---
title: "Creating a Dedicated BigPicture Log File."
canonical: "https://support.appfire.com/space/DLP/297634368/Creating%20a%20Dedicated%20BigPicture%20Log%20File."
format: markdown
---
<span style="color: #000000">**How to set up a separate log file for BigPicture debug data.**</span>

---

<span style="color: #000000">If you get a sizeable amount of BigPicture debug data sent to atlassian-jira.log but would instead divert it to a dedicated log file, you can do it by manually changing the configuration of Jira’s log4j file.</span>

<span style="color: #000000">Here’s how to do it:</span>

1. Add the following snippet to your log4j.properties* file:

|  |
| --- |
| <span style="color: #000000">*log4j.appender.bigpicture=com.atlassian.jira.logging.JiraHomeAppender*</span><br><span style="color: #000000">*log4j.appender.bigpicture.File=bigpicture.log*</span><br><span style="color: #000000">*log4j.appender.bigpicture.MaxFileSize=20480KB*</span><br><span style="color: #000000">*log4j.appender.bigpicture.MaxBackupIndex=5*</span><br><span style="color: #000000">*log4j.appender.bigpicture.layout=com.atlassian.logging.log4j.NewLineIndentingFilteringPatternLayout*</span><br><span style="color: #000000">*log4j.appender.bigpicture.layout.ConversionPattern=%d %p [%X{jira.mailserver}] %t %X{jira.username} %X{*</span><span style="color: #000000">*[jira.request.id](http://jira.request.id)*</span><span style="color: #000000">*} %X{*</span><span style="color: #000000">*[jira.request.assession.id](http://jira.request.assession.id)*</span><span style="color: #000000">*} %X{jira.request.ipaddr} %X{jira.request.url} %m%n*</span><br><span style="color: #000000">*[log4j.logger.com](http://log4j.logger.com)*</span><span style="color: #000000">*.softwareplant = INFO, console, bigpicture*</span><br><span style="color: #000000">*[log4j.additivity.com](http://log4j.additivity.com)*</span><span style="color: #000000">*.softwareplant = false*</span> |

2. Restart your Jira instance.

<span style="color: #000000">This will create a separate bigpicture.log file for all logs from our app or com.softwareplant package specifically.</span>

<span style="color: #000000">**Where to find the log4.properties file?**</span>

<span style="color: #000000">The log4.properties is located in "WEB-INF/classes/log4j.properties." You can find this path by going to your Jira Administration > System > Logging and profiling, and scrolling down to the "Default Loggers" section:</span>

![Logging-and-Profiling-BigPicture-demo.png](media://0645ed5a-a834-4acc-b002-8ffba332f462)

<span style="color: #000000">You can further configure the granularity of the log file and choose the desired logging levels:</span>

![image](media://8ebe7cdf-c5a4-4c20-ad3a-f04802be64be)

<span style="color: #000000">This is it. You've just set up a separate log file for BigPicture debug data.</span>