[Log4cpp-devel] trace level

[Dirk L. <di...@no...>]

Hi,

I would like to add tracing (function call hierarchy) to my application 
by adding a trace/log statement as a first command to each function 
call. The output should be formatted in a way, that there is an 
increasing indentation for each function call (and some possible 
following TRACE statments).

The reason for this is, that I redirect all TRACE (::AfxTrace/afxDump in 
a WIN32/MFC app) messages to a "TRACE" category. I would like to add the 
function name and a calling depth to the output to better see the 
program flow and the context of the TRACE calls (there are some nice 
function that can print the called function and the parameters to 
produce something like a stackdump in the imagehelp.dll).

My problem is the implementation of the indentation. It is very easy to 
add a automatic class that increases/decreases the indentation level 
during entering and leaving the function and adding the indentation to 
all TRACE calls. But I would be very good if I could add this 
information to all logging calls.

I know, that there is the NDC for the purpose to store some global 
information for all following logging calls. But the NDC seems more like 
a place to store information about the state of the application, like 
current client/server pair, current state, and so on. Misusing the NDC 
to simply store two blanks during entering a function and removing these 
blanks during leaving seems to be like a performance kill. And you would 
not exactly loose the stored state information about the current thread 
but you will loose the nice formatting, since indentation spaces and 
stored information is mixed within the synthetizied NDC string.

My question is, wether it would make sence to add a indentation level to 
the NDC and to the LoggingEvent? To the NDC, since there is always one 
NDC (?) per thread and therefore one central object for this type of 
information and to the LoggingEvent so that one can have control over 
the output of the indentation within the PatternLayout.

Thanks for your answers
Dirk