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Best Practices for Log Messages

Formatting the Message​

Try to make the log message short, yet informative. Don't pack details about the error into message, as those belong in Properties.

The alerting capability of log messages is why breaking details into properties is so important. If your log message is a string that says "Main page took 2.45ms to render", you cannot configure any thresholds on this. If the log was instead "Main page took too long to render" with a property of "rendertime" set to "> 2ms", now you can customize an email alert based on this event. You could configure the alerts so that any render times greater than 5 seconds are emailed directly to you.

Properties​

Add details of the message as key-value pairs. Properties are most effective when thought of as filters you can apply to your logs, since this is precisely the feature the dashboard offers. Making the property values categorical rather than using scalar values will help you achieve this.

For example, if you log an error message with a key of "cardtype", where the value could be one of "visa", "mastercard", or "amex", you will be able to see if an issue is disproportionately related to a "cardtype" on the dashboard.

An example of a less useful property would be "cart_total", where the property value could be any dollar amount. This won't lead to a cohesive set of property values since the cart total amount could vary widely. An alternative that would be more useful is to bucket the amounts ("< $5", "$5 - $10", etc.).

Limits on Properties
  • Property keys have a limit of 128 characters.
  • Property values have a limit of 1024 characters.
  • The default limit for session properties is 10. You can have up to 100 properties (the limit can be increased on Android SDK 5.14.2 or iOS SDK 5.16.1 and above). Reach out to support@embrace.io to increase this.

Using Breadcrumbs Instead​

If you're looking to add context around sessions and don't need the immediacy that Log Events provide, we recommend using Breadcrumbs instead as they have a lower overhead cost.