I need a way to find which Java methods are writing a plain log file (this log it's not log4j), I'm certain that the log is written as a text file with the io.file class.
How can I isolate the methods with Eclipse that operate with the log.
I made some investigation on Linux to determine the process that opens the file and it's jboss, so it's the main project, what now is needed is to narrow down the search.
So, what can it be done at this point ?
Any other tips like using 3-rd party monitoring tools like jvisualvm to monitor jboss's threads are welcomed.
I can provide more details about my problem, leave the questions in the comments, because I don't know very well how to explain the issue I'm experiencing.
Related
I'm looking for a way to output traces to a log file in my code, which runs on linux.
I don't want to include the printing information in the binary, in every place I deploy it.
It windows, I simply used WPP to trace without putting the actual traces strings in my binary.
How can this by achieved in Linux?
I'm not very familiar with Linux tools in this area, so maybe there is a better system. However, since nobody else has made any good suggestions, I'll make a suggestion. (Probably not a very good suggestion, but the best I can think of right now.)
In theory, you could continue to use wpp. Wpp is simply a template system. It scans the configuration and input files to create data structures. Then it runs a template, fills in the data values it got from the scan, producing the tmh files. You could create a new set of templates that would use Linux apis instead of Windows apis, and would record the message strings in a way that works with some other log decoder system.
I noticed this question only now and would like to add my two cents to the story just for a case. Personally, I truly appreciate Windows WPP Tracing and consider it probably the best engineering solution for practical development troubleshooting among similar tools.
It happened I extended WPP use to Unix-like platforms twice. We wanted to use strong sides of WPP concept in general and yet use it in a multi-platform pieces of code. This was not a porting but rather a wrapper to specific WPP use we configured on Windows. One time we had a web service to perform actual WPP pre-processing on Windows; it may sound a bit insane but it worked fine and effective within the local network. A wrapper script that was executed before each compilation sent a web request, got a processed file and post-processed the generated include file to make it suitable for Unix-like platforms. The second time we implemented a simplified WPP pre-processor of our own (we found yet additional use for it - we could generate the tracing statements differently for production and unit testing, for example). This was a harsh solution: you anyway need to use some physical tracing framework behind the wrapper on non-Windows platform (well, the first time we apparently implemented our own lower level).
I do not think the Linux world has a framework comparable to WPP. Once I even thought it could be a great idea to make an open source porting project for WPP. I am not sure it would be much requested though. I said it is a great engineering solution. But who wants to do dirty engineering work? Open source community prefer abstract object-oriented and generic solutions, streaming and less necessity in corresponding tools (WPP requires special management tools and OS support).Ease of code writing is the today's choice.
There could be Microsoft fault (or unwillingness) in the lack of WPP popularity too. They kept it as an internal framework that came out just by a case with Windows DDK because they have to offer some logging/tracing solution for driver developers. Nobody even noticed much that WPP is well suitable for the user-space code too. And WPP pre-processor for C#, for example, has never been exposed to public at all.
Nevertheless, I still think that WPP porting to Unix/Linux work can be a challenging, interesting and maybe even useful attempt. If someone decides to lead it. :)
For some time I have been looking at the possibility to integrate PowerShell as a scripting engine in SharePoint but I haven't found the right solution yet.
My main objective is to enable event triggers in e.g. a list to call and execute a PowerShell script (by filename) on the local server. This would give me a lot of flexibility compared to using an ordinary event handler written in visual studio, but the question is whether it is possible and whether I have overlooked some serious security issues?
Since each and every unique idea that I come up with in many years have already be invented by somebody else, I might have missed an existing product/project so any links to such projects will be appreciated, thanks
In the spirit of "already being invented by somebody else", check out http://www.codeplex.com/iLoveSharePoint for some very interesting uses of PowerShell inside SharePoint. Some great code samples and documentation. Haven't tried myself yet, but seems interesting.
I see what you're trying to achieve, but there's something that just doesn't "feel right" about a user indirectly running script code on your server.
The key difference is that the script can be run by anyone logging into the server. Event handlers can only be run by SharePoint. Strict validation of any inputs would be essential. You should also ensure the script is signed so tampered scripts won't execute.
Also, scripts by their nature aren't really designed for enterprise solutions. There is less opportunity for best practices such as good software architecture, design patterns, source control, code analysis, unit testing, and reuse of code. It's also messy/difficult to share code with a common code base that contains web parts, controls, entities, etc.
Finally, introducing PowerShell means another technology to be maintained in the mix we already have with SharePoint. This might be OK if you are comfortable with it.
Depending on how much customisation has already been done or is planned for the future some of the points above may not matter. Be sure to think about how this idea would feel if implemented 6, 12 and 24 months down the track.
Weird question, perhaps. We have a number of simple utilities written in-house that need to be run on an automated basis. These are not build jobs. Just things like running SendOutHourlyEmailAlarms.exe, KeepFoldersInSynch.exe and such. I would normally set these things up as simple scheduled tasks/AT commands (or a Windows Service if more granular control is needed over the scheduling), but a co-worker has set up a number of these tasks as build projects on the CruiseControl.NET server. I asked him why he set these up this way and his response was that the executions (and their logs, return values, thrown exceptions) were all tracked and logged and that this information was accessible through an organized interface on the build server website. I couldn't argue with this.
But this just has a smell that I can't quite identify. Is this a proper use of CruiseControl.NET? If not, what are the dangers? Even if it may fit the bill, aren't there other products better suited for this type of thing?
We have all sorts of non-build related tasks for the exact same reason as your coworker had, I want one spot to look up any and all jobs I need run.
Some Examples of our CC.NET projects:
FTP installers to Remote QA
Creating Source Code Documentation
Create VM's with the installers
installed for QA in the morning
Archiving Installers
Pretty much anything I have to do by hand more than once, becomes a project. IMHO it is much better than a scheduled task for one other reason as well. Our config files are in source control, so we have 1 place to make adjustments. We do not have to log into multiple servers and make adjustments or wonder which server did that.
I think your coworker has made a good argument. If these tasks are related to the development process, then placing them in CruesControl.Net as a project seems acceptable. I would draw the line at utilizing a development server to run production processes though. Although it is true that "If the only tool you have is a hammer, you tend to see every problem as a nail," it doesn't mean that the hammer isn't capable of solving a lot of problems!
Just because a tool is designed to solve a particular problem does not mean that it will not have equal facility at solving similar problems outside the scope originally concieved by the tool creator. If CruiseControl.NET solves these problems well, then it is absolutely the appropriate tool to use.
I'm trying to write a tool which lets me inspect the state of a PowerBuilder-based application. What I'm thinking of is something like Spy++ (or, even nicer, 'Snoop' as it exists for .NET applications) which lets me inspect the object tree (and properties of objects) of some PowerBuilder-based GUI.
I did the same for ordinary (MFC-based) applications as well as .NET applications already, but unfortunately I never developed an application in PowerBuilder myself, so I'm generally thinking about two problems at this point:
Is there some API (preferably in Java or C/C++) available which lets one traverse the
tree of visual objects of a PowerBuilder application? I read up a bit on the PowerBuilder Native Interface system, but it seems that this is meant to write PowerBuilder extensions in C/C++ which can then be called from the PowerBuilder script language, right?
If there is some API available - maybe PowerBuilder applications even expose some sort of IPC-enabled API which lets me inspect the state of a PowerBuilder object hierarchy without being within the process of the PowerBuilder application? Maybe there's an automation interface available, or something COM-based - or maybe something else?
Right now, my impression is that probably need to inject a DLL into the process of the PowerBuilder application and then gain access to the running PowerBuilder VM so that I can query it for the object tree. Some sort of IPC mechanism will then let me transport this information out of the PowerBuilder application's process.
Does anybody have some experience with this or can shed some light on whether anybody tried to do this already?
Best regards,
Frerich
First, the easy answer: I think what you're trying to do has been done, sort of. Rex from Enable does what I think you're after, but IIRC from talking with the developers, it depends on code hooks built into the application.
Which leads to the suggestion that I don't think you'll be able to do what I think you're trying to do completely externally from the application. You can grab window handles with WinAPIs and do some basic things with that, but not as much as you want. And getting information about DataWindows with WinAPIs? Forget it.
I believe I've heard of an API like the one you're asking about, but I've never heard of anyone other that automated testing software tool manufacturers getting their hands on it. If this is true (and the quality of this information is along the lines of "heard it in the hallway"), I suspect there might be some application security issues in letting this get out. (I know you'd never want to infect my application, or poke around and find out my secrets. grin)
Even with hooks into the PowerBuilder VM memory space, I'm not aware of being able to get a list of objects in memory without some PowerScript framework hooks (e.g. populating a list on every open and constructor with object handles). Once you've got a window handle, you can easily traverse its control arrays (and its subclasses control arrays) to get a list of objects on the window, but things like handles to NVO instance variables would be problematic.
I admire the idea. I wish I had better news (other than maybe Rex might solve your problem without the headaches of doing it yourself). Now I'm looking forward even more to what eran may release! grin
Good luck,
Terry.
I've just created such a tool, but I cheated a bit. Was actually about to ask the same question myself on the PB newsgroups. My solution is made of two parts:
Spy-like tool - a stand-alone app that like Spy++, i.e. lets you drag a target onto a control, using Windows API functions (though written in PB).
Internal infrastructure for target applications - located at the ancestor of all of the application's windows. Once given a certain (windows) handle, it goes through the Control[] array and looks for the control whose handle matches the given one. If necessary, it also recurses into control-containers such as tabs.
When the user selects a control, the spy tool first looks for its containing window using Windows API. When found, the tool sends a custom message to that window, which is then handled by the app's infrastructure. The control is then located in the PB app, and its details are finally sent back to the spy tool, which presents them to the user.
I suspect the infrastructure part can be replaced with some external thing, as I've seen tools that seem to be able to do that (Visual Expert, QTP). However, I haven't had the time to further investigate, and this solution was relatively easy to develop.
I've got to say, your question comes on a surprising timing. See this recent question of mine. If you're interested in the tool I've created, drop me a comment.
Any suggestion to detect flaws in VB6 components running under IIS. IIS becomes unstable and after some time enter in a state of hang. The problems occur in the most part only in the production environment. We have many modules running. Probably there are components with bugs and need to identify them.
Thanks in advance.
One thing to watch out for is multi-threading issues. VB6 components often don't play well when accessed by multiple threads.
If the client code is an ASP.NET application consider putting synchlocks around the calls to ensure that they are called sequentially.
Another sure-fire way to fubar IIS is to display a message box or initiate some other sort of user interaction. Get those MsgBox calls outa there.
Other than that... good logging helps. VB6 is pretty opaque when errors arise.
Use Debugging Tools for Windows to analyze a dump of IIS. Tess' blog is one of the best resources to learn to use WinDbg. Although she focuses on .NET debugging, most of the material is applicable to any Win32 process.