Log File Parser Monitoring Agent

Detect application errors, failed transactions, and security threats before users report problems. Nodinite Log File Parser Monitoring Agent empowers operations teams to monitor unlimited text-based log files with pattern detection, ACK/NAK correlation, and instant alerts—without modifying applications or granting server access.

Why Teams Choose This Agent

Text-based log files are the primary troubleshooting source for applications, web servers, databases, and integration platforms, but manual log inspection creates operational bottlenecks and missed incidents:

• Manual Log Inspection Doesn't Scale – Operations teams spend hours daily checking dozens (or hundreds) of log files across servers—errors discovered only after business users complain
• Delayed Problem Detection – Application crashes, database connection failures, or integration errors sit in log files for hours before anyone notices—business impact accumulates silently
• Transaction Correlation Requires Manual Effort – Identifying incomplete workflows (e.g., "received order but no acknowledgment sent") means manually searching multiple log files and correlating timestamps
• No Access to Legacy Systems – Critical applications can't be modified to add structured logging or monitoring instrumentation—teams stuck with existing flat-file logs
• Server Access Sprawl – Granting RDP or SSH access to help desk means exposing server credentials, file system structure, and application configurations
• Alert Fatigue from False Positives – Basic log monitoring tools generate hundreds of alerts for expected patterns (e.g., "connection closed" messages)—teams ignore alerts or disable monitoring

The Nodinite Log File Parser Monitoring Agent solves this by providing automated pattern detection, intelligent correlation, and role-based self-service—with zero application changes and full audit trails:

✅ Monitor unlimited log files from one agent – Application logs, IIS logs, SQL Server logs, custom flat files—all monitored without per-file licensing
✅ Detect errors instantly with pattern matching – Alert on ERROR, EXCEPTION, FATAL patterns (with regex support)—prevents business-impacting failures from going unnoticed
✅ Track transaction flows with ACK/NAK correlation – Match start/end patterns across log files (e.g., "Order received" + "ACK sent")—identify incomplete workflows automatically
✅ Eliminate false positives with negative patterns – Exclude expected log entries (e.g., "normal shutdown")—reduce alert fatigue by 80% or more
✅ Grant read-only access without server login – Operations teams view log file alerts, download specific entries via web browser—no RDP, SSH, or file share credentials required
✅ Monitor legacy systems without code changes – Works with existing log files (any text format, custom timestamps)—retrofit monitoring on unchangeable applications
✅ Centralize log events across all servers – Single dashboard shows errors from Windows, Linux, Java, .NET, databases—eliminates switching between log viewers

How It Works

The Log File Parser Agent monitors text-based log files from any source—application logs, web server logs, database logs, custom formats—using configurable pattern matching and correlation rules.

Tip

The agent supports wildcards for file paths (e.g., C:\Logs\App_*.log) and custom timestamp formats—monitor rotating log files and multi-server environments without manual configuration updates.

What You Can Do

Detect Application Errors Instantly

• Alert on critical patterns (ERROR, EXCEPTION, FATAL, custom keywords)—notifies operations before business users experience failures
• Regex pattern matching for complex scenarios—match specific error codes, transaction IDs, or multi-line stack traces
• Negative patterns to reduce false positives—exclude expected log entries (e.g., "normal shutdown", "connection closed during idle")
• Monitor multiple files with wildcards—track all log files matching pattern (e.g., App_*.log, error_2024*.txt) without individual file configuration

Example: Application logs contain various patterns requiring monitoring. Agent monitors log files with wildcards (e.g., C:\Logs\App_*.log) to track rotating daily log files, alerts on ERROR, EXCEPTION, or FATAL patterns—operations investigates issues before business users experience failures.

Track Transaction Flows with ACK/NAK Correlation

• Start/End pattern correlation across single or multiple log files—identifies incomplete transactions (e.g., "order received" without "ACK sent")
• Timeout detection for long-running transactions—alerts when expected completion pattern doesn't appear within threshold (e.g., ACK expected within 30 seconds)
• Cross-file correlation—track workflows spanning multiple log files (e.g., partner sends message to incoming.log, acknowledgment written to outgoing.log)
• Business transaction visibility—monitor EDI workflows, batch processing, API integrations without changing application code

Example: Order processing system logs orders and responses to text file:

2019-04-10 13:37:00.000 ORDERS #123
2019-04-10 13:39:00.123 ORDERS #456
2019-04-10 14:12:34.456 ORDERRESPONSE #123

Agent correlates ORDERS with ORDERRESPONSE by ID number, alerts when order #456 received but no ORDERRESPONSE #456 within configured timeout (e.g., 30 minutes)—indicates downstream processing failure or stuck workflow.

Monitor Web Server Health

• IIS log monitoring (W3C format)—detect HTTP 500/503 errors, slow response times, failed authentication
• Apache/Nginx access logs—track 4xx/5xx status codes, request patterns, suspicious activity
• Custom log formats—configure timestamp and delimiter patterns for any web server log format
• Real-time detection—alerts within seconds of error appearing in log file (configurable polling interval)

Example: IIS web application serves customer portal. Agent monitors C:\inetpub\logs\LogFiles\W3SVC1\*.log (W3C Extended Log File Format) with regex pattern matching HTTP 4xx and 5xx status codes: \- \- (4[0-9][02-9]|5[0-9]{2}). Operations receives alert within 30 seconds when application pool crashes or authentication fails, fixes issue before customers report problems.

Monitor XML and Structured Log Content

• XML response monitoring—detect rejected orders, failed transactions, error status codes in XML log files
• JSON log parsing—track error states in JSON-formatted application logs
• Multi-line pattern matching—capture complete XML elements, JSON objects, or stack traces across multiple log lines
• Status code detection—alert on specific attribute values (e.g., statusCode="1337" for rejections)

Example: Order processing system writes XML responses to log files. Agent monitors for rejected orders using pattern statusCode="[0-9]+" in files:

<ns0:OrderResponse xmlns:ns0="Common.Schemas/Nodinite/1.0">
    <Order>
        <Id>101</Id>
        <Status>OK</Status>
    </Order>
    <Order>
        <Id>102</Id>
        <Status statusCode="1337">REJECTED</Status>
    </Order>
</ns0:OrderResponse>

Agent detects rejected order #102, alerts operations team who investigates validation failure before customer escalation.

Track Database Health from Log Files

• SQL Server ERRORLOG monitoring—detect login failures, deadlocks, backup failures, database corruption
• Oracle alert.log monitoring—track ORA-errors, tablespace issues, archive log problems
• PostgreSQL logs—monitor connection errors, query failures, replication lag
• Nodinite diagnostic logs—monitor Nodinite's own diagnostic.log.json files for ERROR and FATAL entries

Example: Nodinite diagnostic logs (JSON format with timestamp 2023-09-21T10:48:22.9112818+02:00) monitored for ERROR and FATAL severity levels. Agent uses regex (ERROR|FATAL) to detect critical issues in Nodinite components, alerts administrators who resolve configuration or connectivity problems before services fail.

Security and Compliance Monitoring

• Failed authentication detection—track repeated login failures, privilege escalation attempts, unauthorized access
• Audit trail collection—centralize security events from multiple servers for compliance reporting
• Suspicious pattern detection—custom regex patterns for security threats specific to your applications
• Compliance exports—generate audit reports from collected log events via Web API

Example: Application audit log shows pattern "Access denied: {User} attempted {Action}". Agent monitors for specific high-privilege actions, alerts security team when unauthorized access attempts detected—supports PCI-DSS and SOX compliance audits.

Self-Service Without Server Access

• Grant read-only log monitoring to application teams—view detected errors without server login credentials
• Delegate alert management to operations via Nodinite Roles—acknowledge alerts, download log excerpts without file share access
• Full audit trails for all remote actions—who viewed which log file alerts, when, from which IP address
• Role-based access per log file pattern—application team sees only their log files, not all server logs

Example: Application support team needs to monitor /var/log/myapp/*.log but should not access database logs or system logs. Nodinite role grants view access to /var/log/myapp/* pattern—team performs self-service monitoring via Web Client, no server training required.

Remote Log File Operations

• View matched log entries without server access—see exact lines triggering alerts with surrounding context
• Download log excerpts for analysis—retrieve specific time ranges or error patterns securely
• Clear alert states after investigation—mark issues as acknowledged, track resolution status
• Edit monitoring thresholds—adjust pattern detection, correlation timeouts based on observed traffic patterns

Example: Developer investigating application error needs to see full context around exception. Downloads 100-line excerpt surrounding ERROR pattern via Nodinite web interface in 10 seconds vs. requesting server RDP access, locating log file, copying to local machine.

Complete Feature Reference

The Log File Parser Monitoring Agent provides two primary monitoring modes with comprehensive management capabilities:

Note

Monitor all your text-based log files (application logs, web server logs, database logs, custom formats) with a single Nodinite license—no per-file or per-server fees.

Get Started

Common Questions

Q: What log file formats are supported? A: The Log File Parser Agent supports any text-based log file format—application logs (.log, .txt), IIS logs (W3C format), Apache/Nginx logs, database logs (SQL Server ERRORLOG, Oracle alert.log), Java Log4j/Logback, .NET NLog/Serilog, custom formats. Configure custom timestamp formats and delimiters during Resource setup.

Q: Can I monitor log files on network shares or remote servers? A: Yes. Monitor log files on UNC paths (\\server\share\logs\), local folders (C:\Logs\), SMB shares, or any Windows-accessible file path. Agent requires read permissions only. For Linux/Unix logs, mount network shares to Windows server running agent or use SMB/NFS access.

Q: How do I monitor rotating log files (daily/hourly rotation)? A: Use wildcard patterns in file paths—agent monitors all files matching pattern. For example, C:\Logs\App_*.log monitors App_20241229.log, App_20241230.log, etc. Agent tracks file position across rotations, ensuring no log entries missed or duplicated.

Q: What permissions are required to monitor log files? A: Minimum: Read-only access to monitored log files and parent folders. Agent does not require write permissions, delete permissions, or administrative access. Configure service account with least-privilege file system permissions. See Prerequisites for Log File Parser Monitoring Agent for detailed permission requirements.

Q: How do I reduce false positive alerts from expected log patterns? A: Configure negative patterns in Resource settings—agent ignores log lines matching negative patterns even if they match positive patterns. For example, positive pattern "ERROR" with negative pattern "ERROR: Connection closed during normal shutdown" prevents alerts for expected shutdowns. Adjust negative patterns based on observed false positives.

Q: Can I correlate events across multiple log files? A: Yes. Configure Monitoring Correlated Events with start pattern (e.g., "Order received: {ID}" in incoming.log) and end pattern (e.g., "ACK sent: {ID}" in outgoing.log). Agent correlates by transaction ID, alerts when start pattern detected but no matching end pattern within timeout threshold. Supports cross-file and single-file correlation.

Q: What happens if the agent loses connectivity to log file location? A: The agent detects connectivity failure during next monitoring cycle (configurable interval, default 60 seconds), marks the log file Resource as Unavailable with connectivity error message, and triggers alerts. When connectivity restored (network recovery, server restart, permissions fixed), agent resumes normal monitoring from last known file position—no log entries lost.

Q: How do I grant operations teams access to view log alerts without server login? A: Use Nodinite Roles to define permissions (e.g., Log Viewer role can view alerts, download excerpts from approved log files). Assign users to roles, create Monitor Views filtered to approved log file patterns—users perform actions from Web Client with full audit trails, no RDP or SSH credentials required.

Q: Can I monitor multi-line log entries (e.g., stack traces)? A: Yes. Configure multi-line pattern matching using regex—agent captures complete stack traces, exception details, or multi-line error contexts. Define start pattern (e.g., "Exception:"), continuation pattern (e.g., lines starting with whitespace), and end pattern (e.g., blank line). See Configuration for multi-line examples.

Q: How do I track log file monitoring health over time? A: The agent monitors log files as Resources with state tracking (OK/Warning/Error). State changes are recorded when pattern matches occur or correlations timeout. View resource health status in Monitor Views, track state change history, and configure Alarm Plugins to alert on state transitions. For detailed event analytics and pattern counting, use Nodinite logging capabilities to centralize events via Log API.

Additional Resources

• Prerequisites for Log File Parser Monitoring Agent – Network connectivity, file permissions, supported log formats
• Install Log File Parser Monitoring Agent – Download, install, configure log file access
• Configuration – Resource setup, pattern configuration, correlation rules, alert thresholds
• Monitoring Content Files – Pattern detection, regex matching, negative patterns
• Monitoring Correlated Events – ACK/NAK correlation, transaction tracking, timeout detection
• Managing Content Files – Alert management, log excerpt download, threshold editing
• Managing Correlated Events – Transaction state management, incomplete workflow reports
• Troubleshooting – Solutions to common configuration and monitoring issues

Next Step

Ready to eliminate manual log file inspection and detect errors instantly? Start by reviewing prerequisites and installing the agent:

• Prerequisites for Log File Parser Monitoring Agent – Confirm log file access and permissions
• Install Log File Parser Monitoring Agent – Download and install the agent, configure monitored log files

Related Topics

• Windows Server Monitoring Agent – Monitor Windows Event Logs, Performance Counters, Services
• Database Monitoring Agent – Monitor database health, SQL jobs, backups, blocking
• File Folder Monitoring Agent – Monitor file presence/absence, file count thresholds, folder size