A number of readers have asked me for reference implementations of the stability and capacity patterns.
I've begun to create some free implementations to go along with Release It. As of today, it just includes a drop-in formatter that you can use in place of the java.util.logging default (which is horrible).
This formatter keeps all the fields lined up in columns, including truncating the logger name and method name if necessary. A columnar format is much easier for the human eye to scan. We all have great pattern-matching machinery in our heads. I can't for the life of me understand why so many vendors work so hard to defeat it. The one thing that doesn't get stuffed into a column is a stack trace. It's good for a stack trace to interrupt the flow of the log file... that's something that you really want to pop out when scanning the file.
It only takes a minute to plug in the SingleLineFormatter. Your admins will thank you for it.