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Juergen
Asked: 2017-08-25 02:33:28 +0800 CST

logger -s prints <13> in Ubuntu 16 LTS

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In former LTS releases, the logger -s command just printed the text to stderr:
Ubuntu 14 LTS (package bsdutils, current version 1:2.20.1-5.1ubuntu20.9) and
Ubuntu 12 LTS (package bsdutils, current version 1:2.20.1-1ubuntu3.1):

logger -s -t test text
test: text

But in the current LTS release, it prepends some strange text:
Ubuntu 16 LTS (package bsdutils, current version 1:2.27.1-6ubuntu3.3):

logger -s -t test text
<13>Aug 24 12:19:04 test: text

I understand that there has been a date prepended in the new version.
But what does <13> mean ? (The syslog itself does not contain that <13> string.)

Edit: Bonus question: How can I get rid of that ?

16.04

1 Answers

  1. Best Answer

    The value <13> is the priority prefix for priority user.notice

    Example for various priority values:

    $ logger -p user.error -s -t test text 
<11>Aug 24 13:55:08 test: text
$ logger -p user.warn -s -t test text 
<12>Aug 24 13:55:02 test: text
$ logger -p user.notice -s -t test text 
<13>Aug 24 13:54:55 test: text
$ logger -p user.info -s -t test text 
<14>Aug 24 13:54:59 test: text

$ logger -p local0.error -s -t test text 
<131>Aug 24 13:58:52 test: text

    man logger

    -p, --priority
    priority Enter the message into the log with the specified priority. The priority may be specified numerically or as a facility.level pair. For example, -p local3.info logs the message as informational in the local3 facility. The default is user.notice.

    --prio-prefix
    Look for a syslog prefix on every line read from standard input. This prefix is a decimal number within angle brackets that encodes both the facility and the level. The number is constructed by multiplying the facility by 8 and then adding the level. For example, local0.info, meaning facility=16 and level=6, becomes <134>. If the prefix contains no facility, the facility defaults to what is specified by the -p option. Similarly, if no prefix is provided, the line is logged using the priority given with -p.

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