Log file

Log file

A file that contains a record of activities that have occurred. An application is said to "log" information to the log file (hence the name "log file"). Log files are generated automatically by some applications as they work and are typically (but not always) text editable files. Text editable (and therefore human readable) log files are typically generated produced to provide a record of what went on and are not normally used again by the application that generated them. Databases in particular will generate log files in a binary format which are intended for its own database recovery purposes and are not intended for human reading.

Log files will typically have the file extension of .log, but this is not guaranteed and depends on the application.