How to enable DEBUG logging for RoboServers

Issue

How to enable DEBUG logging for RoboServers? 

Kapow RoboServers create logs that are located in the Logs folder under the Application Data Folder.

• In Windows, Application Data Folder is C:\Users\{UserRunningRoboServer}\AppData\Local\Kofax RPA\{version}
• In Linux, it's under ~/.Kofax RPA/{version}

Solution

By default, the logs will not contain debug information, but this can be enabled following these steps:

1. Configure RoboServers to log events in Log4j:

• Open the cluster settings (MC --> Admin --> Clusters)
• Go to the "Logging" section
• Select "Log to log4j", then click OK to save the changes

Note: You don't need to restart RoboServer for the new settings to be saved, but any changes done in Cluster Settings can be applied when no robots are running. After clicking OK, you can select to apply the settings immediately (and stop any robots currently running) or wait until the robots /schedules finish execution.

 

2. Configure log4j to log debug events.

This will require you to restart  RoboServer (the changes can be made at any time, but they will only be applied after the next RoboServer restart):

• On the machine where RoboServer is running, go to Kapow (or Kofax RPA) Application Data folder
• Go to the Configuration folder
• Open log4j.properties with a text editor (Or log4j2.properties for versions higher or equal to 11.1)
• There are 4 logs that can be configured to log debug information, by replacing "INFO" with "DEBUG"
  log4j.logger.kapow.servermessagelog=INFO
  log4j.logger.kapow.robotrunlog=INFO
  log4j.logger.webkit=INFO
  log4j.logger.kapow.robotmessagelog=INFO

 

Examples:

• Enable DEBUG only on servermessagelog when you are investigating a problem related to RoboServers only, that is not related to specific robots.
• Enable DEBUG on robotrunlog when you're investigating a problem related to starting/stopping/executing robots.
• Enable DEBUG on robotmessagelog when you're investigating issues with robot steps (in this case, enabling profiling - see above - would help too)

 

• Optional: increase the number of files that are kept before being overwritten, by changing the value on this property:
  log4j.appender.file.maxBackupIndex=3
  E.g. Setting DEBUG on robotmessagelog will add a lot of entries in the logs (and even more if profiling is enabled) so more log files are needed.
• Save the file.
• Restart RoboServer (can be postponed, but the logs will only contain DEBUG information after the restart).

 

Level of Complexity 

Easy

 

Applies to  

Product	Version	Build	Environment	Hardware
Kapow/Kofax RPA	ALL

References