Binding: Digital
Label: Syngress
Manufacturer: Syngress
Number Of Pages: 350
Publication Date: 2005-02-10
Publisher: Syngress
Studio: Syngress

HIGHLIGHT
Written by Microsoft's Log Parser developer, this is the first book available on Microsoft's popular yet undocumented log parser tool. The book and accompanying Web site contain hundreds of customized, working scripts and templates that system administrators will find invaluable for analyzing the log files from Windows Server, Snort IDS, ISA Server, IIS Server, Exchange Server, and other products.

System administrators running Windows, Unix, and Linux networks manage anywhere from 1 to thousands of operating systems (Windows, Unix, etc.), Applications (Exchange, Snort, IIS, etc.), and hardware devices (firewalls, routers, etc.) that generate incredibly long and detailed log files of all activity on the particular application or device. This book will teach administrators how to use Microsoft's Log Parser to data mine all of the information available within these countless logs. The book teaches readers how all queries within Log Parser work (for example: a Log Parser query to an Exchange log may provide information on the origin of spam, viruses, etc.). Also, Log Parser is completely scriptable and customizable so the book and accompanying Web site will provide the reader with hundreds of original, working scripts that will automate these tasks and provide formatted charts and reports detailing the results of the queries.

* Written by Microsoft's sole developer of Log Parser, this is the first book available on the powerful yet completely undocumented product that ships with Microsoft's IIS, Windows Advanced Server 2003, and is available as a free download from the
Microsoft Web site.

* The book and accompanying Web site contain dozens of original, working Log Parser scripts and templates for Windows Server, ISA Server, Snort IDS, Exchange Server, IIS, and more!

* This book and accompanying scripts will save system administrators countless hours by scripting and automating the most common to the most complex log analysis tasks.

Customer Rating:
Summary: Great book!!
Comment: This is a must have for any systems engineer who needs to take a proactive approach in system monitoring. Used in conjunction with ASP and a backend database, real time monitoring apps are a snap to build.

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Customer Rating:
Summary: Dream Book on Dream Tool
Comment: This tool is amazing in that it supports a variety input and output formats including reading in syslog and outputting into databases are pretty Excel charts. The filtering uses an SQL syntax. The tool comes with a DLL that can be registered, so that scripters (VBScript, Perl, JScript, etc.) can access the power of this tool.

This book not only covers the tool (alternative being to scrape the network for complex incomprehensible snippets), but shows real world practical solutions with the tool, from analyzing web logs, system events, security and network scans, etc.

This tool is just heavensend for analysis and transforming of any data in a variety of formats. The book and tool go hand-in-hand, and I highly recommend incorporating this into your tool (and book) into your tool kit and/or scripting endeavors immediately.

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Customer Rating:
Summary: Basic and lacked in depth detail
Comment: This book was basic and lacked in depth detail. I actually got more out of the help file that came with log parser. I was hoping for more detail on creating and using charts. This is not one of the better books i've bought this year.

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Customer Rating:
Summary: Excellent Real World Examples
Comment: I bought this book thinking it would be a good reference point for using Log Parser 2.2, and am exceedingly impressed with the volume of real-world, practical examples.

Within minutes I had several scripts in production and was on my way to writing much more complex queries to squeeze every drop of valuable data from my logs. I'm querying IIS logs, Event Logs, CSV files and more with ease.

I've got this book at my side any time I go to write a new script. I would definitely recommend it to others.

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Customer Rating:
Summary: A must have for the Network Administrator / Security Pro
Comment: This is a complete reference for utilizing the MicrosoftLog Parser Tool in real world scenarios.
The authors do an outstanding job of bringing you from the basics of Log Parser through advanced techniques and tricks. I have thoroughly enjoyed reading it end to end, and have begun utilizing Log Parser in my daily log assessment routines. The Tips, Swiss Army Knifes, and Master Craftsman sidebars prove extremely creative and helpful.

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