Using the logging tool to add standard logging functionality.

With all these web applications, how does one keep track of who is using what? When dealing with patient information and privacy how does one keep track of who is viewing what? The answer to these questions is to log this information somewhere. This can be done by using the web application's built in logging functionality, if it has one. If a different logging mechanism is used for each application, you have to look at each individual application log to build a report of what a certain user has done. This can be a lot of work. Because of the general need for centralized logging a logging tool was created. It has a CGI interface so web applications can easily take advantage of this tool. The tool logs source IP, date, a message, and a md5hash to a central location. With this information you can track what a certain user did for every application that the user used.

Example code:

    $log_query = HTTP::Request->new(POST => "http://www.itlab.musc.edu/cgi-bin/dlog.cgi");
    $log_query->content_type('application/x-www-form-urlencoded');
    $log_query->content("logname=myOacis&message=$the_username\t".$escaped_query."&vtoken=$user_hash");
    
    $ua->request($log_query);