Logging documentation reorganised.
diff --git a/Doc/howto/index.rst b/Doc/howto/index.rst
index 417ae00..09bc5cb 100644
--- a/Doc/howto/index.rst
+++ b/Doc/howto/index.rst
@@ -19,6 +19,8 @@
    descriptor.rst
    doanddont.rst
    functional.rst
+   logging.rst
+   logging-cookbook.rst
    regex.rst
    sockets.rst
    sorting.rst
diff --git a/Doc/howto/logging-cookbook.rst b/Doc/howto/logging-cookbook.rst
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..ea1756b
--- /dev/null
+++ b/Doc/howto/logging-cookbook.rst
@@ -0,0 +1,929 @@
+.. _logging-cookbook:
+
+================
+Logging Cookbook
+================
+
+:Author: Vinay Sajip <vinay_sajip at red-dove dot com>
+
+This page contains a number of recipes related to logging, which have been found useful in the past.
+
+.. Contents::
+
+.. currentmodule:: logging
+
+Using logging in multiple modules
+---------------------------------
+
+It was mentioned above that multiple calls to
+``logging.getLogger('someLogger')`` return a reference to the same logger
+object.  This is true not only within the same module, but also across modules
+as long as it is in the same Python interpreter process.  It is true for
+references to the same object; additionally, application code can define and
+configure a parent logger in one module and create (but not configure) a child
+logger in a separate module, and all logger calls to the child will pass up to
+the parent.  Here is a main module::
+
+    import logging
+    import auxiliary_module
+
+    # create logger with 'spam_application'
+    logger = logging.getLogger('spam_application')
+    logger.setLevel(logging.DEBUG)
+    # create file handler which logs even debug messages
+    fh = logging.FileHandler('spam.log')
+    fh.setLevel(logging.DEBUG)
+    # create console handler with a higher log level
+    ch = logging.StreamHandler()
+    ch.setLevel(logging.ERROR)
+    # create formatter and add it to the handlers
+    formatter = logging.Formatter('%(asctime)s - %(name)s - %(levelname)s - %(message)s')
+    fh.setFormatter(formatter)
+    ch.setFormatter(formatter)
+    # add the handlers to the logger
+    logger.addHandler(fh)
+    logger.addHandler(ch)
+
+    logger.info('creating an instance of auxiliary_module.Auxiliary')
+    a = auxiliary_module.Auxiliary()
+    logger.info('created an instance of auxiliary_module.Auxiliary')
+    logger.info('calling auxiliary_module.Auxiliary.do_something')
+    a.do_something()
+    logger.info('finished auxiliary_module.Auxiliary.do_something')
+    logger.info('calling auxiliary_module.some_function()')
+    auxiliary_module.some_function()
+    logger.info('done with auxiliary_module.some_function()')
+
+Here is the auxiliary module::
+
+    import logging
+
+    # create logger
+    module_logger = logging.getLogger('spam_application.auxiliary')
+
+    class Auxiliary:
+        def __init__(self):
+            self.logger = logging.getLogger('spam_application.auxiliary.Auxiliary')
+            self.logger.info('creating an instance of Auxiliary')
+        def do_something(self):
+            self.logger.info('doing something')
+            a = 1 + 1
+            self.logger.info('done doing something')
+
+    def some_function():
+        module_logger.info('received a call to "some_function"')
+
+The output looks like this::
+
+    2005-03-23 23:47:11,663 - spam_application - INFO -
+       creating an instance of auxiliary_module.Auxiliary
+    2005-03-23 23:47:11,665 - spam_application.auxiliary.Auxiliary - INFO -
+       creating an instance of Auxiliary
+    2005-03-23 23:47:11,665 - spam_application - INFO -
+       created an instance of auxiliary_module.Auxiliary
+    2005-03-23 23:47:11,668 - spam_application - INFO -
+       calling auxiliary_module.Auxiliary.do_something
+    2005-03-23 23:47:11,668 - spam_application.auxiliary.Auxiliary - INFO -
+       doing something
+    2005-03-23 23:47:11,669 - spam_application.auxiliary.Auxiliary - INFO -
+       done doing something
+    2005-03-23 23:47:11,670 - spam_application - INFO -
+       finished auxiliary_module.Auxiliary.do_something
+    2005-03-23 23:47:11,671 - spam_application - INFO -
+       calling auxiliary_module.some_function()
+    2005-03-23 23:47:11,672 - spam_application.auxiliary - INFO -
+       received a call to 'some_function'
+    2005-03-23 23:47:11,673 - spam_application - INFO -
+       done with auxiliary_module.some_function()
+
+Multiple handlers and formatters
+--------------------------------
+
+Loggers are plain Python objects.  The :func:`addHandler` method has no minimum
+or maximum quota for the number of handlers you may add.  Sometimes it will be
+beneficial for an application to log all messages of all severities to a text
+file while simultaneously logging errors or above to the console.  To set this
+up, simply configure the appropriate handlers.  The logging calls in the
+application code will remain unchanged.  Here is a slight modification to the
+previous simple module-based configuration example::
+
+    import logging
+
+    logger = logging.getLogger('simple_example')
+    logger.setLevel(logging.DEBUG)
+    # create file handler which logs even debug messages
+    fh = logging.FileHandler('spam.log')
+    fh.setLevel(logging.DEBUG)
+    # create console handler with a higher log level
+    ch = logging.StreamHandler()
+    ch.setLevel(logging.ERROR)
+    # create formatter and add it to the handlers
+    formatter = logging.Formatter('%(asctime)s - %(name)s - %(levelname)s - %(message)s')
+    ch.setFormatter(formatter)
+    fh.setFormatter(formatter)
+    # add the handlers to logger
+    logger.addHandler(ch)
+    logger.addHandler(fh)
+
+    # 'application' code
+    logger.debug('debug message')
+    logger.info('info message')
+    logger.warn('warn message')
+    logger.error('error message')
+    logger.critical('critical message')
+
+Notice that the 'application' code does not care about multiple handlers.  All
+that changed was the addition and configuration of a new handler named *fh*.
+
+The ability to create new handlers with higher- or lower-severity filters can be
+very helpful when writing and testing an application.  Instead of using many
+``print`` statements for debugging, use ``logger.debug``: Unlike the print
+statements, which you will have to delete or comment out later, the logger.debug
+statements can remain intact in the source code and remain dormant until you
+need them again.  At that time, the only change that needs to happen is to
+modify the severity level of the logger and/or handler to debug.
+
+.. _multiple-destinations:
+
+Logging to multiple destinations
+--------------------------------
+
+Let's say you want to log to console and file with different message formats and
+in differing circumstances. Say you want to log messages with levels of DEBUG
+and higher to file, and those messages at level INFO and higher to the console.
+Let's also assume that the file should contain timestamps, but the console
+messages should not. Here's how you can achieve this::
+
+   import logging
+
+   # set up logging to file - see previous section for more details
+   logging.basicConfig(level=logging.DEBUG,
+                       format='%(asctime)s %(name)-12s %(levelname)-8s %(message)s',
+                       datefmt='%m-%d %H:%M',
+                       filename='/temp/myapp.log',
+                       filemode='w')
+   # define a Handler which writes INFO messages or higher to the sys.stderr
+   console = logging.StreamHandler()
+   console.setLevel(logging.INFO)
+   # set a format which is simpler for console use
+   formatter = logging.Formatter('%(name)-12s: %(levelname)-8s %(message)s')
+   # tell the handler to use this format
+   console.setFormatter(formatter)
+   # add the handler to the root logger
+   logging.getLogger('').addHandler(console)
+
+   # Now, we can log to the root logger, or any other logger. First the root...
+   logging.info('Jackdaws love my big sphinx of quartz.')
+
+   # Now, define a couple of other loggers which might represent areas in your
+   # application:
+
+   logger1 = logging.getLogger('myapp.area1')
+   logger2 = logging.getLogger('myapp.area2')
+
+   logger1.debug('Quick zephyrs blow, vexing daft Jim.')
+   logger1.info('How quickly daft jumping zebras vex.')
+   logger2.warning('Jail zesty vixen who grabbed pay from quack.')
+   logger2.error('The five boxing wizards jump quickly.')
+
+When you run this, on the console you will see ::
+
+   root        : INFO     Jackdaws love my big sphinx of quartz.
+   myapp.area1 : INFO     How quickly daft jumping zebras vex.
+   myapp.area2 : WARNING  Jail zesty vixen who grabbed pay from quack.
+   myapp.area2 : ERROR    The five boxing wizards jump quickly.
+
+and in the file you will see something like ::
+
+   10-22 22:19 root         INFO     Jackdaws love my big sphinx of quartz.
+   10-22 22:19 myapp.area1  DEBUG    Quick zephyrs blow, vexing daft Jim.
+   10-22 22:19 myapp.area1  INFO     How quickly daft jumping zebras vex.
+   10-22 22:19 myapp.area2  WARNING  Jail zesty vixen who grabbed pay from quack.
+   10-22 22:19 myapp.area2  ERROR    The five boxing wizards jump quickly.
+
+As you can see, the DEBUG message only shows up in the file. The other messages
+are sent to both destinations.
+
+This example uses console and file handlers, but you can use any number and
+combination of handlers you choose.
+
+
+Configuration server example
+----------------------------
+
+Here is an example of a module using the logging configuration server::
+
+    import logging
+    import logging.config
+    import time
+    import os
+
+    # read initial config file
+    logging.config.fileConfig('logging.conf')
+
+    # create and start listener on port 9999
+    t = logging.config.listen(9999)
+    t.start()
+
+    logger = logging.getLogger('simpleExample')
+
+    try:
+        # loop through logging calls to see the difference
+        # new configurations make, until Ctrl+C is pressed
+        while True:
+            logger.debug('debug message')
+            logger.info('info message')
+            logger.warn('warn message')
+            logger.error('error message')
+            logger.critical('critical message')
+            time.sleep(5)
+    except KeyboardInterrupt:
+        # cleanup
+        logging.config.stopListening()
+        t.join()
+
+And here is a script that takes a filename and sends that file to the server,
+properly preceded with the binary-encoded length, as the new logging
+configuration::
+
+    #!/usr/bin/env python
+    import socket, sys, struct
+
+    data_to_send = open(sys.argv[1], 'r').read()
+
+    HOST = 'localhost'
+    PORT = 9999
+    s = socket.socket(socket.AF_INET, socket.SOCK_STREAM)
+    print('connecting...')
+    s.connect((HOST, PORT))
+    print('sending config...')
+    s.send(struct.pack('>L', len(data_to_send)))
+    s.send(data_to_send)
+    s.close()
+    print('complete')
+
+
+Dealing with handlers that block
+--------------------------------
+
+.. currentmodule:: logging.handlers
+
+Sometimes you have to get your logging handlers to do their work without
+blocking the thread you’re logging from. This is common in Web applications,
+though of course it also occurs in other scenarios.
+
+A common culprit which demonstrates sluggish behaviour is the
+:class:`SMTPHandler`: sending emails can take a long time, for a
+number of reasons outside the developer’s control (for example, a poorly
+performing mail or network infrastructure). But almost any network-based
+handler can block: Even a :class:`SocketHandler` operation may do a
+DNS query under the hood which is too slow (and this query can be deep in the
+socket library code, below the Python layer, and outside your control).
+
+One solution is to use a two-part approach. For the first part, attach only a
+:class:`QueueHandler` to those loggers which are accessed from
+performance-critical threads. They simply write to their queue, which can be
+sized to a large enough capacity or initialized with no upper bound to their
+size. The write to the queue will typically be accepted quickly, though you
+will probably need to catch the :ref:`queue.Full` exception as a precaution
+in your code. If you are a library developer who has performance-critical
+threads in their code, be sure to document this (together with a suggestion to
+attach only ``QueueHandlers`` to your loggers) for the benefit of other
+developers who will use your code.
+
+The second part of the solution is :class:`QueueListener`, which has been
+designed as the counterpart to :class:`QueueHandler`.  A
+:class:`QueueListener` is very simple: it’s passed a queue and some handlers,
+and it fires up an internal thread which listens to its queue for LogRecords
+sent from ``QueueHandlers`` (or any other source of ``LogRecords``, for that
+matter). The ``LogRecords`` are removed from the queue and passed to the
+handlers for processing.
+
+The advantage of having a separate :class:`QueueListener` class is that you
+can use the same instance to service multiple ``QueueHandlers``. This is more
+resource-friendly than, say, having threaded versions of the existing handler
+classes, which would eat up one thread per handler for no particular benefit.
+
+An example of using these two classes follows (imports omitted)::
+
+    que = queue.Queue(-1) # no limit on size
+    queue_handler = QueueHandler(que)
+    handler = logging.StreamHandler()
+    listener = QueueListener(que, handler)
+    root = logging.getLogger()
+    root.addHandler(queue_handler)
+    formatter = logging.Formatter('%(threadName)s: %(message)s')
+    handler.setFormatter(formatter)
+    listener.start()
+    # The log output will display the thread which generated
+    # the event (the main thread) rather than the internal
+    # thread which monitors the internal queue. This is what
+    # you want to happen.
+    root.warning('Look out!')
+    listener.stop()
+
+which, when run, will produce::
+
+    MainThread: Look out!
+
+
+.. _network-logging:
+
+Sending and receiving logging events across a network
+-----------------------------------------------------
+
+Let's say you want to send logging events across a network, and handle them at
+the receiving end. A simple way of doing this is attaching a
+:class:`SocketHandler` instance to the root logger at the sending end::
+
+   import logging, logging.handlers
+
+   rootLogger = logging.getLogger('')
+   rootLogger.setLevel(logging.DEBUG)
+   socketHandler = logging.handlers.SocketHandler('localhost',
+                       logging.handlers.DEFAULT_TCP_LOGGING_PORT)
+   # don't bother with a formatter, since a socket handler sends the event as
+   # an unformatted pickle
+   rootLogger.addHandler(socketHandler)
+
+   # Now, we can log to the root logger, or any other logger. First the root...
+   logging.info('Jackdaws love my big sphinx of quartz.')
+
+   # Now, define a couple of other loggers which might represent areas in your
+   # application:
+
+   logger1 = logging.getLogger('myapp.area1')
+   logger2 = logging.getLogger('myapp.area2')
+
+   logger1.debug('Quick zephyrs blow, vexing daft Jim.')
+   logger1.info('How quickly daft jumping zebras vex.')
+   logger2.warning('Jail zesty vixen who grabbed pay from quack.')
+   logger2.error('The five boxing wizards jump quickly.')
+
+At the receiving end, you can set up a receiver using the :mod:`socketserver`
+module. Here is a basic working example::
+
+   import pickle
+   import logging
+   import logging.handlers
+   import socketserver
+   import struct
+
+
+   class LogRecordStreamHandler(socketserver.StreamRequestHandler):
+       """Handler for a streaming logging request.
+
+       This basically logs the record using whatever logging policy is
+       configured locally.
+       """
+
+       def handle(self):
+           """
+           Handle multiple requests - each expected to be a 4-byte length,
+           followed by the LogRecord in pickle format. Logs the record
+           according to whatever policy is configured locally.
+           """
+           while True:
+               chunk = self.connection.recv(4)
+               if len(chunk) < 4:
+                   break
+               slen = struct.unpack('>L', chunk)[0]
+               chunk = self.connection.recv(slen)
+               while len(chunk) < slen:
+                   chunk = chunk + self.connection.recv(slen - len(chunk))
+               obj = self.unPickle(chunk)
+               record = logging.makeLogRecord(obj)
+               self.handleLogRecord(record)
+
+       def unPickle(self, data):
+           return pickle.loads(data)
+
+       def handleLogRecord(self, record):
+           # if a name is specified, we use the named logger rather than the one
+           # implied by the record.
+           if self.server.logname is not None:
+               name = self.server.logname
+           else:
+               name = record.name
+           logger = logging.getLogger(name)
+           # N.B. EVERY record gets logged. This is because Logger.handle
+           # is normally called AFTER logger-level filtering. If you want
+           # to do filtering, do it at the client end to save wasting
+           # cycles and network bandwidth!
+           logger.handle(record)
+
+   class LogRecordSocketReceiver(socketserver.ThreadingTCPServer):
+       """
+       Simple TCP socket-based logging receiver suitable for testing.
+       """
+
+       allow_reuse_address = 1
+
+       def __init__(self, host='localhost',
+                    port=logging.handlers.DEFAULT_TCP_LOGGING_PORT,
+                    handler=LogRecordStreamHandler):
+           socketserver.ThreadingTCPServer.__init__(self, (host, port), handler)
+           self.abort = 0
+           self.timeout = 1
+           self.logname = None
+
+       def serve_until_stopped(self):
+           import select
+           abort = 0
+           while not abort:
+               rd, wr, ex = select.select([self.socket.fileno()],
+                                          [], [],
+                                          self.timeout)
+               if rd:
+                   self.handle_request()
+               abort = self.abort
+
+   def main():
+       logging.basicConfig(
+           format='%(relativeCreated)5d %(name)-15s %(levelname)-8s %(message)s')
+       tcpserver = LogRecordSocketReceiver()
+       print('About to start TCP server...')
+       tcpserver.serve_until_stopped()
+
+   if __name__ == '__main__':
+       main()
+
+First run the server, and then the client. On the client side, nothing is
+printed on the console; on the server side, you should see something like::
+
+   About to start TCP server...
+      59 root            INFO     Jackdaws love my big sphinx of quartz.
+      59 myapp.area1     DEBUG    Quick zephyrs blow, vexing daft Jim.
+      69 myapp.area1     INFO     How quickly daft jumping zebras vex.
+      69 myapp.area2     WARNING  Jail zesty vixen who grabbed pay from quack.
+      69 myapp.area2     ERROR    The five boxing wizards jump quickly.
+
+Note that there are some security issues with pickle in some scenarios. If
+these affect you, you can use an alternative serialization scheme by overriding
+the :meth:`makePickle` method and implementing your alternative there, as
+well as adapting the above script to use your alternative serialization.
+
+
+.. _context-info:
+
+Adding contextual information to your logging output
+----------------------------------------------------
+
+Sometimes you want logging output to contain contextual information in
+addition to the parameters passed to the logging call. For example, in a
+networked application, it may be desirable to log client-specific information
+in the log (e.g. remote client's username, or IP address). Although you could
+use the *extra* parameter to achieve this, it's not always convenient to pass
+the information in this way. While it might be tempting to create
+:class:`Logger` instances on a per-connection basis, this is not a good idea
+because these instances are not garbage collected. While this is not a problem
+in practice, when the number of :class:`Logger` instances is dependent on the
+level of granularity you want to use in logging an application, it could
+be hard to manage if the number of :class:`Logger` instances becomes
+effectively unbounded.
+
+
+Using LoggerAdapters to impart contextual information
+^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
+
+An easy way in which you can pass contextual information to be output along
+with logging event information is to use the :class:`LoggerAdapter` class.
+This class is designed to look like a :class:`Logger`, so that you can call
+:meth:`debug`, :meth:`info`, :meth:`warning`, :meth:`error`,
+:meth:`exception`, :meth:`critical` and :meth:`log`. These methods have the
+same signatures as their counterparts in :class:`Logger`, so you can use the
+two types of instances interchangeably.
+
+When you create an instance of :class:`LoggerAdapter`, you pass it a
+:class:`Logger` instance and a dict-like object which contains your contextual
+information. When you call one of the logging methods on an instance of
+:class:`LoggerAdapter`, it delegates the call to the underlying instance of
+:class:`Logger` passed to its constructor, and arranges to pass the contextual
+information in the delegated call. Here's a snippet from the code of
+:class:`LoggerAdapter`::
+
+    def debug(self, msg, *args, **kwargs):
+        """
+        Delegate a debug call to the underlying logger, after adding
+        contextual information from this adapter instance.
+        """
+        msg, kwargs = self.process(msg, kwargs)
+        self.logger.debug(msg, *args, **kwargs)
+
+The :meth:`process` method of :class:`LoggerAdapter` is where the contextual
+information is added to the logging output. It's passed the message and
+keyword arguments of the logging call, and it passes back (potentially)
+modified versions of these to use in the call to the underlying logger. The
+default implementation of this method leaves the message alone, but inserts
+an 'extra' key in the keyword argument whose value is the dict-like object
+passed to the constructor. Of course, if you had passed an 'extra' keyword
+argument in the call to the adapter, it will be silently overwritten.
+
+The advantage of using 'extra' is that the values in the dict-like object are
+merged into the :class:`LogRecord` instance's __dict__, allowing you to use
+customized strings with your :class:`Formatter` instances which know about
+the keys of the dict-like object. If you need a different method, e.g. if you
+want to prepend or append the contextual information to the message string,
+you just need to subclass :class:`LoggerAdapter` and override :meth:`process`
+to do what you need. Here's an example script which uses this class, which
+also illustrates what dict-like behaviour is needed from an arbitrary
+'dict-like' object for use in the constructor::
+
+   import logging
+
+   class ConnInfo:
+       """
+       An example class which shows how an arbitrary class can be used as
+       the 'extra' context information repository passed to a LoggerAdapter.
+       """
+
+       def __getitem__(self, name):
+           """
+           To allow this instance to look like a dict.
+           """
+           from random import choice
+           if name == 'ip':
+               result = choice(['127.0.0.1', '192.168.0.1'])
+           elif name == 'user':
+               result = choice(['jim', 'fred', 'sheila'])
+           else:
+               result = self.__dict__.get(name, '?')
+           return result
+
+       def __iter__(self):
+           """
+           To allow iteration over keys, which will be merged into
+           the LogRecord dict before formatting and output.
+           """
+           keys = ['ip', 'user']
+           keys.extend(self.__dict__.keys())
+           return keys.__iter__()
+
+   if __name__ == '__main__':
+       from random import choice
+       levels = (logging.DEBUG, logging.INFO, logging.WARNING, logging.ERROR, logging.CRITICAL)
+       a1 = logging.LoggerAdapter(logging.getLogger('a.b.c'),
+                                  { 'ip' : '123.231.231.123', 'user' : 'sheila' })
+       logging.basicConfig(level=logging.DEBUG,
+                           format='%(asctime)-15s %(name)-5s %(levelname)-8s IP: %(ip)-15s User: %(user)-8s %(message)s')
+       a1.debug('A debug message')
+       a1.info('An info message with %s', 'some parameters')
+       a2 = logging.LoggerAdapter(logging.getLogger('d.e.f'), ConnInfo())
+       for x in range(10):
+           lvl = choice(levels)
+           lvlname = logging.getLevelName(lvl)
+           a2.log(lvl, 'A message at %s level with %d %s', lvlname, 2, 'parameters')
+
+When this script is run, the output should look something like this::
+
+   2008-01-18 14:49:54,023 a.b.c DEBUG    IP: 123.231.231.123 User: sheila   A debug message
+   2008-01-18 14:49:54,023 a.b.c INFO     IP: 123.231.231.123 User: sheila   An info message with some parameters
+   2008-01-18 14:49:54,023 d.e.f CRITICAL IP: 192.168.0.1     User: jim      A message at CRITICAL level with 2 parameters
+   2008-01-18 14:49:54,033 d.e.f INFO     IP: 192.168.0.1     User: jim      A message at INFO level with 2 parameters
+   2008-01-18 14:49:54,033 d.e.f WARNING  IP: 192.168.0.1     User: sheila   A message at WARNING level with 2 parameters
+   2008-01-18 14:49:54,033 d.e.f ERROR    IP: 127.0.0.1       User: fred     A message at ERROR level with 2 parameters
+   2008-01-18 14:49:54,033 d.e.f ERROR    IP: 127.0.0.1       User: sheila   A message at ERROR level with 2 parameters
+   2008-01-18 14:49:54,033 d.e.f WARNING  IP: 192.168.0.1     User: sheila   A message at WARNING level with 2 parameters
+   2008-01-18 14:49:54,033 d.e.f WARNING  IP: 192.168.0.1     User: jim      A message at WARNING level with 2 parameters
+   2008-01-18 14:49:54,033 d.e.f INFO     IP: 192.168.0.1     User: fred     A message at INFO level with 2 parameters
+   2008-01-18 14:49:54,033 d.e.f WARNING  IP: 192.168.0.1     User: sheila   A message at WARNING level with 2 parameters
+   2008-01-18 14:49:54,033 d.e.f WARNING  IP: 127.0.0.1       User: jim      A message at WARNING level with 2 parameters
+
+
+.. _filters-contextual:
+
+Using Filters to impart contextual information
+^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
+
+You can also add contextual information to log output using a user-defined
+:class:`Filter`. ``Filter`` instances are allowed to modify the ``LogRecords``
+passed to them, including adding additional attributes which can then be output
+using a suitable format string, or if needed a custom :class:`Formatter`.
+
+For example in a web application, the request being processed (or at least,
+the interesting parts of it) can be stored in a threadlocal
+(:class:`threading.local`) variable, and then accessed from a ``Filter`` to
+add, say, information from the request - say, the remote IP address and remote
+user's username - to the ``LogRecord``, using the attribute names 'ip' and
+'user' as in the ``LoggerAdapter`` example above. In that case, the same format
+string can be used to get similar output to that shown above. Here's an example
+script::
+
+    import logging
+    from random import choice
+
+    class ContextFilter(logging.Filter):
+        """
+        This is a filter which injects contextual information into the log.
+
+        Rather than use actual contextual information, we just use random
+        data in this demo.
+        """
+
+        USERS = ['jim', 'fred', 'sheila']
+        IPS = ['123.231.231.123', '127.0.0.1', '192.168.0.1']
+
+        def filter(self, record):
+
+            record.ip = choice(ContextFilter.IPS)
+            record.user = choice(ContextFilter.USERS)
+            return True
+
+    if __name__ == '__main__':
+       levels = (logging.DEBUG, logging.INFO, logging.WARNING, logging.ERROR, logging.CRITICAL)
+       a1 = logging.LoggerAdapter(logging.getLogger('a.b.c'),
+                                  { 'ip' : '123.231.231.123', 'user' : 'sheila' })
+       logging.basicConfig(level=logging.DEBUG,
+                           format='%(asctime)-15s %(name)-5s %(levelname)-8s IP: %(ip)-15s User: %(user)-8s %(message)s')
+       a1 = logging.getLogger('a.b.c')
+       a2 = logging.getLogger('d.e.f')
+
+       f = ContextFilter()
+       a1.addFilter(f)
+       a2.addFilter(f)
+       a1.debug('A debug message')
+       a1.info('An info message with %s', 'some parameters')
+       for x in range(10):
+           lvl = choice(levels)
+           lvlname = logging.getLevelName(lvl)
+           a2.log(lvl, 'A message at %s level with %d %s', lvlname, 2, 'parameters')
+
+which, when run, produces something like::
+
+    2010-09-06 22:38:15,292 a.b.c DEBUG    IP: 123.231.231.123 User: fred     A debug message
+    2010-09-06 22:38:15,300 a.b.c INFO     IP: 192.168.0.1     User: sheila   An info message with some parameters
+    2010-09-06 22:38:15,300 d.e.f CRITICAL IP: 127.0.0.1       User: sheila   A message at CRITICAL level with 2 parameters
+    2010-09-06 22:38:15,300 d.e.f ERROR    IP: 127.0.0.1       User: jim      A message at ERROR level with 2 parameters
+    2010-09-06 22:38:15,300 d.e.f DEBUG    IP: 127.0.0.1       User: sheila   A message at DEBUG level with 2 parameters
+    2010-09-06 22:38:15,300 d.e.f ERROR    IP: 123.231.231.123 User: fred     A message at ERROR level with 2 parameters
+    2010-09-06 22:38:15,300 d.e.f CRITICAL IP: 192.168.0.1     User: jim      A message at CRITICAL level with 2 parameters
+    2010-09-06 22:38:15,300 d.e.f CRITICAL IP: 127.0.0.1       User: sheila   A message at CRITICAL level with 2 parameters
+    2010-09-06 22:38:15,300 d.e.f DEBUG    IP: 192.168.0.1     User: jim      A message at DEBUG level with 2 parameters
+    2010-09-06 22:38:15,301 d.e.f ERROR    IP: 127.0.0.1       User: sheila   A message at ERROR level with 2 parameters
+    2010-09-06 22:38:15,301 d.e.f DEBUG    IP: 123.231.231.123 User: fred     A message at DEBUG level with 2 parameters
+    2010-09-06 22:38:15,301 d.e.f INFO     IP: 123.231.231.123 User: fred     A message at INFO level with 2 parameters
+
+
+.. _multiple-processes:
+
+Logging to a single file from multiple processes
+------------------------------------------------
+
+Although logging is thread-safe, and logging to a single file from multiple
+threads in a single process *is* supported, logging to a single file from
+*multiple processes* is *not* supported, because there is no standard way to
+serialize access to a single file across multiple processes in Python. If you
+need to log to a single file from multiple processes, one way of doing this is
+to have all the processes log to a :class:`SocketHandler`, and have a separate
+process which implements a socket server which reads from the socket and logs
+to file. (If you prefer, you can dedicate one thread in one of the existing
+processes to perform this function.) The following section documents this
+approach in more detail and includes a working socket receiver which can be
+used as a starting point for you to adapt in your own applications.
+
+If you are using a recent version of Python which includes the
+:mod:`multiprocessing` module, you could write your own handler which uses the
+:class:`Lock` class from this module to serialize access to the file from
+your processes. The existing :class:`FileHandler` and subclasses do not make
+use of :mod:`multiprocessing` at present, though they may do so in the future.
+Note that at present, the :mod:`multiprocessing` module does not provide
+working lock functionality on all platforms (see
+http://bugs.python.org/issue3770).
+
+.. currentmodule:: logging.handlers
+
+Alternatively, you can use a ``Queue`` and a :class:`QueueHandler` to send
+all logging events to one of the processes in your multi-process application.
+The following example script demonstrates how you can do this; in the example
+a separate listener process listens for events sent by other processes and logs
+them according to its own logging configuration. Although the example only
+demonstrates one way of doing it (for example, you may want to use a listener
+thread rather than a separate listener process - the implementation would be
+analogous) it does allow for completely different logging configurations for
+the listener and the other processes in your application, and can be used as
+the basis for code meeting your own specific requirements::
+
+    # You'll need these imports in your own code
+    import logging
+    import logging.handlers
+    import multiprocessing
+
+    # Next two import lines for this demo only
+    from random import choice, random
+    import time
+
+    #
+    # Because you'll want to define the logging configurations for listener and workers, the
+    # listener and worker process functions take a configurer parameter which is a callable
+    # for configuring logging for that process. These functions are also passed the queue,
+    # which they use for communication.
+    #
+    # In practice, you can configure the listener however you want, but note that in this
+    # simple example, the listener does not apply level or filter logic to received records.
+    # In practice, you would probably want to do ths logic in the worker processes, to avoid
+    # sending events which would be filtered out between processes.
+    #
+    # The size of the rotated files is made small so you can see the results easily.
+    def listener_configurer():
+        root = logging.getLogger()
+        h = logging.handlers.RotatingFileHandler('/tmp/mptest.log', 'a', 300, 10)
+        f = logging.Formatter('%(asctime)s %(processName)-10s %(name)s %(levelname)-8s %(message)s')
+        h.setFormatter(f)
+        root.addHandler(h)
+
+    # This is the listener process top-level loop: wait for logging events
+    # (LogRecords)on the queue and handle them, quit when you get a None for a
+    # LogRecord.
+    def listener_process(queue, configurer):
+        configurer()
+        while True:
+            try:
+                record = queue.get()
+                if record is None: # We send this as a sentinel to tell the listener to quit.
+                    break
+                logger = logging.getLogger(record.name)
+                logger.handle(record) # No level or filter logic applied - just do it!
+            except (KeyboardInterrupt, SystemExit):
+                raise
+            except:
+                import sys, traceback
+                print >> sys.stderr, 'Whoops! Problem:'
+                traceback.print_exc(file=sys.stderr)
+
+    # Arrays used for random selections in this demo
+
+    LEVELS = [logging.DEBUG, logging.INFO, logging.WARNING,
+              logging.ERROR, logging.CRITICAL]
+
+    LOGGERS = ['a.b.c', 'd.e.f']
+
+    MESSAGES = [
+        'Random message #1',
+        'Random message #2',
+        'Random message #3',
+    ]
+
+    # The worker configuration is done at the start of the worker process run.
+    # Note that on Windows you can't rely on fork semantics, so each process
+    # will run the logging configuration code when it starts.
+    def worker_configurer(queue):
+        h = logging.handlers.QueueHandler(queue) # Just the one handler needed
+        root = logging.getLogger()
+        root.addHandler(h)
+        root.setLevel(logging.DEBUG) # send all messages, for demo; no other level or filter logic applied.
+
+    # This is the worker process top-level loop, which just logs ten events with
+    # random intervening delays before terminating.
+    # The print messages are just so you know it's doing something!
+    def worker_process(queue, configurer):
+        configurer(queue)
+        name = multiprocessing.current_process().name
+        print('Worker started: %s' % name)
+        for i in range(10):
+            time.sleep(random())
+            logger = logging.getLogger(choice(LOGGERS))
+            level = choice(LEVELS)
+            message = choice(MESSAGES)
+            logger.log(level, message)
+        print('Worker finished: %s' % name)
+
+    # Here's where the demo gets orchestrated. Create the queue, create and start
+    # the listener, create ten workers and start them, wait for them to finish,
+    # then send a None to the queue to tell the listener to finish.
+    def main():
+        queue = multiprocessing.Queue(-1)
+        listener = multiprocessing.Process(target=listener_process,
+                                           args=(queue, listener_configurer))
+        listener.start()
+        workers = []
+        for i in range(10):
+            worker = multiprocessing.Process(target=worker_process,
+                                           args=(queue, worker_configurer))
+            workers.append(worker)
+            worker.start()
+        for w in workers:
+            w.join()
+        queue.put_nowait(None)
+        listener.join()
+
+    if __name__ == '__main__':
+        main()
+
+
+Using file rotation
+-------------------
+
+.. sectionauthor:: Doug Hellmann, Vinay Sajip (changes)
+.. (see <http://blog.doughellmann.com/2007/05/pymotw-logging.html>)
+
+Sometimes you want to let a log file grow to a certain size, then open a new
+file and log to that. You may want to keep a certain number of these files, and
+when that many files have been created, rotate the files so that the number of
+files and the size of the files both remin bounded. For this usage pattern, the
+logging package provides a :class:`RotatingFileHandler`::
+
+   import glob
+   import logging
+   import logging.handlers
+
+   LOG_FILENAME = 'logging_rotatingfile_example.out'
+
+   # Set up a specific logger with our desired output level
+   my_logger = logging.getLogger('MyLogger')
+   my_logger.setLevel(logging.DEBUG)
+
+   # Add the log message handler to the logger
+   handler = logging.handlers.RotatingFileHandler(
+                 LOG_FILENAME, maxBytes=20, backupCount=5)
+
+   my_logger.addHandler(handler)
+
+   # Log some messages
+   for i in range(20):
+       my_logger.debug('i = %d' % i)
+
+   # See what files are created
+   logfiles = glob.glob('%s*' % LOG_FILENAME)
+
+   for filename in logfiles:
+       print(filename)
+
+The result should be 6 separate files, each with part of the log history for the
+application::
+
+   logging_rotatingfile_example.out
+   logging_rotatingfile_example.out.1
+   logging_rotatingfile_example.out.2
+   logging_rotatingfile_example.out.3
+   logging_rotatingfile_example.out.4
+   logging_rotatingfile_example.out.5
+
+The most current file is always :file:`logging_rotatingfile_example.out`,
+and each time it reaches the size limit it is renamed with the suffix
+``.1``. Each of the existing backup files is renamed to increment the suffix
+(``.1`` becomes ``.2``, etc.)  and the ``.6`` file is erased.
+
+Obviously this example sets the log length much much too small as an extreme
+example.  You would want to set *maxBytes* to an appropriate value.
+
+.. _zeromq-handlers:
+
+Subclassing QueueHandler
+------------------------
+
+You can use a :class:`QueueHandler` subclass to send messages to other kinds
+of queues, for example a ZeroMQ 'publish' socket. In the example below,the
+socket is created separately and passed to the handler (as its 'queue')::
+
+    import zmq # using pyzmq, the Python binding for ZeroMQ
+    import json # for serializing records portably
+
+    ctx = zmq.Context()
+    sock = zmq.Socket(ctx, zmq.PUB) # or zmq.PUSH, or other suitable value
+    sock.bind('tcp://*:5556') # or wherever
+
+    class ZeroMQSocketHandler(QueueHandler):
+        def enqueue(self, record):
+            data = json.dumps(record.__dict__)
+            self.queue.send(data)
+
+    handler = ZeroMQSocketHandler(sock)
+
+
+Of course there are other ways of organizing this, for example passing in the
+data needed by the handler to create the socket::
+
+    class ZeroMQSocketHandler(QueueHandler):
+        def __init__(self, uri, socktype=zmq.PUB, ctx=None):
+            self.ctx = ctx or zmq.Context()
+            socket = zmq.Socket(self.ctx, socktype)
+            socket.bind(uri)
+            QueueHandler.__init__(self, socket)
+
+        def enqueue(self, record):
+            data = json.dumps(record.__dict__)
+            self.queue.send(data)
+
+        def close(self):
+            self.queue.close()
+
+
+Subclassing QueueListener
+-------------------------
+
+You can also subclass :class:`QueueListener` to get messages from other kinds
+of queues, for example a ZeroMQ 'subscribe' socket. Here's an example::
+
+    class ZeroMQSocketListener(QueueListener):
+        def __init__(self, uri, *handlers, **kwargs):
+            self.ctx = kwargs.get('ctx') or zmq.Context()
+            socket = zmq.Socket(self.ctx, zmq.SUB)
+            socket.setsockopt(zmq.SUBSCRIBE, '') # subscribe to everything
+            socket.connect(uri)
+
+        def dequeue(self):
+            msg = self.queue.recv()
+            return logging.makeLogRecord(json.loads(msg))
+
+
+
diff --git a/Doc/howto/logging.rst b/Doc/howto/logging.rst
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..5090ff6
--- /dev/null
+++ b/Doc/howto/logging.rst
@@ -0,0 +1,1016 @@
+=============
+Logging HOWTO
+=============
+
+:Author: Vinay Sajip <vinay_sajip at red-dove dot com>
+
+.. Contents::
+
+.. _logging-basic-tutorial:
+
+.. currentmodule:: logging
+
+Basic Logging Tutorial
+----------------------
+
+Logging is a means of tracking events that happen when some software runs. The
+software's developer adds logging calls to their code to indicate that certain
+events have occurred. An event is described by a descriptive message which can
+optionally contain variable data (i.e. data that is potentially different for
+each occurrence of the event). Events also have an importance which the
+developer ascribes to the event; the importance can also be called the *level*
+or *severity*.
+
+When to use logging
+^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
+
+Logging provides a set of convenience functions for simple logging usage. These
+are :func:`debug`, :func:`info`, :func:`warning`, :func:`error` and
+:func:`critical`. To determine when to use logging, see the table below, which
+states, for each of a set of common tasks, the best tool to use for it.
+
++-------------------------------------+--------------------------------------+
+| Task you want to perform            | The best tool for the task           |
++=====================================+======================================+
+| Display console output for ordinary | :func:`print`                        |
+| usage of a command line script or   |                                      |
+| program                             |                                      |
++-------------------------------------+--------------------------------------+
+| Report events that occur during     | :func:`logging.info` (or             |
+| normal operation of a program (e.g. | :func:`logging.debug` for very       |
+| for status monitoring or fault      | detailed output for diagnostic       |
+| investigation)                      | purposes)                            |
++-------------------------------------+--------------------------------------+
+| Issue a warning regarding a         | :func:`warnings.warn` in library     |
+| particular runtime event            | code if the issue is avoidable and   |
+|                                     | the client application should be     |
+|                                     | modified to eliminate the warning    |
+|                                     |                                      |
+|                                     | :func:`logging.warning` if there is  |
+|                                     | nothing the client application can do|
+|                                     | about the situation, but the event   |
+|                                     | should still be noted                |
++-------------------------------------+--------------------------------------+
+| Report an error regarding a         | Raise an exception                   |
+| particular runtime event            |                                      |
++-------------------------------------+--------------------------------------+
+| Report suppression of an error      | :func:`logging.error`,               |
+| without raising an exception (e.g.  | :func:`logging.exception` or         |
+| error handler in a long-running     | :func:`logging.critical` as          |
+| server process)                     | appropriate for the specific error   |
+|                                     | and application domain               |
++-------------------------------------+--------------------------------------+
+
+The logging functions are named after the level or severity of the events
+they are used to track. The standard levels and their applicability are
+described below (in increasing order of severity):
+
++--------------+---------------------------------------------+
+| Level        | When it's used                              |
++==============+=============================================+
+| ``DEBUG``    | Detailed information, typically of interest |
+|              | only when diagnosing problems.              |
++--------------+---------------------------------------------+
+| ``INFO``     | Confirmation that things are working as     |
+|              | expected.                                   |
++--------------+---------------------------------------------+
+| ``WARNING``  | An indication that something unexpected     |
+|              | happened, or indicative of some problem in  |
+|              | the near future (e.g. 'disk space low').    |
+|              | The software is still working as expected.  |
++--------------+---------------------------------------------+
+| ``ERROR``    | Due to a more serious problem, the software |
+|              | has not been able to perform some function. |
++--------------+---------------------------------------------+
+| ``CRITICAL`` | A serious error, indicating that the program|
+|              | itself may be unable to continue running.   |
++--------------+---------------------------------------------+
+
+The default level is ``WARNING``, which means that only events of this level
+and above will be tracked, unless the logging package is configured to do
+otherwise.
+
+Events that are tracked can be handled in different ways. The simplest way of
+handling tracked events is to print them to the console. Another common way
+is to write them to a disk file.
+
+
+.. _howto-minimal-example:
+
+A simple example
+^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
+
+A very simple example is::
+
+   import logging
+   logging.warning('Watch out!') # will print a message to the console
+   logging.info('I told you so') # will not print anything
+
+If you type these lines into a script and run it, you'll see::
+
+   WARNING:root:Watch out!
+
+printed out on the console. The ``INFO`` message doesn't appear because the
+default level is ``WARNING``. The printed message includes the indication of
+the level and the description of the event provided in the logging call, i.e.
+'Watch out!'. Don't worry about the 'root' part for now: it will be explained
+later. The actual output can be formatted quite flexibly if you need that;
+formatting options will also be explained later.
+
+
+Logging to a file
+^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
+
+A very common situation is that of recording logging events in a file, so let's
+look at that next::
+
+   import logging
+   logging.basicConfig(filename='example.log',level=logging.DEBUG)
+   logging.debug('This message should go to the log file')
+   logging.info('So should this')
+   logging.warning('And this, too')
+
+And now if we open the file and look at what we have, we should find the log
+messages::
+
+   DEBUG:root:This message should go to the log file
+   INFO:root:So should this
+   WARNING:root:And this, too
+
+This example also shows how you can set the logging level which acts as the
+threshold for tracking. In this case, because we set the threshold to
+``DEBUG``, all of the messages were printed.
+
+If you want to set the logging level from a command-line option such as::
+
+   --log=INFO
+
+and you have the value of the parameter passed for ``--log`` in some variable
+*loglevel*, you can use::
+
+   getattr(logging, loglevel.upper())
+
+to get the value which you'll pass to :func:`basicConfig` via the *level*
+argument. You may want to error check any user input value, perhaps as in the
+following example::
+
+   # assuming loglevel is bound to the string value obtained from the
+   # command line argument. Convert to upper case to allow the user to
+   # specify --log=DEBUG or --log=debug
+   numeric_level = getattr(logging, loglevel.upper(), None)
+   if not isinstance(numeric_level, int):
+       raise ValueError('Invalid log level: %s' % loglevel)
+   logging.basicConfig(level=numeric_level, ...)
+
+The call to :func:`basicConfig` should come *before* any calls to :func:`debug`,
+:func:`info` etc. As it's intended as a one-off simple configuration facility,
+only the first call will actually do anything: subsequent calls are effectively
+no-ops.
+
+If you run the above script several times, the messages from successive runs
+are appended to the file *example.log*. If you want each run to start afresh,
+not remembering the messages from earlier runs, you can specify the *filemode*
+argument, by changing the call in the above example to::
+
+   logging.basicConfig(filename='example.log', filemode='w', level=logging.DEBUG)
+
+The output will be the same as before, but the log file is no longer appended
+to, so the messages from earlier runs are lost.
+
+
+Logging from multiple modules
+^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
+
+If your program consists of multiple modules, here's an example of how you
+could organize logging in it::
+
+   # myapp.py
+   import logging
+   import mylib
+
+   def main():
+       logging.basicConfig(filename='myapp.log', level=logging.INFO)
+       logging.info('Started')
+       mylib.do_something()
+       logging.info('Finished')
+
+   if __name__ == '__main__':
+       main()
+
+::
+
+   # mylib.py
+   import logging
+
+   def do_something():
+       logging.info('Doing something')
+
+If you run *myapp.py*, you should see this in *myapp.log*::
+
+   INFO:root:Started
+   INFO:root:Doing something
+   INFO:root:Finished
+
+which is hopefully what you were expecting to see. You can generalize this to
+multiple modules, using the pattern in *mylib.py*. Note that for this simple
+usage pattern, you won't know, by looking in the log file, *where* in your
+application your messages came from, apart from looking at the event
+description. If you want to track the location of your messages, you'll need
+to refer to the documentation beyond the tutorial level - see
+:ref:`advanced-logging-tutorial`.
+
+
+Logging variable data
+^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
+
+To log variable data, use a format string for the event description message and
+append the variable data as arguments. For example::
+
+   import logging
+   logging.warning('%s before you %s', 'Look', 'leap!')
+
+will display::
+
+   WARNING:root:Look before you leap!
+
+As you can see, merging of variable data into the event description message
+uses the old, %-style of string formatting. This is for backwards
+compatibility: the logging package pre-dates newer formatting options such as
+:meth:`str.format` and :class:`string.Template`. These newer formatting
+options *are* supported, but exploring them is outside the scope of this
+tutorial.
+
+
+Changing the format of displayed messages
+^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
+
+To change the format which is used to display messages, you need to
+specify the format you want to use::
+
+   import logging
+   logging.basicConfig(format='%(levelname)s:%(message)s', level=logging.DEBUG)
+   logging.debug('This message should appear on the console')
+   logging.info('So should this')
+   logging.warning('And this, too')
+
+which would print::
+
+   DEBUG:This message should appear on the console
+   INFO:So should this
+   WARNING:And this, too
+
+Notice that the 'root' which appeared in earlier examples has disappeared. For
+a full set of things that can appear in format strings, you can refer to the
+documentation for :ref:`logrecord-attributes`, but for simple usage, you just
+need the *levelname* (severity), *message* (event description, including
+variable data) and perhaps to display when the event occurred. This is
+described in the next section.
+
+
+Displaying the date/time in messages
+^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
+
+To display the date and time of an event, you would place '%(asctime)s' in
+your format string::
+
+   import logging
+   logging.basicConfig(format='%(asctime)s %(message)s')
+   logging.warning('is when this event was logged.')
+
+which should print something like this::
+
+   2010-12-12 11:41:42,612 is when this event was logged.
+
+The default format for date/time display (shown above) is ISO8601. If you need
+more control over the formatting of the date/time, provide a *datefmt*
+argument to ``basicConfig``, as in this example::
+
+   import logging
+   logging.basicConfig(format='%(asctime)s %(message)s', datefmt='%m/%d/%Y %I:%M:%S %p')
+   logging.warning('is when this event was logged.')
+
+which would display something like this::
+
+   12/12/2010 11:46:36 AM is when this event was logged.
+
+The format of the *datefmt* argument is the same as supported by
+:func:`time.strftime`.
+
+
+Next Steps
+^^^^^^^^^^
+
+That concludes the basic tutorial. It should be enough to get you up and
+running with logging. There's a lot more that the logging package offers, but
+to get the best out of it, you'll need to invest a little more of your time in
+reading the following sections. If you're ready for that, grab some of your
+favourite beverage and carry on.
+
+If your logging needs are simple, then use the above examples to incorporate
+logging into your own scripts, and if you run into problems or don't
+understand something, please post a question on the comp.lang.python Usenet
+group (available at http://groups.google.com/group/comp.lang.python) and you
+should receive help before too long.
+
+Still here? There's no need to read the whole of the logging documentation in
+linear fashion, top to bottom (there's quite a lot of it still to come). You
+can carry on reading the next few sections, which provide a slightly more
+advanced/in-depth tutorial than the basic one above. After that, you can
+take a look at the :ref:`logging-cookbook`.
+
+.. _logging-advanced-tutorial:
+
+
+Advanced Logging Tutorial
+-------------------------
+
+The logging library takes a modular approach and offers several categories
+of components: loggers, handlers, filters, and formatters.
+
+* Loggers expose the interface that application code directly uses.
+* Handlers send the log records (created by loggers) to the appropriate
+  destination.
+* Filters provide a finer grained facility for determining which log records
+  to output.
+* Formatters specify the layout of log records in the final output.
+
+Logging is performed by calling methods on instances of the :class:`Logger`
+class (hereafter called :dfn:`loggers`). Each instance has a name, and they are
+conceptually arranged in a namespace hierarchy using dots (periods) as
+separators. For example, a logger named 'scan' is the parent of loggers
+'scan.text', 'scan.html' and 'scan.pdf'. Logger names can be anything you want,
+and indicate the area of an application in which a logged message originates.
+
+A good convention to use when naming loggers is to use a module-level logger,
+in each module which uses logging, named as follows::
+
+   logger = logging.getLogger(__name__)
+
+This means that logger names track the package/module hierarchy, and it's
+intuitively obvious where events are logged just from the logger name.
+
+The root of the hierarchy of loggers is called the root logger. That's the
+logger used by the functions :func:`debug`, :func:`info`, :func:`warning`,
+:func:`error` and :func:`critical`, which just call the same-named method of
+the root logger. The functions and the methods have the same signatures. The
+root logger's name is printed as 'root' in the logged output.
+
+It is, of course, possible to log messages to different destinations. Support
+is included in the package for writing log messages to files, HTTP GET/POST
+locations, email via SMTP, generic sockets, queues, or OS-specific logging
+mechanisms such as syslog or the Windows NT event log. Destinations are served
+by :dfn:`handler` classes. You can create your own log destination class if
+you have special requirements not met by any of the built-in handler classes.
+
+By default, no destination is set for any logging messages. You can specify
+a destination (such as console or file) by using :func:`basicConfig` as in the
+tutorial examples. If you call the functions  :func:`debug`, :func:`info`,
+:func:`warning`, :func:`error` and :func:`critical`, they will check to see
+if no destination is set; and if one is not set, they will set a destination
+of the console (``sys.stderr``) and a default format for the displayed
+message before delegating to the root logger to do the actual message output.
+
+The default format set by :func:`basicConfig` for messages is::
+
+   severity:logger name:message
+
+You can change this by passing a format string to :func:`basicConfig` with the
+*format* keyword argument. For all options regarding how a format string is
+constructed, see :ref:`formatter-objects`.
+
+
+Loggers
+^^^^^^^
+
+:class:`Logger` objects have a threefold job.  First, they expose several
+methods to application code so that applications can log messages at runtime.
+Second, logger objects determine which log messages to act upon based upon
+severity (the default filtering facility) or filter objects.  Third, logger
+objects pass along relevant log messages to all interested log handlers.
+
+The most widely used methods on logger objects fall into two categories:
+configuration and message sending.
+
+These are the most common configuration methods:
+
+* :meth:`Logger.setLevel` specifies the lowest-severity log message a logger
+  will handle, where debug is the lowest built-in severity level and critical
+  is the highest built-in severity.  For example, if the severity level is
+  INFO, the logger will handle only INFO, WARNING, ERROR, and CRITICAL messages
+  and will ignore DEBUG messages.
+
+* :meth:`Logger.addHandler` and :meth:`Logger.removeHandler` add and remove
+  handler objects from the logger object.  Handlers are covered in more detail
+  in :ref:`handler-basic`.
+
+* :meth:`Logger.addFilter` and :meth:`Logger.removeFilter` add and remove filter
+  objects from the logger object.  Filters are covered in more detail in
+  :ref:`filter`.
+
+You don't need to always call these methods on every logger you create. See the
+last two paragraphs in this section.
+
+With the logger object configured, the following methods create log messages:
+
+* :meth:`Logger.debug`, :meth:`Logger.info`, :meth:`Logger.warning`,
+  :meth:`Logger.error`, and :meth:`Logger.critical` all create log records with
+  a message and a level that corresponds to their respective method names. The
+  message is actually a format string, which may contain the standard string
+  substitution syntax of :const:`%s`, :const:`%d`, :const:`%f`, and so on.  The
+  rest of their arguments is a list of objects that correspond with the
+  substitution fields in the message.  With regard to :const:`**kwargs`, the
+  logging methods care only about a keyword of :const:`exc_info` and use it to
+  determine whether to log exception information.
+
+* :meth:`Logger.exception` creates a log message similar to
+  :meth:`Logger.error`.  The difference is that :meth:`Logger.exception` dumps a
+  stack trace along with it.  Call this method only from an exception handler.
+
+* :meth:`Logger.log` takes a log level as an explicit argument.  This is a
+  little more verbose for logging messages than using the log level convenience
+  methods listed above, but this is how to log at custom log levels.
+
+:func:`getLogger` returns a reference to a logger instance with the specified
+name if it is provided, or ``root`` if not.  The names are period-separated
+hierarchical structures.  Multiple calls to :func:`getLogger` with the same name
+will return a reference to the same logger object.  Loggers that are further
+down in the hierarchical list are children of loggers higher up in the list.
+For example, given a logger with a name of ``foo``, loggers with names of
+``foo.bar``, ``foo.bar.baz``, and ``foo.bam`` are all descendants of ``foo``.
+
+Loggers have a concept of *effective level*. If a level is not explicitly set
+on a logger, the level of its parent is used instead as its effective level.
+If the parent has no explicit level set, *its* parent is examined, and so on -
+all ancestors are searched until an explicitly set level is found. The root
+logger always has an explicit level set (``WARNING`` by default). When deciding
+whether to process an event, the effective level of the logger is used to
+determine whether the event is passed to the logger's handlers.
+
+Child loggers propagate messages up to the handlers associated with their
+ancestor loggers. Because of this, it is unnecessary to define and configure
+handlers for all the loggers an application uses. It is sufficient to
+configure handlers for a top-level logger and create child loggers as needed.
+(You can, however, turn off propagation by setting the *propagate*
+attribute of a logger to *False*.)
+
+
+.. _handler-basic:
+
+Handlers
+^^^^^^^^
+
+:class:`Handler` objects are responsible for dispatching the appropriate log
+messages (based on the log messages' severity) to the handler's specified
+destination.  Logger objects can add zero or more handler objects to themselves
+with an :func:`addHandler` method.  As an example scenario, an application may
+want to send all log messages to a log file, all log messages of error or higher
+to stdout, and all messages of critical to an email address.  This scenario
+requires three individual handlers where each handler is responsible for sending
+messages of a specific severity to a specific location.
+
+The standard library includes quite a few handler types (see
+:ref:`useful-handlers`); the tutorials use mainly :class:`StreamHandler` and
+:class:`FileHandler` in its examples.
+
+There are very few methods in a handler for application developers to concern
+themselves with.  The only handler methods that seem relevant for application
+developers who are using the built-in handler objects (that is, not creating
+custom handlers) are the following configuration methods:
+
+* The :meth:`Handler.setLevel` method, just as in logger objects, specifies the
+  lowest severity that will be dispatched to the appropriate destination.  Why
+  are there two :func:`setLevel` methods?  The level set in the logger
+  determines which severity of messages it will pass to its handlers.  The level
+  set in each handler determines which messages that handler will send on.
+
+* :func:`setFormatter` selects a Formatter object for this handler to use.
+
+* :func:`addFilter` and :func:`removeFilter` respectively configure and
+  deconfigure filter objects on handlers.
+
+Application code should not directly instantiate and use instances of
+:class:`Handler`.  Instead, the :class:`Handler` class is a base class that
+defines the interface that all handlers should have and establishes some
+default behavior that child classes can use (or override).
+
+
+Formatters
+^^^^^^^^^^
+
+Formatter objects configure the final order, structure, and contents of the log
+message.  Unlike the base :class:`logging.Handler` class, application code may
+instantiate formatter classes, although you could likely subclass the formatter
+if your application needs special behavior.  The constructor takes three
+optional arguments -- a message format string, a date format string and a style
+indicator.
+
+.. method:: logging.Formatter.__init__(fmt=None, datefmt=None, style='%')
+
+If there is no message format string, the default is to use the
+raw message.  If there is no date format string, the default date format is::
+
+    %Y-%m-%d %H:%M:%S
+
+with the milliseconds tacked on at the end. The ``style`` is one of `%`, '{'
+or '$'. If one of these is not specified, then '%' will be used.
+
+If the ``style`` is '%', the message format string uses
+``%(<dictionary key>)s`` styled string substitution; the possible keys are
+documented in :ref:`logrecord-attributes`. If the style is '{', the message
+format string is assumed to be compatible with :meth:`str.format` (using
+keyword arguments), while if the style is '$' then the message format string
+should conform to what is expected by :meth:`string.Template.substitute`.
+
+.. versionchanged:: 3.2
+   Added the ``style`` parameter.
+
+The following message format string will log the time in a human-readable
+format, the severity of the message, and the contents of the message, in that
+order::
+
+    '%(asctime)s - %(levelname)s - %(message)s'
+
+Formatters use a user-configurable function to convert the creation time of a
+record to a tuple. By default, :func:`time.localtime` is used; to change this
+for a particular formatter instance, set the ``converter`` attribute of the
+instance to a function with the same signature as :func:`time.localtime` or
+:func:`time.gmtime`. To change it for all formatters, for example if you want
+all logging times to be shown in GMT, set the ``converter`` attribute in the
+Formatter class (to ``time.gmtime`` for GMT display).
+
+
+Configuring Logging
+^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
+
+Programmers can configure logging in three ways:
+
+1. Creating loggers, handlers, and formatters explicitly using Python
+   code that calls the configuration methods listed above.
+2. Creating a logging config file and reading it using the :func:`fileConfig`
+   function.
+3. Creating a dictionary of configuration information and passing it
+   to the :func:`dictConfig` function.
+
+For the reference documentation on the last two options, see :ref:`config-ref`.
+The following example configures a very simple logger, a console handler, and
+a simple formatter using Python code::
+
+    import logging
+
+    # create logger
+    logger = logging.getLogger('simple_example')
+    logger.setLevel(logging.DEBUG)
+
+    # create console handler and set level to debug
+    ch = logging.StreamHandler()
+    ch.setLevel(logging.DEBUG)
+
+    # create formatter
+    formatter = logging.Formatter('%(asctime)s - %(name)s - %(levelname)s - %(message)s')
+
+    # add formatter to ch
+    ch.setFormatter(formatter)
+
+    # add ch to logger
+    logger.addHandler(ch)
+
+    # 'application' code
+    logger.debug('debug message')
+    logger.info('info message')
+    logger.warn('warn message')
+    logger.error('error message')
+    logger.critical('critical message')
+
+Running this module from the command line produces the following output::
+
+    $ python simple_logging_module.py
+    2005-03-19 15:10:26,618 - simple_example - DEBUG - debug message
+    2005-03-19 15:10:26,620 - simple_example - INFO - info message
+    2005-03-19 15:10:26,695 - simple_example - WARNING - warn message
+    2005-03-19 15:10:26,697 - simple_example - ERROR - error message
+    2005-03-19 15:10:26,773 - simple_example - CRITICAL - critical message
+
+The following Python module creates a logger, handler, and formatter nearly
+identical to those in the example listed above, with the only difference being
+the names of the objects::
+
+    import logging
+    import logging.config
+
+    logging.config.fileConfig('logging.conf')
+
+    # create logger
+    logger = logging.getLogger('simpleExample')
+
+    # 'application' code
+    logger.debug('debug message')
+    logger.info('info message')
+    logger.warn('warn message')
+    logger.error('error message')
+    logger.critical('critical message')
+
+Here is the logging.conf file::
+
+    [loggers]
+    keys=root,simpleExample
+
+    [handlers]
+    keys=consoleHandler
+
+    [formatters]
+    keys=simpleFormatter
+
+    [logger_root]
+    level=DEBUG
+    handlers=consoleHandler
+
+    [logger_simpleExample]
+    level=DEBUG
+    handlers=consoleHandler
+    qualname=simpleExample
+    propagate=0
+
+    [handler_consoleHandler]
+    class=StreamHandler
+    level=DEBUG
+    formatter=simpleFormatter
+    args=(sys.stdout,)
+
+    [formatter_simpleFormatter]
+    format=%(asctime)s - %(name)s - %(levelname)s - %(message)s
+    datefmt=
+
+The output is nearly identical to that of the non-config-file-based example::
+
+    $ python simple_logging_config.py
+    2005-03-19 15:38:55,977 - simpleExample - DEBUG - debug message
+    2005-03-19 15:38:55,979 - simpleExample - INFO - info message
+    2005-03-19 15:38:56,054 - simpleExample - WARNING - warn message
+    2005-03-19 15:38:56,055 - simpleExample - ERROR - error message
+    2005-03-19 15:38:56,130 - simpleExample - CRITICAL - critical message
+
+You can see that the config file approach has a few advantages over the Python
+code approach, mainly separation of configuration and code and the ability of
+noncoders to easily modify the logging properties.
+
+Note that the class names referenced in config files need to be either relative
+to the logging module, or absolute values which can be resolved using normal
+import mechanisms. Thus, you could use either
+:class:`handlers.WatchedFileHandler` (relative to the logging module) or
+``mypackage.mymodule.MyHandler`` (for a class defined in package ``mypackage``
+and module ``mymodule``, where ``mypackage`` is available on the Python import
+path).
+
+In Python 3.2, a new means of configuring logging has been introduced, using
+dictionaries to hold configuration information. This provides a superset of the
+functionality of the config-file-based approach outlined above, and is the
+recommended configuration method for new applications and deployments. Because
+a Python dictionary is used to hold configuration information, and since you
+can populate that dictionary using different means, you have more options for
+configuration. For example, you can use a configuration file in JSON format,
+or, if you have access to YAML processing functionality, a file in YAML
+format, to populate the configuration dictionary. Or, of course, you can
+construct the dictionary in Python code, receive it in pickled form over a
+socket, or use whatever approach makes sense for your application.
+
+Here's an example of the same configuration as above, in YAML format for
+the new dictionary-based approach::
+
+    version: 1
+    formatters:
+      simple:
+        format: format=%(asctime)s - %(name)s - %(levelname)s - %(message)s
+    handlers:
+      console:
+        class: logging.StreamHandler
+        level: DEBUG
+        formatter: simple
+        stream: ext://sys.stdout
+    loggers:
+      simpleExample:
+        level: DEBUG
+        handlers: [console]
+        propagate: no
+    root:
+      level: DEBUG
+      handlers: [console]
+
+For more information about logging using a dictionary, see
+:ref:`logging-config-api`.
+
+What happens if no configuration is provided
+^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
+
+If no logging configuration is provided, it is possible to have a situation
+where a logging event needs to be output, but no handlers can be found to
+output the event. The behaviour of the logging package in these
+circumstances is dependent on the Python version.
+
+For versions of Python prior to 3.2, the behaviour is as follows:
+
+* If *logging.raiseExceptions* is *False* (production mode), the event is
+  silently dropped.
+
+* If *logging.raiseExceptions* is *True* (development mode), a message
+  'No handlers could be found for logger X.Y.Z' is printed once.
+
+In Python 3.2 and later, the behaviour is as follows:
+
+* The event is output using a 'handler of last resort', stored in
+  ``logging.lastResort``. This internal handler is not associated with any
+  logger, and acts like a :class:`StreamHandler` which writes the event
+  description message to the current value of ``sys.stderr`` (therefore
+  respecting any redirections which may be in effect). No formatting is
+  done on the message - just the bare event description message is printed.
+  The handler's level is set to ``WARNING``, so all events at this and
+  greater severities will be output.
+
+To obtain the pre-3.2 behaviour, ``logging.lastResort`` can be set to *None*.
+
+.. _library-config:
+
+Configuring Logging for a Library
+^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
+
+When developing a library which uses logging, you should take care to
+document how the library uses logging - for example, the names of loggers
+used. Some consideration also needs to be given to its logging configuration.
+If the using application does not use logging, and library code makes logging
+calls, then (as described in the previous section) events of severity
+``WARNING`` and greater will be printed to ``sys.stderr``. This is regarded as
+the best default behaviour.
+
+If for some reason you *don't* want these messages printed in the absence of
+any logging configuration, you can attach a do-nothing handler to the top-level
+logger for your library. This avoids the message being printed, since a handler
+will be always be found for the library's events: it just doesn't produce any
+output. If the library user configures logging for application use, presumably
+that configuration will add some handlers, and if levels are suitably
+configured then logging calls made in library code will send output to those
+handlers, as normal.
+
+A do-nothing handler is included in the logging package: :class:`NullHandler`
+(since Python 3.1). An instance of this handler could be added to the top-level
+logger of the logging namespace used by the library (*if* you want to prevent
+your library's logged events being output to ``sys.stderr`` in the absence of
+logging configuration). If all logging by a library *foo* is done using loggers
+with names matching 'foo.x', 'foo.x.y', etc. then the code::
+
+    import logging
+    logging.getLogger('foo').addHandler(logging.NullHandler())
+
+should have the desired effect. If an organisation produces a number of
+libraries, then the logger name specified can be 'orgname.foo' rather than
+just 'foo'.
+
+**PLEASE NOTE:** It is strongly advised that you *do not add any handlers other
+than* :class:`NullHandler` *to your library's loggers*. This is because the
+configuration of handlers is the prerogative of the application developer who
+uses your library. The application developer knows their target audience and
+what handlers are most appropriate for their application: if you add handlers
+'under the hood', you might well interfere with their ability to carry out
+unit tests and deliver logs which suit their requirements.
+
+
+Logging Levels
+--------------
+
+The numeric values of logging levels are given in the following table. These are
+primarily of interest if you want to define your own levels, and need them to
+have specific values relative to the predefined levels. If you define a level
+with the same numeric value, it overwrites the predefined value; the predefined
+name is lost.
+
++--------------+---------------+
+| Level        | Numeric value |
++==============+===============+
+| ``CRITICAL`` | 50            |
++--------------+---------------+
+| ``ERROR``    | 40            |
++--------------+---------------+
+| ``WARNING``  | 30            |
++--------------+---------------+
+| ``INFO``     | 20            |
++--------------+---------------+
+| ``DEBUG``    | 10            |
++--------------+---------------+
+| ``NOTSET``   | 0             |
++--------------+---------------+
+
+Levels can also be associated with loggers, being set either by the developer or
+through loading a saved logging configuration. When a logging method is called
+on a logger, the logger compares its own level with the level associated with
+the method call. If the logger's level is higher than the method call's, no
+logging message is actually generated. This is the basic mechanism controlling
+the verbosity of logging output.
+
+Logging messages are encoded as instances of the :class:`LogRecord` class. When
+a logger decides to actually log an event, a :class:`LogRecord` instance is
+created from the logging message.
+
+Logging messages are subjected to a dispatch mechanism through the use of
+:dfn:`handlers`, which are instances of subclasses of the :class:`Handler`
+class. Handlers are responsible for ensuring that a logged message (in the form
+of a :class:`LogRecord`) ends up in a particular location (or set of locations)
+which is useful for the target audience for that message (such as end users,
+support desk staff, system administrators, developers). Handlers are passed
+:class:`LogRecord` instances intended for particular destinations. Each logger
+can have zero, one or more handlers associated with it (via the
+:meth:`addHandler` method of :class:`Logger`). In addition to any handlers
+directly associated with a logger, *all handlers associated with all ancestors
+of the logger* are called to dispatch the message (unless the *propagate* flag
+for a logger is set to a false value, at which point the passing to ancestor
+handlers stops).
+
+Just as for loggers, handlers can have levels associated with them. A handler's
+level acts as a filter in the same way as a logger's level does. If a handler
+decides to actually dispatch an event, the :meth:`emit` method is used to send
+the message to its destination. Most user-defined subclasses of :class:`Handler`
+will need to override this :meth:`emit`.
+
+.. _custom-levels:
+
+Custom Levels
+^^^^^^^^^^^^^
+
+Defining your own levels is possible, but should not be necessary, as the
+existing levels have been chosen on the basis of practical experience.
+However, if you are convinced that you need custom levels, great care should
+be exercised when doing this, and it is possibly *a very bad idea to define
+custom levels if you are developing a library*. That's because if multiple
+library authors all define their own custom levels, there is a chance that
+the logging output from such multiple libraries used together will be
+difficult for the using developer to control and/or interpret, because a
+given numeric value might mean different things for different libraries.
+
+.. _useful-handlers:
+
+Useful Handlers
+---------------
+
+In addition to the base :class:`Handler` class, many useful subclasses are
+provided:
+
+#. :class:`StreamHandler` instances send messages to streams (file-like
+   objects).
+
+#. :class:`FileHandler` instances send messages to disk files.
+
+.. currentmodule:: logging.handlers
+
+#. :class:`BaseRotatingHandler` is the base class for handlers that
+   rotate log files at a certain point. It is not meant to be  instantiated
+   directly. Instead, use :class:`RotatingFileHandler` or
+   :class:`TimedRotatingFileHandler`.
+
+#. :class:`RotatingFileHandler` instances send messages to disk
+   files, with support for maximum log file sizes and log file rotation.
+
+#. :class:`TimedRotatingFileHandler` instances send messages to
+   disk files, rotating the log file at certain timed intervals.
+
+#. :class:`SocketHandler` instances send messages to TCP/IP
+   sockets.
+
+#. :class:`DatagramHandler` instances send messages to UDP
+   sockets.
+
+#. :class:`SMTPHandler` instances send messages to a designated
+   email address.
+
+#. :class:`SysLogHandler` instances send messages to a Unix
+   syslog daemon, possibly on a remote machine.
+
+#. :class:`NTEventLogHandler` instances send messages to a
+   Windows NT/2000/XP event log.
+
+#. :class:`MemoryHandler` instances send messages to a buffer
+   in memory, which is flushed whenever specific criteria are met.
+
+#. :class:`HTTPHandler` instances send messages to an HTTP
+   server using either ``GET`` or ``POST`` semantics.
+
+#. :class:`WatchedFileHandler` instances watch the file they are
+   logging to. If the file changes, it is closed and reopened using the file
+   name. This handler is only useful on Unix-like systems; Windows does not
+   support the underlying mechanism used.
+
+#. :class:`QueueHandler` instances send messages to a queue, such as
+   those implemented in the :mod:`queue` or :mod:`multiprocessing` modules.
+
+.. currentmodule:: logging
+
+#. :class:`NullHandler` instances do nothing with error messages. They are used
+   by library developers who want to use logging, but want to avoid the 'No
+   handlers could be found for logger XXX' message which can be displayed if
+   the library user has not configured logging. See :ref:`library-config` for
+   more information.
+
+.. versionadded:: 3.1
+   The :class:`NullHandler` class.
+
+.. versionadded:: 3.2
+   The :class:`~logging.handlers.QueueHandler` class.
+
+The :class:`NullHandler`, :class:`StreamHandler` and :class:`FileHandler`
+classes are defined in the core logging package. The other handlers are
+defined in a sub- module, :mod:`logging.handlers`. (There is also another
+sub-module, :mod:`logging.config`, for configuration functionality.)
+
+Logged messages are formatted for presentation through instances of the
+:class:`Formatter` class. They are initialized with a format string suitable for
+use with the % operator and a dictionary.
+
+For formatting multiple messages in a batch, instances of
+:class:`BufferingFormatter` can be used. In addition to the format string (which
+is applied to each message in the batch), there is provision for header and
+trailer format strings.
+
+When filtering based on logger level and/or handler level is not enough,
+instances of :class:`Filter` can be added to both :class:`Logger` and
+:class:`Handler` instances (through their :meth:`addFilter` method). Before
+deciding to process a message further, both loggers and handlers consult all
+their filters for permission. If any filter returns a false value, the message
+is not processed further.
+
+The basic :class:`Filter` functionality allows filtering by specific logger
+name. If this feature is used, messages sent to the named logger and its
+children are allowed through the filter, and all others dropped.
+
+
+.. _logging-exceptions:
+
+Exceptions raised during logging
+--------------------------------
+
+The logging package is designed to swallow exceptions which occur while logging
+in production. This is so that errors which occur while handling logging events
+- such as logging misconfiguration, network or other similar errors - do not
+cause the application using logging to terminate prematurely.
+
+:class:`SystemExit` and :class:`KeyboardInterrupt` exceptions are never
+swallowed. Other exceptions which occur during the :meth:`emit` method of a
+:class:`Handler` subclass are passed to its :meth:`handleError` method.
+
+The default implementation of :meth:`handleError` in :class:`Handler` checks
+to see if a module-level variable, :data:`raiseExceptions`, is set. If set, a
+traceback is printed to :data:`sys.stderr`. If not set, the exception is swallowed.
+
+**Note:** The default value of :data:`raiseExceptions` is ``True``. This is because
+during development, you typically want to be notified of any exceptions that
+occur. It's advised that you set :data:`raiseExceptions` to ``False`` for production
+usage.
+
+.. currentmodule:: logging
+
+.. _arbitrary-object-messages:
+
+Using arbitrary objects as messages
+-----------------------------------
+
+In the preceding sections and examples, it has been assumed that the message
+passed when logging the event is a string. However, this is not the only
+possibility. You can pass an arbitrary object as a message, and its
+:meth:`__str__` method will be called when the logging system needs to convert
+it to a string representation. In fact, if you want to, you can avoid
+computing a string representation altogether - for example, the
+:class:`SocketHandler` emits an event by pickling it and sending it over the
+wire.
+
+
+Optimization
+------------
+
+Formatting of message arguments is deferred until it cannot be avoided.
+However, computing the arguments passed to the logging method can also be
+expensive, and you may want to avoid doing it if the logger will just throw
+away your event. To decide what to do, you can call the :meth:`isEnabledFor`
+method which takes a level argument and returns true if the event would be
+created by the Logger for that level of call. You can write code like this::
+
+    if logger.isEnabledFor(logging.DEBUG):
+        logger.debug('Message with %s, %s', expensive_func1(),
+                                            expensive_func2())
+
+so that if the logger's threshold is set above ``DEBUG``, the calls to
+:func:`expensive_func1` and :func:`expensive_func2` are never made.
+
+There are other optimizations which can be made for specific applications which
+need more precise control over what logging information is collected. Here's a
+list of things you can do to avoid processing during logging which you don't
+need:
+
++-----------------------------------------------+----------------------------------------+
+| What you don't want to collect                | How to avoid collecting it             |
++===============================================+========================================+
+| Information about where calls were made from. | Set ``logging._srcfile`` to ``None``.  |
++-----------------------------------------------+----------------------------------------+
+| Threading information.                        | Set ``logging.logThreads`` to ``0``.   |
++-----------------------------------------------+----------------------------------------+
+| Process information.                          | Set ``logging.logProcesses`` to ``0``. |
++-----------------------------------------------+----------------------------------------+
+
+Also note that the core logging module only includes the basic handlers. If
+you don't import :mod:`logging.handlers` and :mod:`logging.config`, they won't
+take up any memory.
+