log4net is not logging to log file or console (external log4net.config file)

Question

I created aa file called log4net.config in my project and added the following configuration:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8" ?>
<configuration>
  <configSections>
    <section name="log4net" type="log4net.Config.Log4NetConfigurationSectionHandler,log4net" />
  </configSections>
  <log4net>
    <root>
      <level value="ALL" />
      <appender-ref ref="console" />
      <appender-ref ref="RollingFileAppender" />
    </root>
    <appender name="console" type="log4net.Appender.ConsoleAppender">
      <layout type="log4net.Layout.PatternLayout">
        <conversionPattern value="%date %level %logger - %message%newline" />
      </layout>
    </appender>
    <appender name="RollingFileAppender" type="log4net.Appender.RollingFileAppender">
      <param name="File" value="${LOCALAPPDATA}\MyApp\LogFile.log" />
      <param name="AppendToFile" value="true" />
      <rollingStyle value="Size" />
      <maxSizeRollBackups value="10" />
      <maximumFileSize value="10MB" />
      <staticLogFileName value="true" />
      <layout type="log4net.Layout.PatternLayout">
        <param name="ConversionPattern" value="%-5level [%d{yyyy-MM-dd hh:mm:ss}] [%thread] (Line:%line) %M: - %m%n" />
      </layout>
    </appender>
  </log4net>
</configuration>

After that, I added the line below to my AssemblyInfo.cs file:

[assembly: log4net.Config.XmlConfigurator(ConfigFile = "log4net.config", Watch = true)]

In the application, I have the following static class:

public static class Logger
    {
        private static readonly ILog log = LogManager.GetLogger(System.Reflection.MethodBase.GetCurrentMethod().DeclaringType);


        public static void LogInfo(string msg)
        {
            log.Info(msg);
        }

        public static void LogDebug(string msg)
        {
            log.Debug(msg);
        }

        public static void LogWarn(string msg, Exception e)
        {
            log.Warn(msg, e);
        }

        public static void LogError(string msg, Exception e)
        {
            log.Error(msg, e);
        }
    }

Then I'm trying to log somewhere in the application in another class using Logger.LogDebug("Error logger working.");

However, I can't see any log file being created or written to it. What am I doing wrong?

UPDATE:

I also added the following in my app.config file but I see nothing at all on my Output console...

<appSettings>
    <add key="log4net.Internal.Debug" value="true"/>
</appSettings>

Answer 1

If you have the log4net configuration in a log4net logging configuration file, you do not have to add the configuration of the web.config (configuration tag and sections). Just add the log4net tags:

<log4net>
<root>
  <level value="ALL" />
  <appender-ref ref="console" />
  <appender-ref ref="RollingFileAppender" />
</root>
<appender name="console" type="log4net.Appender.ConsoleAppender">
  <layout type="log4net.Layout.PatternLayout">
    <conversionPattern value="%date %level %logger - %message%newline" />
  </layout>
</appender>
<appender name="RollingFileAppender" type="log4net.Appender.RollingFileAppender">
  <param name="File" value="${LOCALAPPDATA}\MyApp\LogFile.log" />
  <param name="AppendToFile" value="true" />
  <rollingStyle value="Size" />
  <maxSizeRollBackups value="10" />
  <maximumFileSize value="10MB" />
  <staticLogFileName value="true" />
  <layout type="log4net.Layout.PatternLayout">
    <param name="ConversionPattern" value="%-5level [%d{yyyy-MM-dd hh:mm:ss}] [%thread] (Line:%line) %M: - %m%n" />
  </layout>
</appender>
</log4net>

Answer 2

Managed to find out the issue thanks to stuartd's comment. My problem was, my full solution had 2 projects. I had only configured one project (which is not the start-up project) for log4net.

My original log4net configuration did not have any mistake. I simply added log4net reference to my start up project and added log4net configuration to that project as well and it started logging.

Many thanks to everyone who tested my config.

Answer 3

I could not reproduce your mistake. Configure log4net in AssemblyInfo works fine. maybe the problem in configuration. let me show you another implementation

    private static readonly ILog log = LogManager.GetLogger("myLogger");
    private static string configFile = "log4net.config";
    static Logger()
    {
        XmlConfigurator.Configure(new FileInfo(configFile));
    }

log4net.config:

<log4net>
<logger name="myLogger">
  <level value="ALL" />
  <appender-ref ref="console" />
  <appender-ref ref="RollingFileAppender" />
</logger>
<appender name="console" type="log4net.Appender.ConsoleAppender">
  <layout type="log4net.Layout.PatternLayout">
    <conversionPattern value="%date %level %logger - %message%newline" />
  </layout>
</appender>
<appender name="RollingFileAppender" type="log4net.Appender.RollingFileAppender">
  <param name="File" value="${LOCALAPPDATA}\MyApp\LogFile.log" />
  <param name="AppendToFile" value="true" />
  <rollingStyle value="Size" />
  <maxSizeRollBackups value="10" />
  <maximumFileSize value="10MB" />
  <staticLogFileName value="true" />
  <layout type="log4net.Layout.PatternLayout">
    <param name="ConversionPattern" value="%-5level [%d{yyyy-MM-dd hh:mm:ss}] [%thread] (Line:%line) %M: - %m%n" />
  </layout>
</appender>
</log4net>