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Custom logging

Logging is an essential part of software development. It provides developers and support teams a deeper overview and enable them to see what is happening in the application.

SPMeta2 has built-in logging to trace most of the critical operations related to provision. A high level abstraction for all logging operation is covered by TraceServiceBase class. TraceServiceBase class is an abstract one. It has a basic set of methods to report information, exception and warning as following:

• TraceServiceBase.Critical(int id, object message)
• TraceServiceBase.Error(int id, object message)
• TraceServiceBase.Warning(int id, object message)
• TraceServiceBase.Information(int id, object message)
• TraceServiceBase.Verbose(int id, object message)

All the codebase refers to logging subsustem as TraceServiceBase never knowing what is the actual implementation of the logging operations. Obtaining a concrete implementation of the loggin service should be done as following:

Here is an example how a logging service instance can be obtained and used:

// get an instance of ServiceContainer
// then get an instance of required service such as TraceServiceBase
 
var traceService = ServiceContainer.Instance.GetService<TraceServiceBase>();
 
// use trace methods as usual
traceService.Verbose(0, "my verbose message");

SPMeta2 has a default implementation of TraceServiceBase which is TraceSourceService. We use default .NET logging based on Diagnostic.TraceSource. Default TraceSourceService class created a new instance of Diagnostic.TraceSource with the name 'SPMeta2'. It redirects all the logging to the trace listners defined in the app.config file for 'SPMeta2' name.

Replacing default logging

As SPMeta2 is used as a 3rd part library in your application, it may be necessary to integrate SPMeta2 logging output with your preferred logging. That integration can be accomplished in two steps:

• A custom logging service is to be written
• Default logging service needs to be replaced

Here is an example on a custom logging service implementation:

public class CustomLoggingService : TraceServiceBase
{
 
    public override void Critical(int id, object message, Exception exception)
    {
        // handle critical event the way you like
    }
 
    public override void Error(int id, object message, Exception exception)
    {
        // handle error the way you like
    }
 
    public override void Warning(int id, object message, Exception exception)
    {
        // handle warning the way you like
    }
 
    public override void Information(int id, object message, Exception exception)
    {
        // handle info the way you like
    }
 
    public override void Verbose(int id, object message, Exception exception)
    {
        // handle verbose the way you like
    }
 
    public override void TraceActivityStart(int id, object message)
    {
        // no implementation is required
    }
 
    public override void TraceActivityStop(int id, object message)
    {
        // no implementation is required
    }
 
    public override void TraceActivityTransfer(int id, object message, Guid relatedActivityId)
    {
        // no implementation is required
    }
 
    public override Guid CurrentActivityId
    {
        get { return Guid.Empty; }
        set
        {
 
        }
    }
}

Once a custom logging service is implemented, we still need to replace the default logging service with our custom one. That can be accomplished with the following code:

// get an instance of ServiceContainer
// override .Services collection with the right mapping
// typeof(TraceServiceBase) -> your instance of TraceServiceBase class
 
var serviceInstancies = ServiceContainer.Instance.Services[typeof(TraceServiceBase)];
 
serviceInstancies.Clear();
serviceInstancies.Add(new CustomLoggingService());
 
// provision models as usual
// from now on, all logging calls will go to CustomLoggingService instance

Once done, SPMeta2 will use custom logging service to push all trace messages.