Proposal: extension to Log interface to get error message written independently of falcon-debug-mask

[Olav Sandstaa]

Based on the discussion we have had by email about writing to MySQL's 
error log file and my need for always getting the error message about 
problems to the serial log written independently of what the status of 
the --falcon-debug-mask is, I propose following extention to the Log:: 
interface:

Alterantive 1 (based on Ann's suggestions in an earlier email):
===========

 * Introduce a new log category called "Fatal" (or something similar) 
that always get written to the error log independently of what the user 
has specified in the --falcon-debug-mask.
 * Example:

       Log::log(Fatal, "This text will always go to the error log file\n");

    Note: This log category will possibly be documented in the MySQL 
documentation along with the others, but the user not be allowed to turn 
it off if she sets a debug-mask that does not enable it.

Alternative 2:
==========

  * Extend the Log:: interface with a new method called fatal() (or 
error()) that will always write the message to the error log file
  * Example:

      Log::fatal("This text will always go to the error log file, and by 
the way Falcon has just crashed\n");

      or

      Log::error("This text will always go to the error log file, and by 
the way Falcon has just crashed\n");

  * "Advantage" of this is that it does not interfere with the 
falcon-debug-mask and the user visibility of this.

Any strong preference for any of these? Any feedback or other suggestions?

PS: This is not about printf and clashes with the server's log writing, 
it is just to define an interface that can be used for messages that we 
want to get out with having the user needing to specify an appropriate 
debug flag .

Regards,
Olav

PS A bonus proposal: I consider removing the implementation of 
Log::print() as it uses printf directly if there is no particular use 
for it (I do not think it is used anywhere)