Logging Options Overview

The Nextcloud Exchange Connector utilizes a robust, asynchronous logging framework based on Serilog. This system allows administrators to direct diagnostic data to multiple destinations simultaneously, making it highly adaptable to both Docker and Binary deployment architectures.

Rather than writing logs to a single location, the connector supports four distinct output methods. You can enable these individually or combine them based on your infrastructure needs.

Console Output

• How it works: Logs are printed directly to the console.

• Best used for: Initial setup verification and real-time monitoring.

Refer to Console Logging Configuration article for the console logging setup guide.

Database Output

• How it works: Logs are written directly into an automatically generated Logs table within your primary synchronization database.

• Best used for: Single-instance setups where administrators prefer to query and filter logs using their existing database management tools (like pgAdmin or DBeaver).

Refer to Database Logging Configuration article for the database logging setup guide.

File System Output

• How it works: Logs are saved as standard .txt files in a dedicated directory on the host machine. The application handles automatic file rotation, creating new files when a size limit is reached and deleting old files to conserve disk space.

• Best used for: Long-term archival and environments with strict data retention policies.

• Deployment fit: This is the highly recommended approach for Binary installations. The application will automatically generate the configured log folder directly inside each worker's root directory, keeping logs perfectly isolated per instance.

Refer to File System Logging Configuration article for the file system logging setup guide.

Grafana & Loki Output

• How it works: Logs are pushed to Loki and visualized through a dedicated Grafana dashboard web interface.

• Best used for: Advanced, real-time observability in large Docker environments. Grafana provides powerful filtering tools to isolate logs by instance, severity, or specific error codes.

• Deployment fit: Pre-configured for Docker deployments via the docker-compose.grafana.yml component.

Refer to Grafana Logging Configuration article for the Grafana logging setup guide.

Bitwise Configuration

The connector uses a bitwise mathematical configuration to allow multiple logging outputs simultaneously. You activate your desired methods by summing their assigned values and setting the total in the Service__LoggingConfiguration__LogsOutput parameter of your .env file.

Logging Output	Bitwise Value
None	0
Console	1
Database	2
File System	4
Grafana / Loki	8

Example: To log to both the Console (1) and the File System (4), you would set your output value to 5.

Global Log Levels

Regardless of which output destination you choose, you have strict control over how verbose the logs are. The available levels are Information, Debug, Warning, and Error.