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Universal Trace Monitor for Software Developers and Testers

Introduction

DevTracer consists of two parts:

  • DevTracer Monitor

    is a Windows desktop application to display the trace output.

  • DevTracer Component

    is a component you have to use in your application. This component sends the trace information to DevTracer Monitor.

DevTracer Component sends the data to DevTracer Monitor using TCP/IP. Therefore it is possible to use the Component and the Monitor on different machines, thus enabling remote tracing.

If you use DevTracer component and DevTracer Monitor on different machines, make sure that you open your firewall for the port you use on the computer running DevTracer Monitor. The port can be specified when the monitor is started.

It is possible to trace multiple applications at the same time. The following pictures show three scenarios how DevTracer could be used.

Using DevTracer with one Application.

scenario 1

This is probably the most common use of DevTracer. Just one application is sending trace information. In this example localhost and port 12345 are used. If DevTracer Monitor and the application being traced are running on different machines, localhost must be replaced with the IP-address of the computer running DevTracer Monitor, for instance 192.168.1.102.

Using one Instance of DevTracer Monitor with two Applications.

scenario 2

This scenario applies if there are two or more than two applications generating trace information. DevTracer Monitor and all applications must use the same combination of IP-address and port number.

How is the trace information of multiple applications displayed in DevTracer Monitor?  DevTracer Monitor has options to select between three types of user interface: SDI, MDI and Tabbed MDI. For details see Tracing Multiple Applications Simultaneously.

Using Multiple Instances of DevTracer Monitor with Multiple Applications

scenario 3

In this case two instances of DevTracer Monitor are used. Because they run on the same computer, identical IP-addresses are used (localhost). The port number determines which application sends its trace information to which Monitor.

DevTracer Component

There are two versions of DevTracer Component: a .NET component for use with .NET applications, and a COM (Component Object Model) version for use with Visual Basic® 6, C++ and other COM compliant development environment. If you use the COM-version, your application must not support .NET at all. But the COM-version is actually based on the .NET version, and .NET must be installed on the machine where the COM-verion is used.

Only the computer on which you want to use DevTracer must have DevTracer and .NET installed.

When you install DevTracer using Setup.exe, DevTracer Monitor and DevTracer Component are installed. The .NET version of the component is automatically installed in the Global Assembly Cache, and the COM-component is registered properly.

Using DevTracer Component

You have to make some small changes to your application to use DevTracer Component. We will explain this for several development environments. Especially when using the COM-component, we will show how to use it in a way that your application will still run on a machine without .NET and DevTracer installed.

  • DevTracer Component in General

    General description of DevTracer Component, independent of technology used.

  • .NET

    Describes how to uses DevTracer Component with .NET (Windows Forms, ASP.NET).

  • Visual Basic 6 (VB6)

    Describes how use DevTracer Component with Visual Basic® 6.

  • Visual Basic for Applications (VBA)

    Describes how use DevTracer Component with Visual Basic for Applications (Excel, Word ...).

  • VBScript

    Devtracer can be used with scripting languages as well. Here you find a description how to use Devtracer Component with VBScript (Visual basic Scripting Edition).

  • C++

    Describes how to use DevTracer Component with Microsoft Visual C++®.

DevTracer Monitor

DevTracer Monitor is a Windows desktop application. It displays trace information from applications using DevTracer Component.

An introduction to DevTracer Monitor can be found here ...