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AWS Lambda Function Logging in PowerShell

Your Lambda function comes with a CloudWatch Logs log group, with a log stream for each instance of your function. The runtime sends details about each invocation to the log stream, and relays logs and other output from your function's code.

To output logs from your function code, you can use cmdlets on Microsoft.PowerShell.Utility , or any logging module that writes to stdout or stderr. The following example uses Write-Host to log environment variables.

Example function.ps1

#Requires -Modules @{ModuleName='AWSPowerShell.NetCore';ModuleVersion='3.3.365.0'}
$var = (Get-ChildItem env:*).GetEnumerator() | Sort-Object Name
$out = "`n"
Foreach ($v in $var) {$out = $out + "{0} : {1}`n" -f $v.Name, $v.Value}
Write-Host ( $out )

The Lambda console shows log output when you test a function on the function configuration page. To view logs for all invocations, use the CloudWatch Logs console.

To view your Lambda function's logs

1. Open the Logs page of the CloudWatch console.

2. Choose the log group for your function (/aws/lambda/function-name).

3. Choose the first stream in the list.

Each log stream corresponds to an instance of your function. New streams appear when you update your function and when additional instances are created to handle multiple concurrent invocations. To find logs for specific invocations, you can instrument your function with X-Ray, and record details about the request and log stream in the trace. For a sample application that correlates logs and traces with X-Ray, see Error Processor Sample Application for AWS Lambda.

To get logs for an invocation from the command line, use the --log-type option. The response includes a LogResult field that contains up to 4 KB of base64-encoded logs from the invocation.

$ aws lambda invoke --function-name my-function out --log-type Tail
{
    "StatusCode": 200,
    "LogResult": "U1RBUlQgUmVxdWVzdElkOiA4N2QwNDRiOC1mMTU0LTExZTgtOGNkYS0yOTc0YzVlNGZiMjEgVmVyc2lvb...",
    "ExecutedVersion": "$LATEST"
}

You can use the base64 utility to decode the logs.

$ aws lambda invoke --function-name my-function out --log-type Tail \
--query 'LogResult' --output text |  base64 -d
START RequestId: 57f231fb-1730-4395-85cb-4f71bd2b87b8 Version: $LATEST
  "AWS_SESSION_TOKEN": "AgoJb3JpZ2luX2VjELj...", "_X_AMZN_TRACE_ID": "Root=1-5d02e5ca-f5792818b6fe8368e5b51d50;Parent=191db58857df8395;Sampled=0"",ask/lib:/opt/lib",
END RequestId: 57f231fb-1730-4395-85cb-4f71bd2b87b8
REPORT RequestId: 57f231fb-1730-4395-85cb-4f71bd2b87b8  Duration: 79.67 ms      Billed Duration: 100 ms         Memory Size: 128 MB     Max Memory Used: 73 MB

The base64 utility is available on Linux, macOS, and Ubuntu on Windows. For macOS, the command is base64 -D.

Log groups aren't deleted automatically when you delete a function. To avoid storing logs indefinitely, delete the log group, or configure a retention period after which logs are deleted automatically.