Every now and again I change something on my blog, only to see the wonderful Yellow Screen of Death (illustrated on the IKEA jumbo screen)... What's worse is that I usually have to SSH into my server and change the web.config for debug="true" and the "RemoteOnly" to "Off". What a pain in the a$$. There has to be a better way.
Well it turns out, there is (did you see that coming?)... A really cool project is being developed called ELMAH that is designed to change the way you deal with ASP Server Exceptions and Events.
ELMAH (Error Logging Modules and Handlers) is an application-wide error logging facility that is completely pluggable. It can be dynamically added to a running ASP.NET web application, or even all ASP.NET web applications on a machine, without any need for re-compilation or re-deployment.
Elmah Project Home Page
I have been using it for a couple weeks and I am completely sold on it's amazing abilities. I have configured Elmah to save events to an XML file, along with sending me an email notification. The saved XML copy of the event includes the actual screen you would have seen had the debug=true and RemoteOnly was changed to "Off" without making those changes. Even more is that ELMAH works off of the link http://www.domain.com/elmah.axd so the information is available even when your main website is not working because of a bad page element.
Here's a quick run down on some of the cool features:
- Web based interface
- RSS Feed is available to view the exceptions from a feed client
- Use SQL, MySQL, XML, or In-Memory for the storage of events
- Access the error information even when your main site is displaying a YSOD
- Exception filtering to prevent repeated and annoying exceptions you don't care to see
- Support for Medium Trust sites (HUGE)
- Support for ASP.NET 1.x and 2.0
Installing is a snap and is fully documented. I had it up in 10 minutes and now rely on it to keep track of all my exceptions. Have a look and get it going on your site today!