Application settings

The process of releasing software often starts with deployment to a staging environment, and after quality is assured the software is promoted to production. To minimize the risk of introducing new bugs one would like to promote the same binary, but with changes to the configuration. This means that configuration cannot be defined at compile-time, it must be applied at run-time. This is where the story of application settings begin.

The initiative from Microsoft to introduce Microsoft.Extensions.Configuration meant that other libraries, like Serilog, had a solid foundation to build their own configuration upon. This sink, in combination with Serilog.Settings.Configuration, supports application configuration by using Microsoft.Extensions.Configuration.Json or any other provider. The limited type system in JSON however forces us to write some of the configuration parameters in a slightly different way. The following chapters will list all configurable parameters and highlights those that in JSON have a different format than those defined in code.

HTTP sink

Parameter name	CLR type	JSON type	JSON remarks	JSON example
requestUri	string	string
queueLimitBytes	long?	number
logEventLimitBytes	long?	number
logEventsInBatchLimit	int?	number
batchSizeLimitBytes	long?	number
period	TimeSpan?	string	See TimeSpan.Parse	"00:00:02"
textFormatter	ITextFormatter?	string	See Type.GetType	"MyNamespace.MyClass, MyAssembly"
batchFormatter	IBatchFormatter?	string	See Type.GetType	"MyNamespace.MyClass, MyAssembly"
restrictedToMinimumLevel	LogEventLevel	string	See Enum.Parse	"Verbose"
httpClient	IHttpClient?	string	See Type.GetType	"MyNamespace.MyClass, MyAssembly"
configuration	IConfiguration?	N/A	Parameter cannot be set in JSON

Durable file size rolled HTTP sink

Parameter name	CLR type	JSON type	JSON remarks	JSON example
requestUri	string	string
bufferBaseFileName	string	string
bufferFileSizeLimitBytes	long?	number
bufferFileShared	bool	boolean
retainedBufferFileCountLimit	int?	number
logEventLimitBytes	long?	number
logEventsInBatchLimit	int?	number
batchSizeLimitBytes	long?	number
period	TimeSpan?	string	See TimeSpan.Parse	"00:00:02"
textFormatter	ITextFormatter?	string	See Type.GetType	"MyNamespace.MyClass, MyAssembly"
batchFormatter	IBatchFormatter?	string	See Type.GetType	"MyNamespace.MyClass, MyAssembly"
restrictedToMinimumLevel	LogEventLevel	string	See Enum.Parse	"Verbose"
httpClient	IHttpClient	string	See Type.GetType	"MyNamespace.MyClass, MyAssembly"
configuration	IConfiguration?	N/A	Parameter cannot be set in JSON

Durable time rolled HTTP sink

Parameter name	CLR type	JSON type	JSON remarks	JSON example
requestUri	string	string
bufferBaseFileName	string	string
bufferRollingInterval	BufferRollingInterval	string	See Enum.Parse	"Day"
bufferFileSizeLimitBytes	long?	number
bufferFileShared	bool	boolean
retainedBufferFileCountLimit	int?	number
logEventLimitBytes	long?	number
logEventsInBatchLimit	int?	number
batchSizeLimitBytes	long?	number
period	TimeSpan?	string	See TimeSpan.Parse	"00:00:02"
textFormatter	ITextFormatter?	string	See Type.GetType	"MyNamespace.MyClass, MyAssembly"
batchFormatter	IBatchFormatter?	string	See Type.GetType	"MyNamespace.MyClass, MyAssembly"
restrictedToMinimumLevel	LogEventLevel	string	See Enum.Parse	"Verbose"
httpClient	IHttpClient?	string	See Type.GetType	"MyNamespace.MyClass, MyAssembly"
configuration	IConfiguration?	N/A	Parameter cannot be set in JSON