It’s a Bird… It’s a Fruit… It’s a Syslog Server!

What we are going to learn today: needn’t always be a bird or a fruit. For IT pros, it can also be a Syslog Server.

If you don’t know this already, Kiwi® Syslog Server is a log management software for Windows® platform that collects, consolidates, displays, stores, alerts and forwards syslog and SNMP trap messages from network devices, such as routers, switches, Linux® and Unix® hosts, and other syslog and trap-enabled devices. Let’s look at5 MOST USEFUL LOG MANAGEMENT OPERATIONS you can perform with Kiwi Syslog Server.

#1 Monitor Syslog Messages & SNMP Traps from Network Devices & Servers

Kiwi Syslog Server listens to syslog messages and SNMP traps from routers, switches, firewalls, servers and other syslog and trap-enabled devices. Kiwi Syslog Server collects these messages from various sources and displays them on a centralized Web console for easy and secure access. You can also

• Filter messages by host name, host IP address, priority, message text keyword, or time of day
• Generate graphs of syslog statistics over specific time periods

#2 Automate Alerts for Incoming Syslog Messages

Kiwi Syslog Server provides an intelligent alert functionality to help you get notified when a syslog with a predefined criteria is met (based on time, type of syslog message, syslog source, etc.). By default, Kiwi has the following syslog priority levels which helps you immediate understanding of the syslog message for any follow-up action.

Based on the type/priority of syslog message received, you can schedule an email notification, or play a sound to alert you, or run an external program, forward the alert as a syslog message to another server or database.

#3 Schedule Syslog Archive & Clean-Up Actions

Kiwi Syslog Server has an integrated scheduler that allows you to schedule and run automated archival and clean-up tasks.

1. Scheduled Archival: Kiwi Syslog Server allows you to schedule archive options defining the source, destination, archive frequency and notification options. This tasks allows you to copy or move logs from one location to another, compress the files into individual or single archives, encrypt those archives, create multi-part archives, create file or archive hashes, run external programs, and much more.
2. Scheduled Clean-Up: The clean-up task removes/deletes files from the source location that match a specified criteria. This task can be scheduled to occur over any interval or at any date and time desired, or at application/service start-up.

You can also easily customize and implement your organizational log retention policy to meet international compliance standards such as SOX, PCI-DSS, FISMA & more.

#4 Forward & Archive Windows Event Logs

Kiwi Syslog Servers offers the free Log Forwarder for Windows which allows you to forward all your event logs from your Windows servers and workstations to Kiwi Syslog Server and perform scheduled archive to one or more disks in the form of log files.

#5 Securely Transport Syslog Messages Across Any Network (LAN or WAN)

With the help of the free, optional, Kiwi Secure Tunnel, you can receive, compress and securely transport syslog messages from distributed network devices and servers to your instance of Kiwi Syslog Server. Kiwi Secure Tunnel is made up of a client and a server. The Tunnel Client gathers messages from one or more devices on a network and forwards the messages across a secure link to the Tunnel Server. The Server then forwards the messages on to your Kiwi Syslog Server instance.

As you can see, Kiwi Syslog Server can help you simplify most of your log management tasks for syslog messages. This is just a summary of some of the major and common operations that you can accomplish with Kiwi Syslog Server. To explore more features, do visit www.kiwisyslog.com.

(Yes, this title was inspired from Superman opening credits. If you want to watch the clip: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OjS6B4KuPY0)