Add RCL_LOGGING_DISABLE_FILE_WRITING to disable file logging

[mganeff]

Add ability to completely disable file writing in rcp_logging_spdlog by setting the environment variable:

RCL_LOGGING_DISABLE_FILE_WRITING=1

[clalancette]

So I have to say that this is a weird feature.

The entire purpose of the rcl_logging layer is to write to disk. Writing to the console and /rosout are done at different layers. And we already have a way to disable writing to disk at the RCL layer: http://docs.ros.org/en/rolling/Concepts/Intermediate/About-Logging.html#node-creation

So with all of that in mind, can you please explain the use-case for this?

[mganeff]

I understand that I can disable logging for a certain node by using the disable-external-lib-logs argument

ros2 run foo bar --ros-args --disable-external-lib-logs

I am however unable to find a working solution for disabling logging for nodes started with ros2 launch

• ros2 launch launch_file.launch (xml based)
• ros2 launch launch_file.launch.py

In our environment we spawn multiple nodes (20+). For testing we would like to create the logs but for deployment we would like to disable them, hence the env variable to be able to disable/enable external logging features for all nodes :)

[clalancette]

I am however unable to find a working solution for disabling logging for nodes started with ros2 launch

You should be able to declare a launch argument for that, and pass it into all of the nodes. You can see some documentation about that in http://docs.ros.org/en/rolling/Tutorials/Intermediate/Launch/Using-ROS2-Launch-For-Large-Projects.html or http://docs.ros.org/en/rolling/Tutorials/Intermediate/Launch/Using-Substitutions.html

[mganeff]

Thanks for the answer. I managed to disable logging for all my nodes by adjusting the launch files:

ros2 launch .xml:

<node pkg="foo" exec="bar" output="screen" args="--ros-args --disable-external-lib-logs"/>

ros2 launch .py:

ld.add_action(
   Node(
       package="foo",
       executable="bar",
       output="screen",
       emulate_tty=True,
       arguments=["--ros-args", "--disable-external-lib-logs"],
   )
)

ros2 run:

ros2 run foo bar --ros-args --disable-external-lib-logs

I was wondering if there is an environment variable such like DEFAULT_ROS_ARGS which I could extend with --disable-external-lib-logs to be able to toggle logging on/off for our nodes.

[mganeff]

Despite the parameter disable-external-lib-logs, still logs are generated in ~/.ros/log. Each launched node gets a directory with a launch.log. Is there a way to disable this?

[clalancette]

Despite the parameter disable-external-lib-logs, still logs are generated in ~/.ros/log. Each launched node gets a directory with a launch.log. Is there a way to disable this?

That's the logging coming from launch, rather than from the node itself. I think if you remove output from your launch statements, that will stop happening.

[fujitatomoya]

i think even if we had a feature something like this, doing this in the specific implementation is not the right place to do that.

I was wondering if there is an environment variable such like DEFAULT_ROS_ARGS which I could extend with --disable-external-lib-logs to be able to toggle logging on/off for our nodes.

no i don't think so. for me this can be scary giant switch if we have it. because we can add remapping, namespace, names, parameters and logging configuration via arguments. i think those arguments are meant to be applied to the Node, not any Node. So this could possibly lead to the problem for user.