Syslog file paths in 'metalog'? (#423299)

[Christoph Haas <haas@debian.org>]

Fellow Debianistas...

At work we are using syslog-ng a lot and it's very useful for a central
logging server. However I don't like the syntax because it's verbose and
typo-prone. So I was looking at metalog and seeing it orphaned I decided
to adopt it (#423299). I've started bringing the package into good shape
again. There is just an issue with the paths and files where metalog
writes syslog informaton to. The difference to the sysklogd...

sysklogd:
/var/log/mail.log
/var/log/mail.log.0
/var/log/mail.log.1.gz
/var/log/mail.log.2.gz

metalog:
/var/log/mail/log-<year>-<month>-<day>-<hour>:<minutes>:<seconds>

Obviously both logging daemons have different ideas of where the log
files are located and how they are named. sysklogd uses logrotate to
rotate the files. metalog has rotation built in (although I'm sure I can
switch it off and let logrotate do the job). I have tried to reach the
upstream already on whether the sysklogd filename scheme could be used
but didn't get a reply within two weeks.

I'd like to hear your opinions on whether alternative syslog daemons
would need to use the exact same paths and file names as the sysklogd
does. syslog-ng's default config mimics sysklogd's behavior. At least
switching from sysklogd to metalog wouldn't be possible without user
interaction and confusion.

Of course I can live with syslog-ng and probably most others can, too.
But then we should consider removing metalog from the archives because
it has been unmaintained for ages. :(

Cheers
 Christoph
-- 
JID: chrish@jabber.workaround.org