I'm trying to find a way on Red Hat Linux 9 to specify in /etc/syslog.conf a pipe command such that log entries for local4 get piped to a perl script that then inserts the log entries into a MySQL table. I've worked it out so I can use fifo's (named pipes) like the 'syslog.conf' manpage describes: 
   1. mkfifo /tmp/my_log_fifo

   2. In /etc/syslog.conf:

        local4.*        |/tmp/my_log_fifo

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so after restarting syslogd, log entries for local4 get written to fifo /tmp/my_log_fifo. Then I have my perl script read lines from the fifo file, and everything works fine.

But in my testing, with data *in* the fifo file, I rebooted my machine, and when it came back up, the fifo file had a size of 0, meaning the data in the fifo was lost on the reboot. I cannot afford to lose log entries in this application, so it would seem that using a fifo for this purpose would not work.

So my questions are: 
  1. has anyone done this successfully, and if so, how?
  2. am I missing something, or is there a way to make
     fifo's persistent for reboots?
  2. is it possible to code a perl script such that
     the perl script can be specified right in the
     /etc/syslog.conf, like

      local4.*        |/path/to/my_perl_script.pl

     in place of the fifo file?

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Any help or ideas are greatly appreciated.

TIA.

In reply to insert syslog log entries into MySQL? by hmerrill

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