Windows 2000 Administration in a Nutshell

Name

event logs

Synopsis

Archive an event log, configure an event log, and monitor events using Event Viewer.

Procedures

The following procedures assume that you either have the Event Viewer console open and are connected to the computer you want to manage and monitor event logs on, or have the Computer Management console open (which contains the Event Viewer snap-in as part of its set of system tools).

Archive an Event Log

Right-click on an event log → Save Log File as → specify filename and file type

See event logs for information about different file types for archiving event logs. Once a log has been archived, you can view it again by:

Right-click on Event Viewer node → open Log File → select an archived log file → specify the type of log → specify a display name if desired → Open

Configure an Event Log

To configure the size and retention settings of an event log, do the following:

Right-click on an event log → Properties

The maximum log size can range between 64 KB and 4 GB (512 KB is the default). Monitor your logs and if they grow too quickly, increase the maximum log size so events don’t get lost.

You can configure retention settings in one of three modes:

Overwrite events as needed

This is the default setting and means that circular logging is configured. Once the log becomes full, old events are deleted to make room for new ones. This setting can result in loss of important information and should be changed as soon as your server becomes operational on the network.

Overwrite events older ...