Introduction

Spindle Professional creates a number of log files which are essential to confiming the correct functrioning of the software or troubleshooting any issues

Applies to

• Spindle Professional 2005
• Spindle Professional 2007
• Spindle Professional 2009
• Spindle Professional 2012
• Spindle Professional v6

For Spindle Document Management (v7) please see the corresponding article in Section 05

Main Log files

The main log files are created in the Documents\My Draycir Logs folder

ConfigurationImporter_username.log

This file is created/updated when the Spindle Professional Monitor is launched and documents the checks to see whether any database or software upgrades are required before the processing can run.

SpindleFormCreator_username.log

This file is created when a print is sent to the Spindle Pro Form Creator printer. It documents the process of creating a form backdrop. It can be considered the equivalent log file to the Processor log, but for the Forms Creator.

SpindlePro6Monitor_username.log

This file is created when the Spindle Professional Monitor is launched and documents the checks that are made prior to processing, such as whether the User Setup Wizard has run and whether the licence is valid. If the licence is tied to a particular ERP implementation, such as Sage 200, then any checks against the DLnnnnnn or AXnnnnnn numbers will be documented here.

Once the licence check has passed, any print jobs submitted to Spindle Professional will cause an "LO message" to be logged in this file. Note that this log file will be named for the version of Spindle Professional installed.

SpindleProfessionalProcessor_username.log

The primary log file used for troubleshooting. This file details all aspects of the Spindle Professional print process. Whenever submitting any Spindle Professional issue to Draycir support, this is the file that is required.

SpindleProfessionalTools_username.log. Here we can see (amongst other things): 

• The Version of Windows and Spindle Professional
• The Name of the file printed to Spindle Professional
• Whether the file was printed to the Spindle Pro or Spindle Pro Auto printer
• How many pages were printed
• Whether these are portrait or landscape
• What ## commands were read (if any) and what values were assigned to them
• Which operation is being processed
• How any form or operation criteria are being evaluated
• Any logging from external systems such as an SMTP server, Sharepoint archiving
• If any step fails, it will be written to this log with the text FAIL in it

The processor log file lines are all prefixed with a date/time stamp and a line type number. This number will be one of the following:

Searching the Processor log file for either the word "FAIL" or the code "00:" will show the stage where the processing failure. The word ERROR can occur a number of times in a successful process.

Creating Unique log files

By default the processor log file is overwritten each time a document is processed. This ensures that the log file does not increase in size over time. However there can be occasions, such as in the case of an intermittent issue, when the log file available is from a more recent, successful process. In these cases you can configure Spindle Professional to create uniquely named log files for each process. This option can be found under User Settings>User Information>Options:

Additional Logs

The logs mentioned above are all that is required in most cases to troubleshoot any issues with Spindle Professional. However in certain circumstances, primarily when using unattended mode, it can be useful to check another two log files that are invoked before the processor log file is created.

The EPrinter log

This file is always created in C:\Program Files (x86)\Common Files\Draycir\Eprinter\Log\Eprinter.log. Because the location of this file never changes, it can be useful in multi-user environments to show which user ran the last print, and therefore which user's documents folder will contain the 'standard' log files as described above.

The Printer Driver log 

This log file is not created unless there is a folder at C:\TMP. This log file shows low-level messages from the printer driver and its main use is to prove (in unattended mode configurations) by its presence and/or the date/time created that a print job is being received by the Spindle Pro Auto driver on the print server. 

Distribution.mdb

While not a log file as such, this MS Access Database will log the results of all print jobs submitted to it, storing any automations (document types), document operations, Spindle Professional commands and their values, and more. The database consists of the tables shown below. This allows the user/partner to create any reports that are deemed necessary using MS Access's built-in rteporting functionality, or indeed any other reporting solution taht can extract data from an MDB (Jet4.0) database file.

This file is only updated if Unattended Mode is enabled and if the database logging is set in Spindle Professional Tools:

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