Audit Log
What the Audit Log is and how it works, including best practices and examples.
- The Audit Log notes changes made to a record. The Audit Log exists on every Page in MinistryPlatform.
- To access the Audit Log, open a record and click the Audit Log panel. When the panel opens, you can click By Date or By Field to sort the Audit Log accordingly. You can further expand each Audit Log entry to see the Previous Value and New Value.
- Dates are in the User's local time, determined by the User Timezone or the Domain Timezone if the User does not have one.
- Audit Log reports are available to those with the Administrator Security Role.
- If you created or updated something while impersonating another User, the Audit Log notes the actual User and the impersonated User. This occurs when an API client (for example, BMT) acts on behalf of a User (for example, to create a Donation record using the BMT) or if an administrator impersonates a User (for example, using the Impersonate User feature).
- If you receive the "no records found" message when you create the Audit Log, the record was part of the software at implementation or added directly to the database through the back end.
- An API User without an "on Behalf of" specified in the Audit Log means that a person created or edited the record without logging in and therefore didn't automatically match to an existing User. For example, when a person that isn't in the Platform registers for an Event, the related Event Participant record displays Created by: API User.
- SYSTEM in the Audit Log means that the Sign-in/Sign-up flow that several Widgets and external providers use created new Contact and User records.
- As a best practice, we recommend you create a NEW company contact and a NEW user per integration. Then, add the NEW API Client record and name it something other than _apiClient. When you do this, the Audit Log displays exactly which integration made the change. Review Giving Developers Access for more information.
- Context is important when looking for Audit Log entries. The Audit Log tracks changes made to any field on a single record, but it can't see related changes beyond that record. For example, if you add a Participant to a Group, this does not affect the fields on either the Participant or Group record, so the changes don't display in either record's Audit Log. However, the changes display in the new Group Participant record's Audit Log.