The OP doesn't include the implementation of "createLogMessage" because he is suggesting that this method would be part of a framework, and by using it you can

The OP doesn't include the implementation of "createLogMessage" because he is suggesting that this method would be part of a framework, and by using it you can focus your mind on your application code, rather than boring details like checking for file locks on a log file. I do think that choosing where to abstract and where to split functionality is the "art" of the code and we obsess about as we master the craft. So I can appreciate your code example! I personally like to have a dedicated log function. That way you can refactor from using a file to perhaps a database table or any other method of logging. I personally expose our error logs as RSS and subscribe to the feed - I find it a really easy way to monitor because I'm too lazy to go looking at error log files every day!