Re: Using XML for audit trail

Hi Mont,

I've just been through the same thought exercise.

I concluded that xml simply isn't a good format to use for a continual
logging system.
My conclusions were, in part, based upon seeing an internal system
that did pretty much what you're describing fail periodically, leaving
behind a log file that was no longer valid xml (and therefore couldn't
be parsed by all the standard tools we had in place). Trying to read a
10Mb sort-of xml document in a text editor to diagnose faults is
pretty tedious.

My solution was to use a different serialisation format (structured
text) that was record-oriented, and then to have a separate phase
which could convert a given snapshot of the log into xml.

HTH,
  John

2009/2/27 Mont Rothstein <[email protected]>:
> I want to use XML for an audit trail.  The problem I am having is that I
> would like to only use append operations to write to the file.
>
> My thought had been to write an element to each line, with sub-elements and
> the end on the same line.  I could then parse each line when reading the
> file.  The problem is I can't figure out how to get the XML for a
> node/element/document, and all of the sub-elements, to write out as a single
> line.
>
> Alternatively  I could use some other mechanism to parse the file and read
> each audit entry (xml element with sub-elements) in sequence.
>
> Any suggestions on how to either write the XML as a single line or a
> preferred method for parsing elements in a file one at a time?
>
> Thanks,
> -Mont
>
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