Log management process - definition & overview

The log management process involves facilitating, transmitting, analyzing, storing and archiving large sets of log data. By adhering to effective log management best practices—including getting the right tools in place—businesses can optimize their operations, troubleshoot and resolve issues, identify and remedy security vulnerabilities and more.

Log management and analytics are at the top of DevOps teams’ highly specialized and mission-critical functions. Without an effective framework and the right tools for the job, things can get complicated rather quickly, creating cybersecurity vulnerabilities and leaving companies in the dark when it comes to the customer journey.

When companies rely on one or more computer and web-based applications (which most do), they generate seemingly endless data. It comes fast, virtually everywhere — from a customer login to a developer pushing changes to one or more applications. IT Companies must explore log management solutions to make this data reliable, consistent and usable.

Log management is how companies turn their mountains of disparate data into a more structured, accessible and actionable format. In other words, log management makes organizational data much more useful to those who need it.

With log management practices in place, a company can better understand how its systems work and how its customers interact with them. This can improve cybersecurity while providing a better, more data-informed customer experience.

Log management offers a wide range of benefits, including the ability to:

• Evaluate and enhance monitoring and troubleshooting capabilities to help software applications and infrastructure identify and implement effective solutions.

• Track resource usage and performance to better understand how systems perform so that teams allocate resources appropriately.

• Better understand how customers interact with an organization’s website and/or application to optimize their experience.

• Increase cybersecurity awareness and diagnose anomalies and errors in real-time, mitigating vulnerabilities.

• Establish and maintain regulatory compliance, including in relation to:

  • Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA)

  • Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard (PCI DSS)

  • General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR)

By developing and implementing a consistent log management process, companies can experience these benefits on an ongoing basis, better understand and serve their customers and keep their operations dependable and secure.

There are five key steps within a log management process, requiring organizations to:

1. Instrument and collect

The first step is to develop a system for collecting data from applications across the organization’s active tech stack, including operating systems, containers, network devices, AWS infrastructure, application access logs and custom events.

2. Centralize and index

It’s essential to centralize logs that are generated and collected. This step minimizes manual processes and, thereby, the opportunity for inefficiencies, inaccuracies and other errors. When centralized logging best practices are in place, diverse log data becomes more accessible and available for searching.

3. Search and analyze

When an organization centralizes and indexes its data, it facilitates easy searching, retrieval and analysis. These tasks can be manually performed, but incorporating machine learning (ML) elements makes it easier to identify outliers or anomalies in the logs, evaluate and compare patterns and more.

4. Monitor and alert

After centralizing logs and analysis is underway, DevSecOps teams benefit from the ability to monitor incoming data quickly. Then, those teams can be alerted when any pressing issues or questions arise. By integrating log management systems with other collaborative tools, organizations can set dynamic thresholds and configure additional alerts based on advanced analytics powered by machine learning.

5. Log report and dashboard

Finally, as the above steps are underway, ensure that teams or individuals who need to access and understand logs and log data can do so easily. By creating custom log reports and dashboards, organizations can benefit from constant access to vital information and insights. These dashboards can be made widely available or apply a Role-Based Access Control (RBAC) approach to limit access to those most needing it.

Learn more about Sumo Logic’s 5-step log management process in our DevOps and Security Glossary.

As more companies adopt cloud and digital technologies, the importance of having the right tools to process and make sense of that data grows—almost exponentially. Log management tools provide a consistent, scalable and secure solution for centralizing, indexing and monitoring logs in alignment with industry best practices.

The best log monitoring tools are those that enable the following:

• Scalability, so the organization doesn’t outgrow the solution over time.

• Cloud-readiness (often in addition to on-premises), to prevent obsolescence.

• Dynamic data monitoring and observability features to:

  • Evaluate and improve performance

  • Reduce mean time to resolution

  • Identify patterns and correlations within log data

  • Understand and mitigate security threats.

• Unified log management to bring together increasingly-large data sets from across multiple systems and applications.

• Integrations with other data-generating business systems and repositories.

What is the best log management tool? Sumo Logic offers a sophisticated, all-in-one platform for log management and analytics. Our platform includes key features that:

• Help with the collection and aggregation of log data

• Enable real-time interpretation and analysis

• Empower organizations with quick, reliable support and troubleshooting.

Learn why our unified, cloud-native platform was named a Challenger in the 2022 Gartner® Magic Quadrant™ for APM and Observability, how we were a Visionary in the Gartner SIEM MQ, or contact us to learn more about how Sumo Logic can enhance your log management process today.