Why doesn't trace write timestamp?

[Brett Romero]

I have this in an app.config file:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8" ?>
<configuratio n>
<system.diagnos tics>
<trace autoflush="true " indentsize="2">
<listeners>
<add name="myListene r" traceOutputOpti ons="Timestamp"
type="System.Di agnostics.TextW riterTraceListe ner"
initializeData= "C:\TestConsole \MyListener.log "/>
</listeners>
</trace>
</system.diagnost ics>
</configuration>

The code I'm using to write is this:

Debug.WriteLine ("Hello config file.");

I just want to output variable values but also would like a time stamp
appended with every .Write or .WriteLine. First, what is the above
timestamp option doing (this came from intellisense) and how do I get
the behavior I'm looking for?

Thanks,
Brett

[Jon Skeet [C# MVP]]

Brett Romero <ac*****@cygen. com> wrote:

I have this in an app.config file:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8" ?>
<configuratio n>
<system.diagnos tics>
<trace autoflush="true " indentsize="2">
<listeners>
<add name="myListene r" traceOutputOpti ons="Timestamp"
type="System.Di agnostics.TextW riterTraceListe ner"
initializeData= "C:\TestConsole \MyListener.log "/>
</listeners>
</trace>
</system.diagnost ics>
</configuration>

The code I'm using to write is this:

Debug.WriteLine ("Hello config file.");

I just want to output variable values but also would like a time stamp
appended with every .Write or .WriteLine. First, what is the above
timestamp option doing (this came from intellisense) and how do I get
the behavior I'm looking for?

Having had a little experiment, it looks like this is only used when
you call Trace.TraceErro r, Trace.TraceInfo rmation or Trace.TraceWarn ing
- not the Write* methods.

--
Jon Skeet - <sk***@pobox.co m>
http://www.pobox.com/~skeet Blog: http://www.msmvps.com/jon.skeet
If replying to the group, please do not mail me too

[Brett Romero]

I see: I'm using:

Trace.Flush();
Trace.TraceInfo rmation("");

and see this entry in the log file:
TestConsole.vsh ost.exe Information: 0 :
Timestamp=16209 13894489365

How exactly can the readable date/time be written into the log?

Also, flush() doesn't seem to be doing anything. I still have all of
the previous log entries there. How can I clean out the log file on
each debug session or is this something I have to do completely
manually (streamwriter)?

Thanks,
Brett

[Jon Skeet [C# MVP]]

Brett Romero <ac*****@cygen. com> wrote:

I see: I'm using:

Trace.Flush();
Trace.TraceInfo rmation("");

and see this entry in the log file:
TestConsole.vsh ost.exe Information: 0 :
Timestamp=16209 13894489365

How exactly can the readable date/time be written into the log?
Have you tried DateTime as an option instead of Timestamp?
Also, flush() doesn't seem to be doing anything. I still have all of
the previous log entries there. How can I clean out the log file on
each debug session or is this something I have to do completely
manually (streamwriter)?

Flush doesn't do what you think it does - it makes sure that any cached
data is flushed to disk.

--
Jon Skeet - <sk***@pobox.co m>
http://www.pobox.com/~skeet Blog: http://www.msmvps.com/jon.skeet
If replying to the group, please do not mail me too

[Brett Romero]

I tried datetime but that didn't do anything. Nothing is outputting in
that regard:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8" ?>
<configuratio n>
<system.diagnos tics>

<trace autoflush="true " indentsize="2">
<listeners>
<add name="myListene r" traceOutputOpti ons="DateTime"
type="System.Di agnostics.TextW riterTraceListe ner"
initializeData= "C:\Test\bin\De bug\MyListener. log"/>
</listeners>
</trace>

</system.diagnost ics>
</configuration>

Any other suggestions on the timestamp?

I'd also like to output only certain code. It seems to be outputting
all errors. In other words, how do I configure a Trace in the
app.config file then reference it in code the same way I do Debug? For
example, the trace may be named myTrace and I can do
myTrace.WriteLi ne(). The log file will contain only entries that I
explicitly reference via myTrace.

Thanks,
Brett

[Jon Skeet [C# MVP]]

Brett Romero <ac*****@cygen. com> wrote:

I tried datetime but that didn't do anything. Nothing is outputting in
that regard:
Could you post a short but complete program which demonstrates the
problem?

See http://www.pobox.com/~skeet/csharp/complete.html for details of
what I mean by that.

Here's some sample code which uses the same configuration as yours:

using System;
using System.Diagnost ics;

class Test
{
static void Main()
{
Trace.TraceInfo rmation("Hello" );
Trace.Flush();
}

}

Here's the result:
test Information: 0 : Hello
DateTime=2006-04-10T18:23:25.343 7500Z

(Of course, you need to compile with TRACE defined.)
I'd also like to output only certain code. It seems to be outputting
all errors. In other words, how do I configure a Trace in the
app.config file then reference it in code the same way I do Debug? For
example, the trace may be named myTrace and I can do
myTrace.WriteLi ne(). The log file will contain only entries that I
explicitly reference via myTrace.

You can use Trace.Listeners["myTrace"] to get a specific TraceListener,
but I don't think you would normally do that. (TraceListener doesn't
seem to encourage you to use it directly.)

Perhaps you should look at other logging frameworks, such as Log4Net?

--
Jon Skeet - <sk***@pobox.co m>
http://www.pobox.com/~skeet Blog: http://www.msmvps.com/jon.skeet
If replying to the group, please do not mail me too