Openlog and Worst Practice?
Category OpenLog Error Trapping Dumb Developer
I'm a big fan of Openlog. The error trapping database that you can find on OpenNTF.org. I've been using it for YEARS... Trapping errors and recoding log messages from agents. Julian did a fantastic job with this application. Or did he?
One of the things that has bothered me about OpenLog is that it never sent me e-mail alerts. I always figured it was something simple but never really found the time to check it. Until Monday that is.
Here's how NOT to start your work week!
11:20 AM: Wow a couple of minutes free. Let's get that OpenLog thing running.
11:22 AM: Check the using document. Read down. Oh there's a scheduled agent. That must be it. Information obtained - stop reading.
11:23 AM: Turn the scheduled agent on in Production. That should do it.
11:30 AM: Man I'm hungry. Let's go to Lunch.
12:30 AM: Hmm... Why is my mail taking so long to open? Why is my administrator (I'm a developer mostly but also a backup admin) at my desk with a half shame on you and half laughing at me expression???
Oh No!!!!
I'm a big fan of Openlog. The error trapping database that you can find on OpenNTF.org. I've been using it for YEARS... Trapping errors and recoding log messages from agents. Julian did a fantastic job with this application. Or did he?
One of the things that has bothered me about OpenLog is that it never sent me e-mail alerts. I always figured it was something simple but never really found the time to check it. Until Monday that is.
Here's how NOT to start your work week!
11:20 AM: Wow a couple of minutes free. Let's get that OpenLog thing running.
11:22 AM: Check the using document. Read down. Oh there's a scheduled agent. That must be it. Information obtained - stop reading.
11:23 AM: Turn the scheduled agent on in Production. That should do it.
11:30 AM: Man I'm hungry. Let's go to Lunch.
12:30 AM: Hmm... Why is my mail taking so long to open? Why is my administrator (I'm a developer mostly but also a backup admin) at my desk with a half shame on you and half laughing at me expression???
Oh No!!!!
It would seem that the OpenLog agent decided to notify me of every event it ever recorded!! Something like 63,000 events!!!
No they weren't all errors!!!! Mostly scheduled agent notifications that I just logged way to much detail for.... and didn't do anything about purging...
So what happened? Well the severs didn't crash... But the server that holds my mail got backed up enough that it slowed to a crawl. So what did Notes do? I guess it started routing to another server once the pimary slowed down. My administrator, Maria, had to do some quick hocus pocus to fix this. And now has a serious weapon to use the next time I get one of my bright ideas.
Ok. She gets a good laugh at my expense. I'm a big boy, I deserve it. Then she goes to lunch.
ROUND 2
A little while later, I start getting flooded with e-mails again! Apparently I scheduled the agent HOURLY. But not only that, it was scheduled to run on any sever. So not only did I start getting flooded again, but now there are replication conflicts all over the database.
I quickly shut down agent manager on all the servers and disabled the openlog agent. I'll be deleting just about every document before we turn that bad boy on again.
So how could this has happened? I mean I read the instructions right? Well I totally blame Julian here. I think he set me and other unsuspecting OpenLog users up.
OpenLog has one of the best "Using" documents that I've ever seen. Great information on how to use the database. I read this section on the Notification.
4. Turn on the Notification agent. There is a scheduled agent that checks unprocessed errors and events on a regular basis and sends out notifications about all the ones that match an Active notification profile. Two things to keep in mind about this:
- The person who enables/signs the notification
agent should have proper access to run background agents on the server,
and to create new documents in the OpenLog database
- If the notification agent has never been turned on or it's been off for some length of time, you might want to manually clear out most or all of the error/event documents in the "Pending Events" view, so people aren't notified about a large number of old events when the agent first runs. You can do this by selecting the necessary documents in the Pending Events view (Edit-Select All for everything) and clicking the "Mark Docs As Processed" button at the top of the view.
Do you see the bold (my emphasis) section? Look what he did! He put that AFTER he explains about enabling the agent!!! Of course I didn't read the bold section initially. I had the information I was looking for! Maybe this really wasn't my fault after all!
Of course I'm kidding!
This is a "I did a dumb thing and the only way to purge the memory is to come clean" type of post.
Comments
I took that agent and modified it for SuperNTF ({ Link } so it would read the purge interval setting from the database configuration document instead of being hardcoded. The agent is called "SYSTEM - Purge OpenLog Events", and might give you some ideas. Also, the SuperNTF download contains a sample notification profile document (Go to the Administration - Event Log section) JUST for sending error reports to whomever you wish.
Posted by Kevin Pettitt At 08:57:21 AM On 11/12/2008 | - Website - |
And if it is not in the documentation, the whole product stinks.
Posted by John Kingsley At 09:21:39 AM On 11/12/2008 | - Website - |
John,
Yeah... I was right there too... that's what kills me... I actually went to the documentation first rather then going into Designer to look for the agent.
Didn't I feel like an idiot! Still do really... :)
Posted by David Leedy At 09:49:27 AM On 11/12/2008 | - Website - |