I often have to merge log files of 2 or more types (different parser mappings).
e.g. web logs with app logs etc.
See https://www.logviewplus.com/forum/2320/Another-scrambled-fields-with-merged-logs or https://www.logviewplus.com/forum/2321/Performance-issue-with-nested-Filters for my examples.

However, everytime I create a new merge or add new files to the merge or even if an update happens to the referenced files, all my column settings are gone. 
To be frank, this is VERY(!) frustrating and one of my biggest pain points with LogViewPlus.
I cannot rely on any selected columns, their particular order, any pins or the widths, which makes my analysis efforts quite inefficient.

Could you please come up with a solution to this problem?
I know that the scenario of merged files is a hard one, because you cannot reference a particular parser or any other anchor point. But maybe it is possible to define certain views or rules etc.?

Thank you very much for considering this!
Best regards,
Daniel

Thanks for highlighting this Daniel.

> the scenario of merged files is a hard one, because you cannot reference a particular parser or any other anchor point.

This is correct and it is why this behaviour is not currently supported.

To be honest, LogViewPlus has behaved this way forever.  Originally, merging files across different parsers was not a common user activity and we had more important problems to work on.  I think now is a good time to revisit that decision.

I will take a look and see what we can do.  This may be something for Q2.

Thanks again,

Toby

Hi guys,

Your app is beautiful! Thank you for creating it!
I just want to add that I’d like the same feature Daniel mentioned above.

I use your app only for merging logs, and every time I merge them, I need to rearrange the columns to make the logs readable. I wish there were a default column order that I could configure and apply as a fallback.

For merged logs, I only use the following columns:
- Log name
- Date
- Time
- Level
- Message

Also, I like to configure the columns width and to enable one line per log entry. Those parameters also aren't saved when I close the app which is a shame

Thanks for the feedback Andrei!  The +1 helps inform how we should allocate resources.

This is something we will investigate for the next release.  I will post back here when I have more information.

Thanks again,

Toby

Hi,

I just wanted to let you know that we have now released LogViewPlus v3.1.20 as a BETA release.

This release addresses improves column management in LogViewPlus by:
1. Column settings for merge files and message parsers will now be saved automatically.
2. We have reintroduced an improved version of the 'Column Customization' dialog which allows for columns to be added or reordered.

You can find the new dialog in the columns conext menu:



Or in the View -> Grid Columns menu:



Either of these options will open the columms customization dialog:



Hope that helps. Please do let me know if you have any further questions or issues.

Toby

Thanks I already tried it and works great! Thanks for your work!

Some things I have noticed:
* The Customization dialog has some visual glitches when using drag & drop in there.
* I also had one issue where the whole application got under very high load and did not respond for several seconds and kept doing so until I closed the dialog again. Not sure what caused this, but I think it was related to drag&drop as well.

One further wish for this:
* Even though it applies to new merges as well, it would be nice to save and apply the column settings like some kind of "view template" - similar to the filter templates.
* In extension to this: Are these settings part of the settings export as well? I tried to check it, but I wasn't able to confirm this.

That’s amazing, works like a charm. Thank you!

Sounds like we have made some progress - thanks for letting me know!  :-)

Daniel, I will try and recreate, but I think it might be best to create a separate thread for issues #1 and #2.

Issue three is something I will put on the backlog.  I can see where this feature would be useful, but I also think it could be confusing for some people in the same way that not saving the columns was confusing.

The column settings should absolutely be part of the exported settings, but I don't think this is the case at the moment.  I will review this and make sure the settings are exported before the full release next week.

Thanks again!

Toby