diff options
Diffstat (limited to 'source/configuration/nomatch.rst')
-rw-r--r-- | source/configuration/nomatch.rst | 47 |
1 files changed, 47 insertions, 0 deletions
diff --git a/source/configuration/nomatch.rst b/source/configuration/nomatch.rst new file mode 100644 index 0000000..9cb84b7 --- /dev/null +++ b/source/configuration/nomatch.rst @@ -0,0 +1,47 @@ +Property Replacer nomatch mode +------------------------------ + +**The "nomatch-Mode" specifies which string the property replacer shall +return if a regular expression did not find the search string.**. +Traditionally, the string "\*\*NO MATCH\*\*" was returned, but many +people complained this was almost never useful. Still, this mode is +support as "**DFLT**\ " for legacy configurations. + +Three additional and potentially useful modes exist: in one (**BLANK**) +a blank string is returned. This is probably useful for inserting values +into databases where no value shall be inserted if the expression could +not be found. + +A similar mode is "**ZERO**\ " where the string "0" is returned. This is +suitable for numerical values. A use case may be that you record a +traffic log based on firewall rules and the "bytes transmitted" counter +is extracted via a regular expression. If no "bytes transmitted" counter +is available in the current message, it is probably a good idea to +return an empty string, which the database layer can turn into a zero. + +The other mode is "**FIELD**\ ", in which the complete field is +returned. This may be useful in cases where absence of a match is +considered a failure and the message that triggered it shall be logged. + +If in doubt, **it is highly suggested to use the** `rsyslog online regular +expression checker and generator <http://www.rsyslog.com/tool-regex>`_ +**to see these options in action**. With that online tool, you can craft +regular expressions based on samples and try out the different modes. + +Summary of nomatch Modes +~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ + ++------------+-----------------------------------------------------------+ +| **Mode** | **Returned** | ++------------+-----------------------------------------------------------+ +| DFLT | "\*\*NO MATCH\*\*" | ++------------+-----------------------------------------------------------+ +| BLANK | "" (empty string) | ++------------+-----------------------------------------------------------+ +| ZERO | "0" | ++------------+-----------------------------------------------------------+ +| FIELD | full content of original field | ++------------+-----------------------------------------------------------+ +| | `Interactive Tool <http://www.rsyslog.com/tool-regex>`_ | ++------------+-----------------------------------------------------------+ + |