We would like to use the flexibility of the standard logging mechanism for the AccessLogValue. I could find no way to do this. Looking at the AccessLogValve code in Tomcat 7, it seems it would really would not be hard to add.

There already is standard logger in the AccessLogValve class, which is where error in the logger itself get routed. private static final Log log = LogFactory.getLog(AccessLogValve.class);

This still makes a lot of sense, and should probably be kept separate.

What I would propose is that a new attribute be added, called maybe "systemLoggerName". If this is set, then the logger by that name would be used instead of the current hard-coded file logger. (Errors would still go to the statically defined Logger.)

I already tried this with the XML listed below and a slightly modified AccessLogValve and it seems to work perfectly. If this is something that would be considered a positive change, I would be happy to submit a patch and propose some documentation updates.

I am not exactly sure how this all works, especially since this is more of an enhancement rather than a bug fix. I sure there are guidelines for when in a release cycle these types of changes are appropriate.