Description of problem:

SR-IOV webhook pod doesn't show debug logs even if we set SriovOperatorConfig.spec.logLevel=2.

[root@util ~]# oc get   SriovOperatorConfig default -o yaml |grep logLevel
  logLevel: 2

[root@util ~]# oc logs operator-webhook-lsrjt -n openshift-sriov-network-operator
2026-02-19T08:24:01.885560158Z    INFO    sriov-network-operator-webhook    cobra/command.go:987    Run sriov-network-operator-webhook
2026-02-19T08:24:01.891874181Z    INFO    sriov-network-operator-webhook    runtime/asm_amd64.s:1695    start server

  ===> There is no debug logs

Version-Release number of selected component (if applicable):

I found this issue on OCP 4.18.
This is didn't occur on OCP 4.14.

How reproducible:

Steps to Reproduce:{}

1. Deploy OCP 4.18
2. Install SRIOV operator
3. Create SriovOperatorConfig with enableOperatorWebhook=true and logLevel=2

   apiVersion: sriovnetwork.openshift.io/v1
   kind: SriovOperatorConfig
   metadata:
     name: default
     namespace: openshift-sriov-network-operator
   spec:
     disableDrain: false
     enableInjector: true
     enableOperatorWebhook: true
     logLevel: 2 

1. Try to create a wrong SriovNetworkNodePolicy, and it failed. This fine.

   [root@util ~]# cat sriov-policy.yaml 
   apiVersion: sriovnetwork.openshift.io/v1
   kind: SriovNetworkNodePolicy
   metadata:
     name: test
     namespace: openshift-sriov-network-operator
   spec:
     resourceName: test
     nodeSelector:
       node-role.kubernetes.io/worker: ""
     numVfs: 4
     nicSelector:
       vendor: "15b3"
       deviceID: "101d"
   
   [root@util ~]# oc apply -f   sriov-policy.yaml 
   Error from server (no supported NIC is selected by the nicSelector in CR test): error when creating "sriov-policy.yaml": admission webhook "operator-webhook.sriovnetwork.openshift.io" denied the request: no supported NIC is selected by the nicSelector in CR test
    

1. Even though the creation of SriovNetworkNodePolicy failed due to webhook validation, webhook pods doesn't show any debug logs. This makes troubleshooting quite difficult:

   [root@util ~]# oc logs operator-webhook-lsrjt -n openshift-sriov-network-operator 2026-02-19T08:24:01.885560158Z    INFO    sriov-network-operator-webhook    cobra/command.go:987    Run sriov-network-operator-webhook 2026-02-19T08:24:01.891874181Z    INFO    sriov-network-operator-webhook    runtime/asm_amd64.s:1695    start server  

Actual results:

Webhook pods doesn't show any debug logs.
It's quite difficult to troubleshoot SriovNetworkNodePolicy validation error without webhook debug logs.

Expected results:

Webhook pods doesn't shows debug logs.

Workaround:

Debug logs is emitted by adding --zap-log-level=2 option to the webhook pod

1. Stop reconciliation 
# oc -n openshift-sriov-network-operator scale deploy/sriov-network-operator --replicas=0
 
2. add --zap-log-level=2 option to the webhook pods
# oc -n openshift-sriov-network-operator patch ds operator-webhook --type='json' -p='[ {"op":"add","path":"/spec/template/spec/containers/0/args/-","value":"--zap-log-level=2"} ]'
 
3. webhook pods shows debug logs
# oc logs operator-webhook-zrjjx|cut -c 1-150 
2026-02-19T08:41:02.230541052Z    INFO    sriov-network-operator-webhook    cobra/command.go:987    Run sriov-network-operator-webhook 
2026-02-19T08:41:02.236942821Z    INFO    sriov-network-operator-webhook    runtime/asm_amd64.s:1695    start server 
2026-02-19T08:41:04.739337348Z    LEVEL(-2)    serve    webhook/start.go:127    handling request    {"request-body": "{\"kind\":\"AdmissionReview\",\"apiVersion\":\" 
2026-02-19T08:41:04.739571222Z    LEVEL(-2)    webhook/start.go:99    validating custom resource 
2026-02-19T08:41:04.739686491Z    LEVEL(-2)    webhook/webhook.go:66    validateSriovNetworkNodePolicy    {"object": {"kind":"SriovNetworkNodePolicy","apiVersion" 
2026-02-19T08:41:04.748614613Z    LEVEL(-2)    webhook/validate.go:284    validatePolicyForNodeState(): validate policy for node    {"policy-name": "test", "node- 
2026-02-19T08:41:04.748651163Z    LEVEL(-2)    webhook/validate.go:284    validatePolicyForNodeState(): validate policy for node    {"policy-name": "test", "node- 
2026-02-19T08:41:04.748656022Z    LEVEL(-2)    webhook/validate.go:284    validatePolicyForNodeState(): validate policy for node    {"policy-name": "test", "node- 
2026-02-19T08:41:04.748745491Z    LEVEL(-2)    serve    webhook/start.go:127    sending response    {"response": "{\"kind\":\"AdmissionReview\",\"apiVersion\":\"admi

Additional info:

The issue didn't occur on OCP 4.14.
I suppose that the following patch changed logging library, and now --zap-log-level=2 option is required: 

https://github.com/openshift/sriov-network-operator/commit/2542dde8c8d98ee938d4be39b48cab4868a6468e