Presently, as far as I can tell, a new user must duplicate the log4j.properties.template file into log4j.properties in the conf dir for Livy to run, otherwise it writes
log4j:WARN No appenders could be found for logger (org.apache.livy.server.AccessManager). log4j:WARN Please initialize the log4j system properly. log4j:WARN See http://logging.apache.org/log4j/1.2/faq.html#noconfig for more info.
to the log file and nothing else.
It would be better to bundle the server, or the livy core, with a default log4j file that is initialised if no other one is present, the same way Spark does. This would make setting up Livy for the first time that bit more frictionless.