When a user session commits, the session’s redo information needs to be flushed from memory to the redo logfile to make it permanent.

At the time of commit, the user session will post the LGWR to write the log buffer (containing the current unwritten redo, including this session’s redo information) to the redo log file. When the LGWR has finished writing, it will post the user session to notify it that this has completed. The user session waits on ‘log file sync’ while waiting for LGWR to post it back to confirm all redo changes have made it safely on to disk.

The time between the user session posting the LGWR and the LGWR  posting the user after the write has completed is the wait time for ‘log file sync’ that the user session will show.

Most common causes of log file sync wait events are:-

• Slow I/O throughput of the disks hosting redo log files.
• Excessive Application Commits.