RCL - Remote Client Logging

A websocket bridge allowing persistent debug logging from client to server/local node instance

Official doc at jsoverson.github.com/rcl

Getting started

Include the logging client in your application

<script src="path/to/rcl.js"></script>

For AMD/RequireJS, It is recommended that you add it to your global deps config.

require.config({
  deps : [
    "path/to/rcl.js"
  ]
})

Install the rcl npm package

$ sudo npm install -g rcl

Run rcl

$ rcl
Running "rcl" task
   info  - socket.io started
[2012-09-25 09:14:48.863] [DEBUG] rcl - Connected on port 8888

Log to your heart's content

rcl.info("Hi, I am your app.");
rcl.debug("Foo is now : %s", 42);

Logs will show up in your console, rcl (if running), and any client connected to your rcl instance.

Usage

Include the client source file in your client application and you can use the following commands immediately

rcl.info()
rcl.debug()
rcl.trace()
rcl.error()
rcl.warn()

Getting the client source file

You can download it at raw.github.com/jsoverson/rcl/master/src/rcl.js or you can output the version that matches your npm install via

$ rcl rcl.js > path/for/rcl.js

Specify a different host to connect to

rcl.connect('127.0.0.1','8888');

Configure log levels

rcl.logLevel(rcl.INFO);

Turn off logging

rcl.server = false; // || true
rcl.client = false; // || true

Sprintf like formatting

For console logging, the support is the native console's capabilities. Terminal and web client support use string-format syntax (mostly the same).

How to strip logging

The grunt task to strip logging has been extracted and distributed as its own package, grunt-strip. You will find more documentation there.

Grunt-strip is designed to be run as part of a build chain, probably after concatenation and before minification.

Example grunt configuration

grunt.initConfig({
  /*
   * Configure a 'strip' block like this
   */

  strip : {
    main : {
      src : 'src/main.js',
      dest : 'build/main.built.js',
      nodes : ['rcl','console']
    }
  }
});

// Load grunt-strip tasks.
grunt.loadTasks('grunt-strip');

See grunt-strip for advanced configurations

FAQ

Why use RCL?

You are programming in a language stretched beyond its design across environments spanning years of standards and are delivering your source code directly to the client to be run outside of your control.

It's hard but so, so awesome and you are a brilliant genius to have gotten this far.

At the base, RCL is just a websocket bridge to log from your browser to another client. It could be anything, but right now is something like a server, another browser tab, or a mobile device.

RCL aggregates and classifies your log messages so that they are configurable in verbosity, using log4js on the server side for more flexibility.

Does my application break if rcl is not running?

No, you will still get console messages in your browser.

Why is this not recommended for production logging?

Because logging will bloat your code, expose intent behind your logic, and be an extra burden on the client. But, that said, if production logging is important enough to you, then try it out and we'd love to hear how it works.

Our primary frustration for large JavaScript projects is the lack of extensive logging during development and testing. This is a solution to that works very well and allows for fewer issues to occur in production.

One avenue being considered is to have grunt-strip support removing properties of nodes so that only certain log levels can be removed.

rcl as a grunt plugin

RCL was written with grunt so, by convenience, can be used as a grunt plugin. No special functionality exists, but you can specify a custom port via an rcl config

rcl : {
  port : 3000
}

log4js configuration

Please visit the project page for documentation log4js-node

Contributing

In lieu of a formal styleguide, take care to maintain the existing coding style. Add unit tests for any new or changed functionality. Lint and test your code using [grunt][grunt].

Release History

• v0.2.2 Fixed new use cases
• v0.2.0 Initial release

License

Copyright (c) 2012 Jarrod Overson
Licensed under the MIT license.