Puppet writes logging by default to syslog. Why is that? Most software write to some separate logfile. I checked the documentation and there is a mention that you can write to a log file but there was a mention that "This is generally not used." Is it a bad idea?
What is the typical setup for following the puppet logging? Using grep on the /var/log/messages file?
Answer
Since your mentioned syslog, I assume you were talking about Debian-like Linux.
Actually there is no need to write your own log facility. Customizing /etc/default/puppet is enough.
# Startup options
DAEMON_OPTS="--logdest /var/log/puppet/puppet.log"
/etc/default/puppet is sourced by /etc/init.d/puppet, so the options you added here will be executed when puppet service is started.
Docs about --logdest options : https://docs.puppetlabs.com/references/3.3.1/man/apply.html#OPTIONS
BTW, the deb package puppet provides for Debian(or Ubuntu) even includes a logrotate configuration file for /var/log/puppet, I don't know why this option is not default.
/var/log/puppet/*log {
missingok
sharedscripts
create 0644 puppet puppet
compress
rotate 4
postrotate
pkill -USR2 -u puppet -f 'puppet master' || true
[ -e /etc/init.d/puppet ] && /etc/init.d/puppet reload > /dev/null 2>&1 || true
endscript
}