Log Viewer - Information pack
This document contains the collection of documents about using the log viewer
How to search the log viewer for successful and unsuccessful login attempts
How to view changes to system preferences in the log viewer
How to enable Koha to log different activities on the system
How to search the log viewer for successful and unsuccessful login attempts
It is possible to set the log on Koha to record successful and unsuccessful attempts to login to the system. This document will outline how to set this login information to be recorded and how to search the logs for the information.
Set appropriate system preferences
Go to Koha administration > System Preferences and search for auth log.
This will bring up a few system preferences. The specific ones for this function are AuthFailureLog and AuthSuccessLog.
It is possible to set one or both of these system preferences to Log, depending on whether you want to record only successful logins or only unsuccessful logins or if you want both to be recorded.
To record only successful logins, only set AuthSuccessLog to Log and ensure AuthFailureLog is set to Don't Log.
To record only unsuccessful logins, set AuthFailureLog to Log and ensure AuthSuccessLog is set to Don't Log.
These instructions will be recording both successful and unsuccessful login attempts, so both AuthFailureLog and AuthSuccessLog will be set to Log. After setting the appropriate system preference(s) click Save all Logging preferences.
Navigate to the Log Viewer
Go to Tools > Additional tools > Log viewer.
This will take you into a page with the log viewer tool on it.
Set the Log Viewer to search for authentication information for a specific log attempt
There are a few ways the log viewer can be used to search for information about successful and unsuccessful login attempts. As logins happen regularly on the site, trying to bring back every login attempt may be too resource intensive and may slow the site. A better approach is to find ways to narrow the search to a particular time frame or patron.
For example, in the Modules section, untick the All option and tick the Authentication option.
This is where the login information is drawn from, so this must be selected regardless of how the results are being reduced by other parameters.
In the Info: box put in the username the patron attempted to login with.
Scroll to the bottom of the tool and click Submit.
This will bring up a table of actions take in the Authentication area for the username specified.
| Version | Date | Detail | Author |
| 1.0 | 31/05/21 | Doc. Created | Holly Cooper |
| 1.1 | 01/06/21 | Adding details | Holly Cooper |
| 1.2 | 02/06/21 | Adding details | Holly Cooper |
| 1.3 | 03/06/21 | Adding details | Holly Cooper |
| 1.4 | 31/07/26 | Updating for newer version of Koha | Holly Cooper |
How to view changes to system preferences in the log viewer
Be aware that the Log Viewer can be resource intensive and if it is run without limitations applied it will slow or take down the system.
Identify the system preference to search updates for.
Go to Koha administration > System preferences and search for the preference to be checked. This example will use the AcqCreateItem system preference.
This will bring up a system preference of the same name. Take a note of the name of the system preference. The log viewer will only work with the exact system preference, so it may be useful to copy the system preference.
Search for changes to the system preference in the log viewer
Go to Tools > Additional tools > Log viewer
This will bring up the overall log viewer tool.
Any field with an exclamation mark beside it aren't enabled. This means there won't be any information about the module.
Untick the All option under Modules. Click System preferences under Modules.
Under Actions click Modify.
Put the name of the system preference into the Info box.
It is also possible to limit the log viewer by dates but for changes to system preferences this shouldn't be necessary.
Scroll down to the bottom of the tool and click Submit.
The log viewer will run and any results matching the preferences defined will appear below the Log entries table.
| Version | Date | Detail | Author |
| 1.0 | 29/07/26 | Doc. Created | Holly Cooper |
| 1.1 | 30/07/26 | Adding details | Holly Cooper |
How to enable Koha to log different activities on the system
Logging Transactions
Actions within the Koha system are tracked in log files. Your system preferences can be changed to prevent the logging of different actions if you wish.
Go to Koha Administration > System Preferences and search for logging.
This will bring up the different system preferences which can be enabled to collect details about the different areas of the system. None, one, some or all the system preferences can be enabled or disabled. The more that are enabled, the more details that will be recorded.
Log viewer
These logs can be viewed using the log viewer.
Go to Tools > Additional tools > Log viewer.
The overall area of the system to report on can be selected under the Modules section. Choosing different combinations of menu options will produce the log file for that query.
NOTE : When you click on the Submit button the system will process your query and depending on the size of your log file and the number of results to be listed, this may take some time. Although it may appear that nothing is happening, DO NOT click the Submit button again. Multiple requests will put an excessive load on your system.For example, a query for all logs related to the Cataloguing module for a specific cataloguer in a specified time period produces this result:
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