log4j: Rolling logs into .gz file with DailyRollingFileAppender using TimeBasedRollingPolicy

Question

The current system is working as expected and the log files are rolled once an hr according to the logic below:

log4j.appender.oozie=org.apache.log4j.DailyRollingFileAppender
log4j.appender.oozie.DatePattern='.'yyyy-MM-dd-HH
log4j.appender.oozie.File=${oozie.log.dir}/oozie.log
log4j.appender.oozie.Append=true
log4j.appender.oozie.layout=org.apache.log4j.PatternLayout
log4j.appender.oozie.layout.ConversionPattern=%d{ISO8601} %5p %c{1}:%L - %m%n

I can understand that rolling of log file directly into a compressed file(.gz or .zip) is possible with RollingFileAppender(rolling based on file size) using TimeBasedRollingPolicy. I'm using DailyRollingFileAppender(time based rolling) and would like to achieve compression with that. I modified my properties as follows. But that doesnt work.

log4j.appender.oozie=org.apache.log4j.DailyRollingFileAppender
log4j.appender.oozie.DatePattern='.'yyyy-MM-dd-HH
log4j.appender.oozie.File=${oozie.log.dir}/oozie.log
log4j.appender.oozie.Append=true
log4j.appender.oozie.RollingPolicy=org.apache.log4j.rolling.TimeBasedRollingPolicy
log4j.appender.oozie.RollingPolicy.FileNamePattern=foo.%d{yyyy-MM-dd-HH}.gz
log4j.appender.oozie.layout=org.apache.log4j.PatternLayout
log4j.appender.oozie.layout.ConversionPattern=%d{ISO8601} %5p %c{1}:%L - %m%n

Any pointers would be highly appreciated. Here are some relevant links.

Configuring RollingFileAppender in log4j

http://logging.apache.org/log4j/companions/extras/apidocs/org/apache/log4j/rolling/TimeBasedRollingPolicy.html

Answer 1

Pardon my surprise, but at the exact link you gave above it says in the accepted answer:

Note that TimeBasedRollingPolicy can only be configured with xml, not log4j.properties

Have you tried rewriting your configuration to XML format?