Is there an idiom for doing this? I came up with this technique: Logger rootLogger = (Logger)LoggerFactory.getLogger("root"); LoggerContext loggerContext = rootLogger.getLoggerContext(); GafferUtil.runGafferConfigurationOn(loggerContext, this, urlToConfigfile); Good? Bad? Is the a better way? Also can I do something like this: 1. create some initial configuration code, including some default appenders 2. import configuration code from a URL as above 3. append some more groovy code