CSV and space-delimited files are not recognized

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carehart
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CSV and space-delimited files are not recognized

Post by carehart »

Folks, I tried to open some simple log files, some in CSV (comma separated value) format and some in space-delimited format. Both are not recognized by the tool, using the Eval edition. I don't see these listed as being only in the pro edition.

Ah, I just reviewed the front page, and see now that the "Handle any log format" indicates that only log4j and logfactor5 formats are provided. Wow, that heading really misled me. Ok, so I see that I could "easily create new LogMX parsers to open [my] own log files". I really wasn't anticipating that.

But let me ask this: is there a place that people who do write such (perhaps commonly needed) parsers might share them with others?
admin
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Post by admin »

Hello,

These formats are not "natively" recognized by Eval and Pro versions, because LogMX wouldn't know the fields order you use, which date format you use, and if some fields are padded with whitespace.

In Eval version, the simplest way to learn LogMX this format is to use a "Log4j Pattern Parser" (http://www.logmx.com/display_media.php? ... ic=2&vid=0). You could also write a Java Class, but this may only be used for complex formats (XML, binary data,...)

Creating a LogMX Parser like a "Log4j Pattern Parser" is only a "configuration-time" step using only LogMX GUI, and should not take more than a few minutes. Do you mean that LogMX should be able to recognize any log format without having to add Parsers?

You're right, we also used to think it would be nice to let LogMX users share their parsers. This forum contained such a topic but we deleted it because it was never used :cry:. Maybe there's too many possible different log formats... (if we exclude Log4j or LF5 of course)

Xavier.
carehart
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Joined: Sat Dec 20, 2008 7:02 pm
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Post by carehart »

Thanks for the reply, Xavier. Yes, when I started writing the note (and when I first visited the site), I assumed that LogMX would support such standard log files. I mean, the product's subtitle is "the universal log file viewer", as shown in the top right corner of this very page. And again the phrase "any log format" as the first line of text on the front page also led to that expectation. :-)

As I was writing that note, I noticed (as I said) that instead it was really just log4j and LogFactor5 formats. I just had not expected it to be thus limited. I'm sure you have lots of happy users.

But there is a market out there for analysis of csv, tsv, and space-delimited files. As for knowing the details you mention, that wouldn't be mandatory. There are other tools that process them without identifying the datatype of each column in advance. Sure, some data types would require that, but it could instead be defined only when need for that kind of analysis.

No worries if you don't want to provide a tool that's that generic. I wish you well with the market you do serve.
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