'Initializes the handler with a specific host address and port.
When the attribute *closeOnError* is set to True - if a socket error
occurs, the socket is silently closed and then reopened on the next
logging call.'

def __init__(self, host, port):

    logging.Handler.__init__(self)
    self.host = host
    self.port = port
    if (port is None):
        self.address = host
    else:
        self.address = (host, port)
    self.sock = None
    self.closeOnError = False
    self.retryTime = None
    self.retryStart = 1.0
    self.retryMax = 30.0
    self.retryFactor = 2.0
