis. However, it is recommended to use the standard Filters feature in Log4j instead.

The use of java.util.logging.Handler classes is NOT supported. Custom Handlers should instead use an appropriate Appender or code their own Appender plugin.

Java logging levels are translated into Log4j logging levels dynamically. The following table lists the conversions between a Java logging level and its equivalent Log4j level. Custom levels should be implemented as an implementation of LevelConverter, and the Log4j property log4j.jul.levelConverter must be set to your custom class name. Using the default LevelConverter implementation, custom logging levels are mapped to whatever the current level of the Logger being logged to is using.

Default Level Conversions

Java Level	Log4j Level
`OFF`	`OFF`
`SEVERE`	`ERROR`
`WARNING`	`WARN`
`INFO`	`INFO`
`CONFIG`	`CONFIG`
`FINE`	`DEBUG`
`FINER`	`TRACE`
`FINEST`	`FINEST`
`ALL`	`ALL`

Log4j JDK Logging Bridge Handler

The LogManager is not always useable because you have to set a JVM wide effective system property - e.g. in web servers this is not possible if you are not the administrator.

The Log4jBridgeHandler is an alternative that can be declaratively used via logging.properties.

It is less performant than the LogManager but still okay to use: the LogManager replaces the JDK implementation, so your logging code (using JDK syntax) effectively directly uses log4j. When using the BridgeHandler the original JDK implementation along with its configuration (e.g. log levels) is still fully working but the log events are “written” via this handler to log4j as if you would have called log4j.Logger.debug() etc.; it is like a FileHandler but instead of writing to a file, it “writes” to log4j Loggers - thus there is some overhead compared to using LogManager.

Usage

The JUL configuration file logging.properties needs the line

handlers = org.apache.logging.log4j.jul.Log4jBridgeHandler

and JUL logs go to log4j2. Additionally, you typically want to use to following:

org.apache.logging.log4j.jul.Log4jBridgeHandler.propagateLevels = true

In a webapp on Tomcat (and maybe other servers, too), you may simply create a WEB-INF/classes/logging.properties file with above content. The bridge and the log levels defined in this file are only valid for your webapp and do not have any impact on the other webapps on the same Tomcat instance.

Alternatively you may call Log4jBridgeHandler.install() inside your webapp's initialization code, e.g. inside ServletContextListener or a ServletFilter static-class-init. or contextInitialized().

Important: Log levels of JDK should match the ones of log4j. You may do this manually or use the automatic level propagation via Log4jBridgeHandler.propagateLevels = true.