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Log4j not writing logs to file on one Websphere server and writing to file on other

I have maven application with log4j.properties in it with setting to write the logs to a specified file instead of console. When I run the EAR on one of the websphere servers it is creating the file as expected and writing logs to it. But, when I am running the same EAR on other webspehere server it is writing to console instead of writing the logs to the specified file. I have checked the permissions and everything seems to be fine. Please help me in identifying what the issue is. Thanks in advance.
# CONSOLE APPENDER (stdout)
log4j.appender.stdout=org.apache.log4j.ConsoleAppender
log4j.appender.stdout.Threshold=DEBUG
log4j.appender.stdout.layout=org.apache.log4j.PatternLayout
log4j.appender.stdout.layout.ConversionPattern=[%d] [%t] %-5p %20c - %m%n
# ROLLING FILE APPENDER (on the file system) for memberpolicyattributesservice code
log4j.appender.xxxxService=org.apache.log4j.RollingFileAppender
log4j.appender.xxxxService.Threshold=DEBUG
log4j.appender.xxxxService.File=/var/logs/xxxServer1/xxxServiceLog.log
log4j.appender.xxxxService.layout=org.apache.log4j.PatternLayout
log4j.appender.xxxxService.layout.ConversionPattern=%d{MM-dd#HH:mm:ss} %-5p (%13F:%L) %3x - %m%n
log4j.appender.xxxxService.MaxFileSize=10000KB
log4j.appender.xxxxService.MaxBackupIndex=30
log4j.appender.xxxxService.layout=org.apache.log4j.PatternLayout
log4j.appender.xxxxService.layout.ConversionPattern=[%d] [%t] %-5p %20c - %m%n
# ROLLING FILE APPENDER (on the file system) for hiberate, open source code log files
log4j.appender.open_source_code=org.apache.log4j.RollingFileAppender
log4j.appender.open_source_code.layout=org.apache.log4j.PatternLayout
log4j.appender.open_source_code.Threshold=DEBUG
#message format:YYYY-MM-DD HH:mm:ss,ms [ThreadId] <PRIORITY> classname.message
log4j.appender.open_source_code.layout.ConversionPattern=%d [%t]<%-5p> %c.%m \r\n
#file that will be logged to
log4j.appender.open_source_code.File=/var/logs/xxxServer1/open_source_code.log
log4j.appender.open_source_code.Append=true
log4j.appender.open_source_code.MaxFileSize=1024KB
log4j.appender.open_source_code.MaxBackupIndex=5
#turn on log4j verbose mode
log4j.debug = true
# Set root logger level to INFO and its appender to DSInstrumentor,stdout.
log4j.rootLogger=DEBUG,stdout,xxxxService
# YOUR CATEGORIES (to customize logging per class/pkg/project/etc)
log4j.category.fatal=FATAL,xxxxService
log4j.category.error=ERROR,xxxxService
#This will also enable the logging for all the children (packages and classes) of this package
log4j.logger.com.xxxxx=ALL,xxxxService
# Print only messages of level INFO in the open source code
log4j.logger.org=INFO,open_source_code

You have multiple loggers defined in your root logger (DEBUG, stdout, xxxxService) but the xxxxService loggers look like they're bound to the file system on one of the systems:
log4j.appender.open_source_code.File=/var/logs/xxxServer1/open_source_code.log
Make sure that path is valid for each server in your WAS cluster.
As a side note, you should probably avoid using debug and stdout on a remote server. This is fine for local development in your workstation, but not on a remote box. Instead, provide different log4j properties on your various deployment tiers. This lets you customize the log location or appender (say c:\temp or CONSOLE on your desktop, but /var/logs ... on all remote machines) as well as your log levels (DEBUG for desktop, maybe INFO for QA or Staging, and WARN or ERROR for Production).

Log4j on AppEngina -> All log messages shown with the same log level

My log messages always show up as "info" in the app engine logging console, even if i log a message as error (see screenshot).
I log a message like that:
private static Logger logger = Logger.getLogger(PingServlet.class);
logger.error("Database was successfully pinged!!.");
The configs like this:
src/main/resources/log4j.properties
# Root logger option
log4j.rootLogger=INFO, stdout
# Direct log messages to stdout
log4j.appender.stdout=org.apache.log4j.ConsoleAppender
log4j.appender.stdout.Target=System.out
log4j.appender.stdout.layout=org.apache.log4j.PatternLayout
log4j.appender.stdout.layout.ConversionPattern=%d{yyyy-MM-dd HH:mm:ss} %-5p %c{1}:%L - %m%n
src/main/webapp/WEB-INF/logging.properties
# A default java.util.logging configuration.
# (All App Engine logging is through java.util.logging by default).
#
# To use this configuration, copy it into your application's WEB-INF
# folder and add the following to your appengine-web.xml:
#
# <system-properties>
# <property name="java.util.logging.config.file" value="WEB-INF/logging.properties"/>
# </system-properties>
#
# Set the default logging level for all loggers to WARNING
.level = INFO
How can I change that? I want to show an error as error and so on.

If you are logging with log4j the log messages are being printed to the "console" with ConsoleAppender which AppEngina then collects in its own log. The two log parts you have are not connected.
you either need to use java.util.logging directly instead of log4j or use slf4 to redirect log4j to java.util.logging (a bit tricky, read the documentation carefully)

Shunting certain org.apache.log4j log messages off to a particular log file

We already have extensive logging in our application using org.apache.log4j. We now want to shunt some of these messages off to a new XML log file (while continuing to go to the original log file).
Is this possible? Is there a way we can identify these messages and send them someplace special in addition to the regular log file?

I think you can define two file appenders. One at the root level and other at the package(select the package level as appropriate) level as below:
# Root logger option
log4j.rootLogger=DEBUG, RootFileAppender
#Shunted Logger option
log4j.logger.com.shunted=ERROR,ShuntedFileAppender
# RootFileAppender - used to log messages in the root.log file.
log4j.appender.RootFileAppender=org.apache.log4j.FileAppender
log4j.appender.RootFileAppender.File=root.log
log4j.appender.RootFileAppender.MaxFileSize=100MB
log4j.appender.RootFileAppender.layout=org.apache.log4j.PatternLayout
log4j.appender.RootFileAppender.layout.ConversionPattern= %5p [%t] (%F:%L) - %m%n
# ShuntedFileAppender - used to log messages in the shunted.log file.
log4j.appender.ShuntedFileAppender=org.apache.log4j.FileAppender
log4j.appender.ShuntedFileAppender.File=shunted.log
log4j.appender.ShuntedFileAppender.MaxFileSize=10MB
log4j.appender.ShuntedFileAppender.layout=org.apache.log4j.PatternLayout
log4j.appender.ShuntedFileAppender.layout.ConversionPattern= %5p [%t] (%F:%L) - %m%n
Please Note: You can define the two logger option as different levels as well. In above example, ROOT is defined at DEBUG while shunted is devined as ERROR level.

Log4j output on console instead of configured file

I configured Log4j to log into a file but it is instead logging to stdout.
it creates the log file but it does not write to it, instead to stdout.
Here is my config file:
log4j.rootCategory=INFO, file, mail
log4j.appender.file=org.apache.log4j.RollingFileAppender
log4j.appender.file.File=/path-to/jobs-batch.log
log4j.appender.file.MaxFileSize=10MB
log4j.appender.file.MaxBackupIndex=2
log4j.appender.file.layout=org.apache.log4j.PatternLayout
log4j.appender.file.layout.ConversionPattern=[jobs-batch] %p [%t] %c{1}.%M(%L) | %m%n
log4j.logger.org.springframework.jdbc=WARN
# Configuration for receiving e-mails when ERROR messages occur.
log4j.appender.mail=org.apache.log4j.net.SMTPAppender
log4j.appender.mail.To=xxx#xxx.com
log4j.appender.mail.From=xxx#xxx.com
log4j.appender.mail.SMTPHost=mail.xxx.de
log4j.appender.mail.Threshold=ERROR
log4j.appender.mail.Subject=Jobs Batch Error
log4j.appender.mail.layout=org.apache.log4j.PatternLayout
log4j.appender.mail.layout.ConversionPattern=%d %-5p %c %x - %m%n
any ideas?
Thanks

Adjust to suite your needs:
log4j.rootCategory=DEBUG, C
log4j.appender.C=org.apache.log4j.ConsoleAppender
log4j.appender.C.layout=org.apache.log4j.PatternLayout
log4j.appender.C.layout.ConversionPattern=%d{MMddyyyy HH:mm} %-5p %c{1}:%L - %m%n
log4j.appender.C.Target=System.out

Things to check:
What is the name of your Log4j property file? The default is log4j.properties, which is what the Log4j library will look for on startup.
Related to what Thorbjorn asks in his comment, where is the log4j property file located? Placing it in the default package will ensure it's found (by default Log4j searches the classpath).
Optionally specify the location of the log4j property file using the log4j.configuration property when starting the JVM.

i was stupid by myself.
i was using the -Dlog4j.configuration to set my file.
BUT i was also configuring log4j programmatically to use the SAME configuration file.
i still do not understand why it did behave like that since i was just setting the SAME configuration file twice. But once i did it only once it worked as expected.

How to make log4j record to a file and print to console

I can make the log to go the console but I cant seem to make it go to a log file. Here is my properties file.
log4j.rootLogger=DEBUG, LOG , stdout
log4j.appender.stdout=org.apache.log4j.ConsoleAppender
log4j.appender.stdout.layout=org.apache.log4j.PatternLayout
log4j.appender.stdout.layout.ConversionPattern=%5p %d{d/MM/yy HH:mm:ss}:%m%n
# log4j.appender.LOG.Threshold=INFO
log4j.appender.LOG=org.apache.log4j.RollingFileAppender
log4j.appender.LOG.File=C:\dev\harry\data\logs\core.log
log4j.appender.LOG.layout=org.apache.log4j.PatternLayout
log4j.appender.LOG.Append=true
log4j.appender.LOG.layout.ConversionPattern=%5p %d{d/MM/yy HH:mm:ss}:%m%n
# log4j.appender.LOG.Threshold=INFO

The problem is that your single \ should be \\. This is true in most properties files.

There are some issues with the \ in the file path that need to be fixed. The syntax is a bit cryptic but the way to log to multiple locations is to attach a named logging appender to the root logger. In this example this is:
log4j.rootLogger=DEBUG, LOG , stdout
DEBUG is a logging level (threshold filter) to use for the root logger.
LOG is the name of a logging appender
stdout is the name of a second appender
The logging appenders are specified by
log4j.appender.{logging-appender-name}={some.log4j.appender.class}
log4j.appender.{logging-appender-name}.{some-other-property}=...
Where {logging-appender-name} is a name selected by yourself (in this case LOG and stdout) and {some.log4j.appender.class} is one of the many log4j logging appender classes such as DailyRollingFileAppender or ConsoleAppender.

I would have added:
log4j.appender.LOG.Threshold=ALL
I'm not sure what the default is.