A simple and fast remote mobile logger that plugs into existing infrastructure rather than adding more.
Problem
After working at company after company, each one had its operational issues with mobile logs.
- It wasn't easy to get them.
- It wasn't easy to search them.
We needed logs whenever clients complained of an issue that we couldn't reproduce locally, this could be due to their environment or an unforeseen state. Sometimes, it wasn't even an actual issue but we couldn't just dismiss them without actual evidence.
It wasn't easy to get them (the log files)
Every company had some variation of a file logger which would persist a limited amount of data on disk. When we asked clients to send us those logs, we would have to wait for days (if we ever got them). The general steps included:
- Go to the settings screen in the app.
- Go to the debug menu.
- Click on this button and send the attached logs via email.
If by chance you get the logs and it covered the time period you're interested in, then you're in luck. If not, then you're SOL.
It wasn't easy to search them
Server side was always great, we always had some APM like New Relic or Datadog which provided great log management (we also paid quite a bit for these services). On mobile, we were stuck with Sublime Text's search function. It worked but it wasn't fun.
We would then have to coordinate timestamps with server logs to get a picture of what the user was experiencing at the time.
Solution
What if we could pipe mobile logs into our existing log management solution so we could get a complete trace of what was happening for the user?
What if we could adjust the log verbosity remotely to get more fine grained details temporarily?
This is what Birch was built to help with. It combines device management and log transport to help you collect the right logs, from the right people, and deliver them to the right place.
Interested? Birch has a generous free tier that gives you 1gb of transfer. Check it out