[LOG4J2-837] Hex-dump layout for binary messages

• Type: New Feature
• Status: Open
• Priority: Major
• Resolution: Unresolved
• Component/s: API, Layouts
• Labels: binary
• Assignee: Remko Popma
• Reporter: Gary D. Gregory
• Created: 18/Sep/14 17:34
• Updated: 18/Sep/14 17:34

Description

Add a layout that can format a BinaryMessage as text, each byte encoded as a hexadecimal number, with spacing and grouping to make the data easy to read.

BinaryMessage can be an interface as discussed in LOG4J2-506. One proposal is to also provide a ByteBufferMessage implementation that can be constructed from either a byte[] or a java.nio.ByteBuffer.

Ideas for BinaryLayout configuration parameters:

• group size in bytes (default 8)
• group count per line (default 4)
• uppercase vs. lowercase output (default?)
• base (default 16, should this even be configurable?)
• group separator (default space " ")
• char encoding (default UTF-8 or ASCII), if present extends the a line with text version of the bytes
• groups-text separator (default " | ")
• address-groups separator (default " | ")
• unprintable char (default .)

Example output line (bogus values):
00000 | 01234567 a1234567 b1234567 c1234567 | .HELLO...

This layout also needs some way to handle Messages that are not BinaryMessages. One idea is to have a nested fallback layout that the BinaryLayout will delegate to for non-binary messages.

Issue Links

• depends upon: LOG4J2-506 Binary logging interface