sails.config.log
Configuration for the
logger
in your Sails app. These settings apply whenever you call functions like
sails.log.debug()
or
sails.log.error()
in your app code, as well as when Sails logs a message to the console automatically. The options here are conventionally specified in the
config/log.js
configuration file.
Properties
Property
Default
Details
Set to false to disable captain's log's handling of logging, logs will instead be passed to the configured custom logger.
custom
undefined
Specify a reference to an instance of a custom logger (such as
Winston
). If provided, instead of logging directly to the console, the functions exposed by the custom logger will be called, and log messages from Sails will be passed through. For more information, see
captains-log
.
Using a custom logger
It is sometimes useful to configure a custom logger, particularly for regulatory compliance and organizational requirements (e.g. if your company is using a particular logger in other apps). In the context of Sails, configuring a custom logger also allows you to intercept all log messages automatically created by the framework, which is handy for setting up email notifications about errors and warnings.
Don't feel like you
have
to use a custom logger if you want these sorts of notifications! In fact, there are usually more straightforward ways to implement features like automated Slack, SMS, or email notifications when errors occur. One approach is to customize your app's default server error response (
responses/serverError.js
). Another popular option is to use a product like
Papertrail
, or a monitoring service like
AppDynamics
or
NewRelic
.
Here's an example configuring
Winston
as a custom logger, defining both a console transport and file transport.
First of all, add
winston
as a dependency of your project:
npm install winston
Then, replace the content of config/log.js
with the following:
// config/log.js
const { version } = require('../package');
const { createLogger, format, transports } = require('winston');
const { combine, timestamp, colorize, label, printf, align } = format;
const { SPLAT } = require('triple-beam');
const { isObject } = require('lodash');
function formatObject(param) {
if (isObject(param)) {
return JSON.stringify(param);
return param;
// Ignore log messages if they have { private: true }
const all = format((info) => {
const splat = info[SPLAT] || [];
const message = formatObject(info.message);
const rest = splat.map(formatObject).join(' ');
info.message = `${message} ${rest}`;
return info;
const customLogger = createLogger({
format: combine(
all(),
label({ label: version }),
timestamp(),
colorize(),
align(),
printf(info => `${info.timestamp} [${info.label}] ${info.level}: ${formatObject(info.message)}`)
transports: [new transports.Console()]
module.exports.log = {
custom: customLogger,
inspect: false
// level: 'info'
© 2012-2024 The Sails Company.
The Sails framework is free and open-source under the MIT License.
Illustrations by Edamame.