Aug 20 2008   6:22AM GMT

What is Service timestamps logging, and how it can be configured Cisco Switch or a Router?

Posted by: Yasir Irfan
Switches, Cisco, Cisco 2950, Cisco 6500, Cisco 3745, Syslog, IOS commands, Router Troubleshooting, Service timestamp

Logging is a quite essential part of a secure network configuration. Logging not only helps the Network Administrators to identify the issue while troubleshooting, also enables them to react to intrusion attempts or Denial-of –Service attacks.

By default  on Cisco IOS , no timestamp information is included; however, you can enable timestamps and also modify the format of the timestamp attached to SYSLOG message by using the service timestamps log global configuration commands as follows:

ITKE(Config)# service timestamps log {uptime |datetime [msec |localtime |show-timezone]}

I will demonstrate how to configure a Cisco IOS Switch to log the datetime and loclatime.

Before Configuring the service timestamps log you will get the following logs in a IOS Switch.

ITKE#sho log

Syslog logging: enabled (0 messages dropped, 0 messages rate-limited, 0 flushes, 0 overruns, xml disabled, filtering disabled)

No Active Message Discriminator.

No Inactive Message Discriminator.

   Console logging: level debugging, 453895 messages logged, xml disabled,

                     filtering disabled

    Monitor logging: level debugging, 0 messages logged, xml disabled,

                     filtering disabled

    Buffer logging:  level debugging, 453895 messages logged, xml disabled,

                    filtering disabled

    Exception Logging: size (4096 bytes)

    Count and timestamp logging messages: disabled

    File logging: disabled

    Persistent logging: disabled

    Trap logging: level informational, 453898 message lines logged

        Logging to 10.0.0.2  (udp port 514,  audit disabled,

              authentication disabled, encryption disabled, link up),

              453898 message lines logged,

              0 message lines rate-limited,

              0 message lines dropped-by-MD,

              xml disabled, sequence number disabled

              filtering disabled

        Logging to 10.0.0.1  (udp port 514,  audit disabled,

              authentication disabled, encryption disabled, link up),

              453898 message lines logged,

              0 message lines rate-limited,

              0 message lines dropped-by-MD,

              xml disabled, sequence number disabled

              filtering disabled

          Log Buffer (4096 bytes):

17w5d: %LINK-3-UPDOWN: Interface GigabitEthernet0/41, changed state to down

17w5d: %LINK-3-UPDOWN: Interface GigabitEthernet0/41, changed state to up

17w5d: %LINEPROTO-5-UPDOWN: Line protocol on Interface GigabitEthernet0/41, changed state to up

17w5d: %SEC-6-IPACCESSLOGP: list 102 permitted tcp 10.0.0.6(49336) -> 0.0.0.0(23), 1 packet

Now we will configure the Cisco IOS Switch with the Service timestamp log command with date & local time of the Switch by issuing the following command from the global configuration mode. 

ITKE(config)#service timestamps log datetime localtime

Here are the details of log show in the switch after configuring the service timestamps log command

ITKE#sho log

Syslog logging: enabled (0 messages dropped, 0 messages rate-limited, 0 flushes, 0 overruns, xml disabled, filtering disabled)

No Active Message Discriminator.

No Inactive Message Discriminator.

    Console logging: level debugging, 454006 messages logged, xml disabled,

                     filtering disabled

    Monitor logging: level debugging, 0 messages logged, xml disabled,

                     filtering disabled

    Buffer logging:  level debugging, 454006 messages logged, xml disabled,

                    filtering disabled

    Exception Logging: size (4096 bytes)

    Count and timestamp logging messages: disabled

    File logging: disabled

    Persistent logging: disabled

    Trap logging: level informational, 454009 message lines logged

        Logging to 10.0.0.2  (udp port 514,  audit disabled,

              authentication disabled, encryption disabled, link up),

              454009 message lines logged,

              0 message lines rate-limited,

              0 message lines dropped-by-MD,

              xml disabled, sequence number disabled

              filtering disabled

        Logging to 10.0.0.1  (udp port 514,  audit disabled,

              authentication disabled, encryption disabled, link up),

              454009 message lines logged,

              0 message lines rate-limited,

              0 message lines dropped-by-MD,

              xml disabled, sequence number disabled

              filtering disabled

         

Log Buffer (4096 bytes):

Aug 20 09:10:48: %LINK-3-UPDOWN: Interface GigabitEthernet0/13, changed state to up

Aug 20 09:10:49: %LINEPROTO-5-UPDOWN: Line protocol on Interface GigabitEthernet0/13, changed state to up

Aug 20 09:10:55: %SYS-5-CONFIG_I: Configured from console by yasir on vty2 (10.0.0.6)

Aug 20 09:11:19: %LINEPROTO-5-UPDOWN: Line protocol on Interface GigabitEthernet0/13, changed state to down

Aug 20 09:11:20: %LINK-3-UPDOWN: Interface GigabitEthernet0/13, changed state to down

Aug 20 09:11:22: %SEC-6-IPACCESSLOGP: list 102 permitted tcp 10.0.0.1(44420) -> 0.0.0.0(23), 1 packet

Aug 20 09:11:23: %LINK-3-UPDOWN: Interface GigabitEthernet0/13, changed state to up

Aug 20 09:11:24: %LINEPROTO-5-UPDOWN: Line protocol on Interface GigabitEthernet0/13, changed state to up

Aug 20 09:11:37: %SEC-6-IPACCESSLOGP: list 102 permitted tcp 10.0.0.6(49493) -> 0.0.0.0(23), 1 packet

ITKE#