[zbailey]

We use syslog where I work, and I've always felt the same way, but never heard any suggestions for better options with as wide adoption, support, and background as syslog.

Out of pure curiosity, what do you see as the tool most likely to displace syslog in the future? Is there any alternative available that fixes most of these problems without rolling your own from pieces and parts?

[tptacek]

I think we're stuck with syslog, but for app logging, ad-hoc database storage --- especially if you have either (a) a database optimized for message queueing or (b) a schemaless database --- is going to tend to beat syslog. You're not going to realize it until you need the information you're logging, though; until then, it's going to seem like syslog is everything you could reasonably need.