Exception logging/reporting issue in Dragnet

[jmercker]

I recently had to troubleshoot an issue with the sending of email by Dragnet. I had the email configured to use 127.0.0.1 and set up to send the mail anonymously to the SMTP server running on the same box.

The SMTP service was running and configured to allow relay for 127.0.0.1 and also to allow anonymous access. Unbeknownst to me, someone had changed the SMTP config to use a set IP which, of course, will cause access on any other IP including localhost to fail.

I ended up writing a utility to isolate the mail send using System.Web.Mail.SmtpMail and caught an exception identifying that the connection was not being made. This led me to identify the configuration issue in the SMTP service noted above.

Unfortunately, As far as I could tell, Dragnet hadn't logged the exception to the event viewer or to another location. If I've missed the location that I should be looking in, then please let me know and I'll note for the future. I had assumed that since Dragnet sets up its own event log in the event viewer that it would log an issue like this there... Again, an exception was being thrown, but apparently not logged.

On another topic, it would be a helpful feature to have a test message feature on the email configuration page to test the installation similar to what Outlook has when configuring email addresses. It could run the process of sending a message, but also show the user the status of the test (e.g. "Starting Test, Sending message to [] using configuration [], Test Successul, Test Failed with exception []".

Overall, Dragnet has been a great product to use. We've had it running for a couple of days and the entire team really likes it. The menu system takes a bit to get used to, but overall it's a really easy-to-use product.

Thanks in advance,
Jeramie

[jclausius]

Unbeknownst to me, someone had changed the SMTP config to use a set IP which, of course, will cause access on any other IP including localhost to fail.

...

Unfortunately, As far as I could tell, Dragnet hadn't logged the exception to the event viewer or to another location. If I've missed the location that I should be looking in, then please let me know and I'll note for the future. I had assumed that since Dragnet sets up its own event log in the event viewer that it would log an issue like this there... Again, an exception was being thrown, but apparently not logged.

Due to security problems in regards how an ASP.Net can access the event viewer in .Net 1.1, the Event Viewer is not used. Instead, Dragnet stores ALL of its log information in a file. The file location is specified in web.config. By default it is in %windir%\temp\sgdragnet. Check there, if Dragnet could not contact the SMTP server, and an error was thrown, the message will be logged there.

On another topic, it would be a helpful feature to have a test message feature on the email configuration page to test the installation similar to what Outlook has when configuring email addresses.

Nice suggestion. I've added an enhancement request for this feature.

Overall, Dragnet has been a great product to use. We've had it running for a couple of days and the entire team really likes it. The menu system takes a bit to get used to, but overall it's a really easy-to-use product.

Thank you. We appreciate the feedback.

[jmercker]

Thanks for the information. I'll note that for the future.

If dragnet isn't using the event viewer, it may be a good idea to not install the event log into the event viewer (e.g. might save others the same mistaken assumption that I had made...).

Thanks again,
Jeramie

[jclausius]

That is weird...

It must be some deprecated code from pre-beta stuff that creates the event viewer. I'll log a bug for this.

Thanks for the report.

[jclausius]

BTW, if you wish to remove the log entry, you can remove the following KEY from your registry - "HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Service\EventLog\SourceGear Dragnet"

The normal "changing your registry may break things" warning goes here.

[jmercker]

Thanks.