Basic Setup in .NET

[Zac Harvey <za...@gmail.com>]

I'm trying to get log4net setup with my .NET project, using VS 2008. I'm
completely new to the log4net API, and to logging systems in general, and so
I want a very basic logger for my first time out of the starting gate.

My solution consists of several projects (one executable and several DLLs),
and many classes exist inside each project.  Since I want to use log4net in
a very simple way (even if doing so compromises standard or best practices),
I want to use it to log all "errors" (caught exceptions) to the same log
file (*errors.log*). So, for instance, if the *CWidget* class belongs to the
*Something* project, and it throws an error, I want that error logged in the
same file as, say, an exception thrown by the *CBlort* class, which belongs
to the *SomethingElse* project. So basically:

try
{
    // Some code.
}
catch(Exception exc)
{
    // Log the exc.Message string to the error.log file.
}

.. will be my mechanism for logging, at least for now until I understand
log4net a little better.  The following questions all aim to help me achieve
just this. And please, if the nature of my questions indicate that I don't
grasp something, feel free to tear into me and explain to me how I've
strayed from the path!

(1) I believe what I am looking for is a FileAppender. I would like to
configure my project to use a single FileAppender that I will write
(borrowing heavily from online examples) in XML.  Where does this XML-based
config file have to be stored (path) inside the solution?

(2) So the logger now appends log info to a file via FileAppender...where do
I store (path) my error.log file so that the logger will work?

(3) Since all objects across all projects will only use this single
FileAppender for logging to my error.log file, *instead* of declaring a new
logger object inside of each class, I'd like to use a generic logger that
all objects have access to. So in one project I am planning to have a class
called CLogger that basically wraps a log4net logger, and then any class can
reference/use it to log to error.log.... but now that I think about it...

(4) ... Is it possible to create a single logger using XML or some other
config method, and then only declare a new instance of it inside every
logging class? Or is that what the standard already is with the "ILog log =
new ILog.LogManager(...)" statements I see in most examples? I'm so
confused!

Thanks for any clarification here, any and all advice will be tremendously
helpful to me.