MultiTail



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What can MultiTail do for you?

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...an almost complete featurelist

  • Display logfiles
    • More than one in multiple windows
      • Terminal window is not only horizontally divided, also vertical is possible
        • Height/width of the windows can be set
        • Number of windows per column can be configured
      • Windows can be swapped and closed
      • A window can temporarily be hidden
        • all windows can be unhidden at once
        • all windows but the one selected can be hidden at once
      • New windows can be created
        • The fileselector has "TAB-completion"
      • Windows can be temporarily hidden
      • all windows can be merged into one new popup window
    • Multiple logfiles can be merged into one window
    • One can search in all windows at once
      • All found lines can be merged into one new popup-window
      • or displayed reversed (highlighted) in their original window
    • Logfiles can be filtered with the help of one or more regular expressions
    • A label can be put in front of lines depending on the subwindow (usefull when merging)
    • Parts of lines can be filtered
      • Using ranges
      • Using column-numbers
      • Using regular expressions
    • MultiTail can act as a "visual pipe" (or 'multi-tee'). While displaying inputs, the following is possible:
      • The input can be written to one or more files, either filtered or unfiltered
      • The input can be send (piped) to one or more processes, either filtered or unfiltered
      • The input can be send (piped) to a syslog server, either filtered or unfiltered
    • MultiTail can act like a syslog server
    • When it is detected that a line gets repeated, it can be replaced with a "Last message repeated x times" message
    • A mark-line can be added automatically when it is detected a logfile/process has been idle for a configurable amount of time
    • When a file has changed, the statusline (each logfilewindow has a statusline) is updated to show the new size and the timestamp of the change ('atime')
      • Statusline can be switched off
      • Statusline can be put above or below data window
      • Colors/attributes of statusline can be set
      • A message can be shown when the current user has new mail
      • Instead of the filename/commandline a more descriptive text can be put in the statusline
      • Filesizes can be abbreviated to KB/MB/GB
      • A statusline in the xterm titlebar can be shown:
        • Current user
        • Current hostname
        • Name of changed file
        • Timestamp of change
        • System load
        • "new mail" indicator
    • The initial number of lines read can be set
    • Instead of the descriptor also the filename can be followed (usefull for situations where "mv log log.old" is done after which a new file 'log' is created)
    • It can also monitor wildcards: if another file matching the wildcard has a more recent modification date, it will automatically switch to that file. That way you can, for example, monitor a complete directory of files.
  • Of course, STDIN can be monitored as well.
  • You can truncate a logfile from within MultiTail
  • Idle windows can automatically be closed.
  • Window can be left open when the process underneath exits
  • Windows can be restarted
  • Not only logfiles, also external programs can be viewed (e.g. the output of netstat)
    • Programs can be automatically restarted (like the 'watch' program)
      • Restart interval can be set
      • The difference since the previous run can be displayed (instead of everything)
      • The last exit status of command is displayed in the statusline
      • a window can be cleared before a new iteration (-rc)
    • One can now send signals to running commands
    • Output can be merged with the output of other programs
    • Output can be merged with logfiles
    • Output can be colored: see 'logfiles'-section
    • Output can be filtered: see 'logfiles'-section
    • A statusbar can be shown: see 'logfiles'-section
    • One can type in the window of a program, like the 'splitvt' program
    • Line wrap is configurable
      • Cut off at the left or right
      • Wrap at the right
      • Cut off at the syslog procname
  • One can scrollback in a window
    • All text (including that of the scrollbackbuffer) can be stored in a file
    • Size of scrollbackbuffer can be set (in number of lines and KB)
    • A searchfunction is included (also with regular expressions!)
    • Line wrapping can be switched off, after that one can scroll to the left/right with the cursor keys
    • Scrollback window has the same keybindings of 'less'
    • All scrollback windows can be cleared in one go (press 'N')
  • One can set marks
    • A mark (a line) can be set so that one can easily see what is new
      • The attributes (foreground, background, underline, bold, etc.) can be set for the markerline
      • A timestamp can be printed in the markerline
    • A window can be cleared while maintaining the scrollbackbuffer
    • MultiTail can automatically add a marker when it switches subwindow
    • syslog '-- MARK --' lines can be replaced
    • when a window is idle for a configurable amount of time, a markerline can be displayed
  • The width of a tab can be set
  • For lines longer then the width of a window, one can set what to be shown:
    • The complete line
    • Only the left part
    • Only the right part
    • A configurable offset
    • In case of a 'syslog'-style logfile;
      • Everything after the date/time
      • Everything after the date/time without the procname
  • Update frequency of the display can be set (default: immediately), usefull for slow links
  • Some statistics can be shown (update frequency, tendency of the update frequency)
  • Bind external programs to keys. For example: one can let MultiTail execute /usr/bin/pine when CTRL+G is pressed. That way MultiTail can act as a central command center.
  • In case one is monitoring something without timestamps, multitail can add them itself
  • The format of timestamps can be configured in the configurationfile
  • While displaying, MultiTail can convert parts of the input:
    • ip-adresses to hostnames
    • an external script can be invoked for the conversion
    • seconds since the UNIX epoch to user configurable timeformats
    • "errno" values to descriptive messages
    • decimal to hex and hex to decimal
    • tai64 (qmail etc.) to user configurable timeformats
    • a value to KB/MB/GB
    • signal number to signal name
  • Has context-sensitive on-line help (press F1 at any time)
  • Instead of a beep, one can get a beep, a flashing screen, nothing or a popup
  • all configurationfile settings can be set from the commandline
  • suppressing of empty lines can be configured in the configfile
  • one can let multitail beep for every x-th line it processes
  • inputfields have a history buffer which is automatically stored on disk
  • other tail variants can be used (e.g. inotail)
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