Updated: 29-Jan-2012

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Monitor Shutdown Utility Log Files In Real Time

JSutils Technical Note: JSU008

Applies To: AllOff, AllOff Lite, LANOff, ProcOff

Operating Systems: Windows 2000, Windows XP, Windows Vista, Windows 7

Sometimes it is useful to monitor the log files of JSutils shutdown utilities in real time to aid problem solving. This technical note explains probably the simplest way. There are programs out there that monitor log files in real time more elegantly and some of them are free however they all have limitations of one sort or another. The method outlined here is based on using the command prompt and the simple steps are outlined below:

Download And Install Tail
There is a free windows utility called 'tail' which as it's name suggests enables the tail end of log files to be examined without scrolling through the whole log file which could be large. Tail has an option to also monitor the log file in real time as it is updated. Unfortunately a utility like this is not supplied a standard with windows so it has to be downloaded. The particular version chosen is a free one which is very small and is simple to install. The link for downloading tail is:

http://www.trisunsoft.com/tail-for-windows.htm

Unzip tail.exe from the downloaded package tail-for-windows.zip and put it into c:\windows\system32 (replace c: by the system drive letter where c: is not the system drive).

Open A Command Prompt
Either open a command prompt from the Start Menu or press Win + R and type cmd then press <Enter >

Resize The Command Prompt Window
To display the log file properly the window needs to be wide en ought to make sure there are no work wrapping problems and the window buffer needs to be large enough to scroll back in the log a reasonable distance. To do this right click on the top bar of the window and select properties and then the layout tab. Set the window width to 90 and the screen buffer height to 1000. Click OK and adjust the window height to fill the screen.

Open The Log File To Monitor
The example below uses AllOff. Navigate to the log file directory for the utility you are interested in by typing the following command:

cd "c:\Program Files\JSutils\AllOff"\Log

Note the quotes around part of the expression. Replace c: by the system drive letter where c: is not the system drive. The log paths for all the shutdown utilities can be found on the Log page of the utility help pages. The links are:

AllOff Log
AllOff Lite Log
LANOff Log
ProcOff Log

Now type the command to see the tail of the log:

tail -f AllOff.log

Now the display will update each time the log file updates.

Example Screen Shot

Monitoring AllOff log file in real time