log4net delete file at runtime is it possible c#

Question

Is it possible to delete a log at runtime? What I would like to do before the application starts is deleting all logs; if that is not possible I would like to clear all logs at runtime.

Any suggestion/code snippet?

Answer 1

Yes, is it possible to clear the log files. The log file will be created by starting the program, if it doesn't exist. To clear the files, look here: Clearing content of text file using C#

Answer 2

Yet another alternative is to use the processid in the log file name - then everytime you start the app, you get a new log file:

<appender name="LogFileAppender" type="log4net.Appender.RollingFileAppender, log4net">
  <file type="log4net.Util.PatternString" value="D:\Logs\MyApp.log-[%processid].txt"/>

Answer 3

It is not supported "out of the box" from log4net. However, you could using the RollingFileAppender and create a manual class/method to clean up/delete the log file. Please refer to this answer: https://stackoverflow.com/a/2916628/3016125

Answer 4

Instead of trying to delete the log file programmatically, I prefer to combine a RollingFlatFileWriter and a scheduled task that executes something like the following recurring daily: forfiles -p "C:\\path to logd" -s -m *.log -d -5 -c "cmd /c del @path"

The above delete any file ending in .log that is older than 5 days. This gives more than enough time to make sure there are copies of each day's log available in your backup archive.