ShowLog

15 Aug 2002 19:03

 

Introduction

ShowLog is a glorified "tail" program with Perl5 regex search features.  ShowLog is superior to Notepad and "tail" because it was written specifically to handle log files that are truncated once they reach a certain size.

Download

Install the DevGuy FileTools

License

ShowLog is free open source and can be used for any purpose.  The SourceForge CVS module name is ShowLog.  You need 'perlapp' from the Perl Dev Kit to convert the PL files into EXEs.

ShowLog is provided as-is without any expressed warranty with the hope that it might be useful.  If ShowLog causes loss of data, life, or sanity, it's your own fault.

Usage

You must click the icon after modifying any settings in the dialog box.

  1. Run showlog.exe
  2. The ShowLog window appears:
  3. All of the edit boxes in the Filter group box are ignored
  4. Enter the file to view in the File edit box
  5. In the "Search Last" box, enter the number of bytes from the bottom of the file you want to view.  Use 0 to view the entire file.
  6. Click the button to view the log entries
  7. Click the to enlarge view
  8. To search for text, enter the text to search for in the upper right-hand corner and click the buttons.  This edit box supports Perl5 regular expressions.  $_ is the current line.
  9. Click the button to clear the window
  10. Click the to stop the window from automatically scrolling
  11. Some types of files are truncated once they reach a certain size.  The log viewer does its best to keep up with truncation, but it's not perfect.  Files are expected to be truncated to 1 meg by default.  Enter the truncation size in the "truncation (kb)" edit box.