Errors not written to Apache error log

apache, error-logging, php

Solution

I just had this it was because I inadvisably deleted the /var/log/httpd/error_log file and then touched a new log file.

service httpd restart

cleared the problem . next time I'll truncate the error_log with

:>error_log

Problem

I've had a problem with some Apache web server error logs. I have a virtually hosted website scotthermmann.loc on my computer. After I manually clear an error log, using ``` sudo cat /dev/null > scotthermmann.loc-error_log ``` or by opening the file in emacs & deleting all content, errors no longer get logged to the file. I've tried using ``` sudo apachectl restart ``` to solve the problem, but it doesn't solve it. Logging out & back in doesn't solve it either. What does solve it is restarting the computer, but I don't want to do that after every time I clear an error log. This isn't the case for every website I host. I have another website barefootfool.loc. After I clear that error log, I don't have any problems. Both virtual sites have essentially the same setup in the httpd-vhosts.conf file. For scottherrmann.loc: ``` <VirtualHost *:80> DocumentRoot "/Users/dan/Sites/scottherrmann.com"     ServerName scottherrmann.loc     ServerAlias www.scottherrmann.loc     ErrorLog "/private/var/log/apache2/scottherrmann.loc-error_log"     CustomLog "/private/var/log/apache2/scottherrmann.loc-access_log" <Directory "/Users/dan/Sites/scottherrmann.com">     Options Indexes FollowSymLinks         AllowOverride All         Order Allow,Deny         Allow from all </Directory> </VirtualHost> ``` And for barefootfool.loc: ``` <VirtualHost *:80> DocumentRoot "/Users/dan/Sites/barefootfool.com" ServerName barefootfool.loc ServerAlias www.barefootfool.loc ErrorLog "/private/var/log/apache2/barefootfool.loc-error_log" CustomLog "/private/var/log/apache2/barefootfool.loc-access_log" <Directory "/Users/dan/Sites/barefootfool.com">     Options Indexes FollowSymLinks         AllowOverride All         Order Allow,Deny       Allow from all </Directory> </VirtualHost> ``` Does anyone have an idea what could be causing the problem?

Original source