${currentdir} target is not generating file anymore - nlog

I have recently upgraded my asp.net core project to .net core 2.2 and at same time updated NLog.Web.AspNetCore.
After I did this (maybe coincidence?) I noticed that log files are not being generated.
In my config this is my target:
<target xsi:type="File" name="allfile" fileName="${currentdir}/Logs/nlog-all-${shortdate}.log"
layout="${longdate}|${event-properties:item=EventId_Id}|${uppercase:${level}}|${logger}|${message} ${exception:format=tostring}" />
After some debugging I realised that if I specified the path explicitly then it would generate log file:
<target xsi:type="File" name="allfile" fileName="E:\Project\Logs\nlog-all-${shortdate}.log"
layout="${longdate}|${event-properties:item=EventId_Id}|${uppercase:${level}}|${logger}|${message} ${exception:format=tostring}" />
I have throwExceptions="true" set in config but when a file is not generated no exception is thrown, it just silently doesn't create the file.
To further debug this I created a console project and added nuget NLog.Web.AspNetCore and copied my config. Now in the console project it works fine and is creating log files in the debug output directory.
Is there any way to debug why the log file isn't being generated with this target in my main project?

Instead of using ${currentdir} then consider using ${aspnet-appbasepath} (Or ${basedir} if not in-process-hosting)
NLog InternalLogger usually gives very good hints when something is not working as expected.
Please avoid using throwExceptions="true" as it is for unit-testing, and not for production environments.

Related

NLog - Configure log file name from appsettings in web.config

What i want is to pull the Log File path from my Web.config appsettings section.
The scenario is that, the deployment team would replace all the files while deployment except the web.config. Hence even if i set up my NLog Config File, it would be replaced in the next deployment and all my settings would be lost.
Is there a way that I could read the appsettings from my config and use it to set my log file path?
<target xsi:type="File" name="FileLog" fileName="PULL_LOG_PATH_FROM_WEB_CONFIG/${shortdate}.log">
Use NLog.Extended and use
${appsetting:key1}.
So
<target xsi:type="File" name="FileLog" fileName="${appsetting:key1}/${shortdate}.log" />
See docs for ${appsetting}
update: this is currently only supported for ASP.NET and not for ASP.NET Core. See issue for ASP.NET Core: https://github.com/NLog/NLog/issues/2334

Server Error in '/ccnet' Application

My CCTray says build is broken and on the server(http://172.25.165.10/ccnet/)
I get this error
Server Error in '/ccnet' Application.
Configuration Error
<cruisecontrol xmlns:cb="urn:ccnet.config.builder">
<!-- This is your CruiseControl.NET Server Configuration file.
Add your projects below! -->
<project name="winapp"
description="demoproject showing a small config" queue="Q1">
<webURL>http://172.25.165.10/ccnet/</webURL>
<!-- specify a state folder to prevent CCNet from saving it in Program Files\CruiseControl.NET\server
programs may not standard write their data in it on windows Vista and up)
-->
<sourcecontrol type="svn">
<trunkUrl>https://citdevbox.arcade.local:8443/svn/cardwellR/trunk/winapp</trunkUrl>
<workingDirectory>c:\builds\winapp</workingDirectory>
<username>***</username>
<password>***</password>
</sourcecontrol>
<state type="state" directory="C:\CCNet\State" />
<!-- specify a artifactDirectory to prevent CCNet from saving it in Program Files\CruiseControl.NET\server
programs may not standard write their data in it on windows Vista and up)
-->
<artifactDirectory>C:\CCNet\BuildArtifacts\MyFirstProject</artifactDirectory>
<tasks>
<msbuild>
<executable>C:\WINDOWS\Microsoft.NET\Framework\\v3.5\MSBuild.exe</executable>
<projectFile>C:\Builds\build\BootStrapper.msbuild</projectFile>
<buildArgs>/noconsolelogger /t:CTSx86;BuildZip /v:d</buildArgs>
<logger>ThoughtWorks.CruiseControl.MsBuild.XmlLogger,C:\Program Files\CruiseControl.NET\server\ThoughtWorks.CruiseControl.MsBuild.dll</logger>
<timeout>900</timeout>
</msbuild>
</tasks>
<triggers>
<!-- check the source control every X time for changes,
and run the tasks if changes are found -->
<intervalTrigger
name="continuous"
seconds="300"
buildCondition="IfModificationExists"
initialSeconds="5"/>
</triggers>
<publishers>
<xmllogger />
<artifactcleanup cleanUpMethod="KeepLastXBuilds"
cleanUpValue="50" />
</publishers>
</project>
</cruisecontrol>
Description: An error occurred during the processing of a configuration file required to service this request. Please review the specific error details below and modify your configuration file appropriately.
Parser Error Message: The root element must match the name of the section referencing the file, 'appSettings'
Source Error:
Line 1: cruisecontrol xmlns:cb="urn:ccnet.config.builder"
Source File: C:\Program Files (x86)\CruiseControl.NET\server\ccnet.config Line: 1
Version Information: Microsoft .NET Framework Version:2.0.50727.5456; ASP.NET Version:2.0.50727.5456
You didn't post the content of your ccnet.config file which the error you are getting is complaining about. Lets start with the obvious. I would look to see if there is a typo in there, for example maybe a missing quote or something in the appSettings section. If you have the unmodified version revert back to that and see if your issue goes away and compare the unmodified with the modified.
There is an app called CCValidator which will tell you where the error is in your ccnet.config file. I suspect that is not where the problem is. It sounds like the error is in the ccservice.exe.config. Perhaps someone accidentally copied ccnet.config to ccservice.exe.config. The error may also be in your web dashboard's configuration.
I solved the issue by removing the build args tag.
</noconsolelogger /t:CTSx86;BuildZip /v:d>
My processor was 64 bit and I was using noconsolelogger /t:CTSx86 which is for a 32 bit processor. Anyway these were optional so I removed it worked fine.

Include files in MSBuild that are not part of project

I'm trying to create an automated build for my web application project.
We use a standard CMS project and have tweaked some parts of it. Only the tweaked files are part of our project, but I want to include the full CMS in the deployment package.
So I've created a custom .targets file to define a task to include the CMS files during the build:
<Target Name="GetCMSFiles">
<ItemGroup>
<!-- Include the CMS files into the package -->
<_CMSFiles Include="..\packages\CMSFiles\**\*" />
<FilesForPackagingFromProject Include="%(_CMSFiles.Identity)">
<DestinationRelativePath>
%(RecursiveDir)%(Filename)%(Extension)
</DestinationRelativePath>
</FilesForPackagingFromProject>
</ItemGroup>
</Target>
<PropertyGroup Condition="'$(Configuration)|$(Platform)' == 'Release|AnyCPU'">
<!-- VS2010 -->
<CopyAllFilesToSingleFolderForPackageDependsOn>
GetCMSFiles;
$(CopyAllFilesToSingleFolderForPackageDependsOn);
</CopyAllFilesToSingleFolderForPackageDependsOn>
<!-- VS2012 -->
<CopyAllFilesToSingleFolderForMsdeployDependsOn>
GetCMSFiles;
$(CopyAllFilesToSingleFolderForMsdeployDependsOn);
</CopyAllFilesToSingleFolderForMsdeployDependsOn>
</PropertyGroup>
This works fine, but the problem is that the files from our project do not get copied to the deployment folder. So in other words, it does not overwrite the files that already exist after I copied them with the GetCMSFiles task.
The way I see it there are two options:
Force the CopyAllFilesToSingleFolder to overwrite any existing files in the deployment folder.
Have a condition in the GetCMSFiles task to only include files that don't already exist in the project.
But I'm not sure whether this is possible and how to achieve this. Any ideas?

Transform external config in a web role

Can slowcheetah transform an external config file in an azure web role? e.g. I have logging info in log4net.config. But the transformed version does not get created when packaged.
I did not manage to get slowCheetah working in my Azure solution.
One alternative you can use is to create complete config files for each environment - e.g. :
log4net.debug.config
log4net.release.config
and copy the contents of these into the log4net.config at buildtime depending on the build configuration chosen.
This is done by adding a build target to your csproj file like so:
<Target Name="BeforeBuild">
<Delete Files="$(ProjectDir)log4net.config" />
<Copy SourceFiles="$(ProjectDir)log4net.$(Configuration).config"
DestinationFiles="$(ProjectDir)log4net.config" />
</Target>
(you may have to modify the paths in the script depending on where in the solution your config files are)
You can find more information on MSBuild and manipulating your .csproj file here and here

using AppData location in NLog

My NLog targets is like this:
<targets>
<target xsi:type="Console" name="console"
layout="${longdate}|${level}|${message}" />
<target xsi:type="File" name="ErrorLog" fileName="${basedir}/error.txt"
layout="${longdate}
Trace: ${stacktrace}
${message}" />
<target xsi:type="File" name="AccessLog" fileName="${basedir}/access.txt"
layout="${shortdate} | ${message}" />
</targets>
But this causes problems if the user isn't an admin on their machine, because they will not have write access to "Program Files". How can I get something like %AppData% to NLog instead of BaseDir?
You're looking for the NLog special folders.
Example:
...fileName="${specialfolder:folder=ApplicationData}/Program/file.txt"...
Oren's answer should be the right answer. However, for the life of me I couldn't get it to work with my .NET 4.0 website using nLog 2.0.0.0. I ended up using simply
fileName="${basedir}app_data\logs\${shortdate}.log"
${specialfolder:ApplicationData} also works
The previous answers helped solve the problem I was having, but a couple of years later and the solution is now somewhat different under v4.3. The directory and filename are combined with the path.
#theGecko's link is still current for the syntax, but the page is deficient of an example:
https://github.com/nlog/NLog/wiki/Special-Folder-Layout-Renderer
The following example would write the file myLog.log to the current users application data roaming directory C:\USers\current.user\AppData\Roaming\My\Path\Somewhere:
fileName="${specialfolder:dir=My/Path/Somewhere/:file=myFile.log:folder=ApplicationData}"
For logging to the project directory:
While the previous answers work for the original question, searching for how to log to the project APP_DATA directory leads to this question. And while bkaid's answer works for ASP.NET and for using the APP_DATA folder specifically, for .NET Core and .NET 5 the solution is a bit different, because that motif has been abandoned in favor of defining a wwwroot folder for only those things which should be served, and the remainder being private. The answer for .NET Core/5, then, is to write to the solution root directory:
First, ensure the NLog.Web.AspNetCore assembly is added to nlog.config:
<extensions>
<add assembly="NLog.Web.AspNetCore"/>
</extensions>
Then use one of the layout renderers provided by that extension, in this case ${aspnet-appbasepath} which references the solution root directory:
<targets>
<target name="file"
type="File"
xsi:type="File"
fileName="${aspnet-appbasepath}/log/${shortdate}.log"
layout="${longdate}|${event-properties:item=EventId_Id:whenEmpty=0}"/>
</targets>
This will write the file to <solution folder>/log/2021-07-01.log, which will never be served by the public-facing website. Other layout renderers provided by this assembly are listed on the NLog website.

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