Diagnose File Upload Failure ASP.NET - asp.net

In a ASP.NET application, users are having a hard time trying to upload files.
The application is access by about 30 people through 1Mb fiber optic dedicated line to the server.
The file upload implementation doesn't seem to have problems since the problem doesn't occur frequently only occasionally.Also i already tried to upload larger files (up to 50 Mb) and i didn't have any problem.
So i assume the problem must be on the network connection that some days must have some kind of bandwidth problem.
How can i diagnose effectively the root cause of the problem?
Thanks.

Do you log your exceptions? Logging modules for ASP.NET
http://code.google.com/p/elmah/
http://www.codeproject.com/Articles/14819/How-to-use-log4net
If don't you can look web server eventlog.
Error may come upload limitations of web server and security problems.

The fileupload module was filled with lots of try catch blocks , so the message showing on log4net log files was the error message provided by the developer. After trying step by step to reproduce the problem we got to a part where the error message was from the system "the file cannot be saved because it excedes 50 chars", but the file was about 40 chars. The developer was using a function Server.HTMLEncode on the filename to store the name on the database but when the file had special chars the file name sometimes increased beyond the 50 chars because of the text encoding. The solution was increasing the size of the file name by some chars and when validating the file name, we validated with HTML.Encode length and warned the user to decrease the exceeding x number of chars for the file to be valid.

Related

"The transaction log for database is full due to 'LOG_BACKUP'" in a shared host

I have an Asp.Net MVC 5 website with EntityFramework codefirst approach in a shared hosting plan. It uses the open source WebbsitePanel for control panel and its SQL Server panel is somewhat limited. Today when I wanted to edit the database, I encountered this error:
The transaction log for database 'db_name' is full due to 'LOG_BACKUP'
I searched around and found a lot of related answers like this and this or this but the problem is they suggest running a query on the database. I tried running
db.Database.ExecuteSqlCommand("ALTER DATABASE db_name SET RECOVERY SIMPLE;");
with the visual studio (on the HomeController) but I get the following error:
System.Data.SqlClient.SqlException: ALTER DATABASE statement not allowed within multi-statement transaction.
How can I solve my problem? Should I contact the support team (which is a little poor for my host) or can I solve this myself?
In Addition to Ben's Answer, You can try Below Queries as per your need
USE {database-name};
GO
-- Truncate the log by changing the database recovery model to SIMPLE.
ALTER DATABASE {database-name}
SET RECOVERY SIMPLE;
GO
-- Shrink the truncated log file to 1 MB.
DBCC SHRINKFILE ({database-file-name}, 1);
GO
-- Reset the database recovery model.
ALTER DATABASE {database-name}
SET RECOVERY FULL;
GO
Update Credit #cema-sp
To find database file names use below query
select * from sys.database_files;
Call your hosting company and either have them set up regular log backups or set the recovery model to simple. I'm sure you know what informs the choice, but I'll be explicit anyway. Set the recovery model to full if you need the ability to restore to an arbitrary point in time. Either way the database is misconfigured as is.
Occasionally when a disk runs out of space, the message "transaction log for database XXXXXXXXXX is full due to 'LOG_BACKUP'" will be returned when an update SQL statement fails.
Check your diskspace :)
This error occurs because the transaction log becomes full due to LOG_BACKUP. Therefore, you can’t perform any action on this database, and In this case, the SQL Server Database Engine will raise a 9002 error.
To solve this issue you should do the following
Take a Full database backup.
Shrink the log file to reduce the physical file size.
Create a LOG_BACKUP.
Create a LOG_BACKUP Maintenance Plan to take backup logs frequently.
I wrote an article with all details regarding this error and how to solve it at The transaction log for database ‘SharePoint_Config’ is full due to LOG_BACKUP
This can also happen when the log file is restricted in size.
Right click database in Object Explorer
Select Properties
Select Files
On the log line, click the ellipsis in the Autogrowth / Maxsize column
Change/verify Maximum File Size is Unlimited.
After chaning to unlimited, database came back to life.
I got the same error but from a backend job (SSIS job). Upon checking the database's Log file growth setting, the log file was limited growth of 1GB. So what happened is when the job ran and it asked SQL server to allocate more log space, but the growth limit of the log declined caused the job to failed. I modified the log growth and set it to grow by 50MB and Unlimited Growth and the error went away.

Timeout when uploading images

I am currently testing Tridion 2011 and am having problems creating multimedia components with uploaded content (as opposed to external).
I fill out the title, schema, multimedia type, select a file from my system then click save. I get a Saving item... information message then approximately 30 seconds later I will receive a The wait operation timed out message.
There doesn't appear to be any error messages in the C:\Program Files (x86)\Tridion\log directory. Looking at the event viewer I see the following information relating to the save action
Unable to save Component (tcm:4-738361).
The wait operation timed out
Error Code:
0x8004033F (-2147220673)
Call stack:
System.Data.SqlClient.SqlConnection.OnError(SqlException,Boolean,Action`1)
System.Data.SqlClient.SqlInternalConnection.OnError(SqlException,Boolean,Action`1)
System.Data.SqlClient.TdsParser.ThrowExceptionAndWarning(TdsParserStateObject,Boolean,Boolean)
System.Data.SqlClient.TdsParser.TryRun(RunBehavior,SqlCommand,SqlDataReader,BulkCopySimpleResultSet,TdsParserStateObject,Boolean&)
System.Data.SqlClient.SqlCommand.FinishExecuteReader(SqlDataReader,RunBehavior,String)
System.Data.SqlClient.SqlCommand.RunExecuteReaderTds(CommandBehavior,RunBehavior,Boolean,Boolean,Int32,Task&,Boolean)
System.Data.SqlClient.SqlCommand.RunExecuteReader(CommandBehavior,RunBehavior,Boolean,String,TaskCompletionSource`1,Int32,Task&,Boolean)
System.Data.SqlClient.SqlCommand.InternalExecuteNonQuery(TaskCompletionSource`1,String,Boolean,Int32,Boolean)
System.Data.SqlClient.SqlCommand.ExecuteNonQuery()
Tridion.ContentManager.Data.AdoNet.Sql.SqlDatabaseUtilities.SetBinaryContent(Int32,Stream)
Tridion.ContentManager.Data.AdoNet.ContentManagement.ItemDataMapper.Tridion.ContentManager.Data.ContentManagement.IItemDataMapper.SetBinaryContent(Stream,TcmUri)
Tridion.ContentManager.ContentManagement.RepositoryLocalObject.SetBinaryContent(BinaryContent)
Tridion.ContentManager.ContentManagement.Component.OnSaved(SaveEventArgs)
Tridion.ContentManager.IdentifiableObject.Save(SaveEventArgs)
Tridion.ContentManager.ContentManagement.VersionedItem.Save(Boolean)
Tridion.ContentManager.ContentManagement.VersionedItem.Save()
Tridion.ContentManager.BLFacade.ContentManagement.VersionedItemFacade.UpdateAndCheckIn(UserContext,String,Boolean,Boolean)
XMLState.Save
Component.Save
I already have my timeout settings in the Content Manager Snap-In set to high values (more than 10 minutes) due to another issue.
The BINARIES table in the Content Manage Database is 25GB if that helps.
Any ideas? Thanks.
Edit 1
Following suggestions from Bart Koopman, my DBA has rebuilt the indexes but does not reckon the Transaction log has any impact on performance. The problem persists.
Edit 2
I have just found more details of the error
Unable to save Component (tcm:0-0-0).
Timeout expired.
The timeout period elapsed prior to completion of the operation or the server is not responding.
A database error occurred while executing Stored Procedure "EDA_ITEMS_UPDATEBINARYCONTENT".EDA_ITEMS_UPDATEBINARYCONTENT
After taking a look at this procedure it looks like the following statement could be the root cause
SELECT 1 FROM BINARIES WHERE ID = #iBINARY_ID AND CONTENT IS NULL
I execute it manually with #iBINARY_ID as -1 and after 2 minutes it still hasn't completed. I assume that when I insert a new multimedia component the query will be something similar (i.e. the id will not exist in the table).
The BINARIES table currently has a NON-CLUSTERED Primary Key. Maybe the solution would be to change this to a CLUSTERED Primary Key? However, I assume it is NON-CLUSTERED for a reason.
Just had a response from SDL customer support. Apparently this is a known issue related to statistics and the chosen query plan.
Running the following statement manually from SQL Server Management Studio fixes the problem (it didn't even need to complete for me)
SELECT 1 FROM BINARIES WHERE ID = -1 AND CONTENT IS NULL
Hope this helps someone else out!
Timeouts on database operations are usually an indication of a misconfiguration or a lack of maintenance. By increasing the timeout you are just working around the problem rather than solving it.
With a binaries table that big you will want to make sure you have proper database setup with data files that are separated from your log files (separated on different physical partitions/disks) and possibly even multiple data files on multiple physical partitions to take advantage of performance gains.
Next to that you will want to assure that the standard database maintenance is performed daily/hourly. Things like backing up and truncating the transaction log every hour will greatly improve your database performance (on MS SQL Server a transaction log of more than 1GB slows the database down drastically, you should always try to keep it below that size through timely backup/trucate). Updating statistics and rebuilding indexes is also something you should not forget on a regular basis.

Sqlite frequent Header access

I am using sqlite in my application only for read access. The DB gets hit often by my application and I could see that the header(100 bytes) of the database is read every time when i access the database.
Precisely speaking, 16 bytes from the 24th byte of the header is read everytime. My question is , if the database is used only for read purpose, why the header is read everytime as the database connection is not closed?..can we make it read it only once?
Thanks!!
Google search gave me this link, and it says
"Your process may promise that it will only read the database, but there
might be some other process writing to it.
Not being a server, sqlite has no other way to find that out than by
reading the header over and over again. It has to check whether the
schema was changed, or whatever other info is in those bytes."
http://www.mail-archive.com/sqlite-users#sqlite.org/msg69900.html

Audio Cutter in Silverlight

1.
I have created a audio player in silverlight.
within that player user is able to select a portion of song to save as ringtone.
but i got the time duration from .. but I have to cut the partial portion of stream or audio stream and save it to the server dick.
Plz suggest me how I can convert the selected audio time duration into the stream or byte array..?
-- Additional information on this question:
2.
I have created a ringtone audio player in silverlight. Within that user can select a portion which can be cut and save as a audio file.
I am unable to save the stream to the disk.. it is giving following errors:
Error 1. Attempt to access the method failed System IO FileInfo OpenWrite
Plz help
-- Additional information on this question:
3.
What are the use of MediaStreamSample & MediaStreamSource class in silverlight with respect to MediaElement?
Will it help in cutting a portion of audio file in order to create the ringtone out of a song?
If you need to save to the server, then you need to get that data to the server.
Just saving it (as answered) will try to save to the client's machine. What you need to do is upload the data to the server either via a WCF service or an ASHX handler or such. I've done something similar -- uploading MP3 files from a Silverlight client to a WCF service via a Stream, works well.
Next: You need to make sure that whatever splitting process you use accommodates the audio format-- ie you probably just can't split the binary file. What format are you using, mp3?
I've used something called mp3plt, before to split mp3s. You may be able to recompile the source into a Silverlight-compatible library, assuming it's written in something you can use, source here.
Or you can look into the mp3 specs to see if it is possible to just split the binary file, in which case taking the duration to cut (the one the user chose), and multiplying by the bitrate, (kb/s * seconds = kb) will give you the place in the file byte[] you can cut at.
Error 1. Attempt to access the method failed System IO FileInfo OpenWrit, you getting this error coz of security reasons. Before saving to disk you should promt SaveFileDialog to user, and then only save file to disk.

Programmatically open an email from a POP3 and extract an attachment

We have a vendor that sends CSV files as email attachments. These CSV files contain statuses that are imported into our application. I'm trying to automate the process end-to-end, but it currently depends on someone opening an email, saving the attachment to a server share, so the application can use the file.
Since I cannot convince the vendor to change their process, such as offering an FTP location or a Web Service, I'm stuck with trying to automate the existing process.
Does anyone know of a way to programmatically open an email from a POP3 account and extract an attachment? The preferred solution would reside on a Windows 2003 server, be written VB.NET and secure. The application can reside on the same server as the POP3 server, for example, we could setup the free POP3 server that comes with Windows Server and pull against the mail file stored on the file system.
BTW, we are willing to pay for an off-the-shelf solution, if one exists.
Note: I did look at this question but the answer points to a CodeProject solution that doesn't deal with attachments.
Try Mail.dll email component, it's very affordable, supports attachments national characters and is easy to use, it also supports SSL:
Using pop3 As New Pop3()
pop3.Connect("mail.server.com")
pop3.Login("user", "password")
Dim builder As New MailBuilder()
For Each uid As String In pop3.GetAll()
' Receive email message'
Dim mail As IMail = builder.CreateFromEml(pop3.GetMessageByUID(uid))
'Write out received message'
Console.WriteLine(mail.Subject)
'Here you can use mail.Attachmets collection'
For Each attachment As MimeData In mail.Attachments
Console.WriteLine(attachment.FileName)
attachment.Save("c:\" + attachment.FileName)
' you can also use attachment.Data here'
Next attachment
Next
pop3.Close(true)
End Using
You can download it here: http://www.lesnikowski.com/mail.
possible duplication of Reading Email using Pop3 in C#
Atleast, there's a shed load of suggestions there that you may find useful
I'll throw in a late suggestion for a more generalized "download POP3 messages and extract attachments" solution using existing software and minimal programming. I needed to do this for a client who switched to receiving faxes via email and was not pleased with manually saving the attachments to a location where they could be imported into an application.
For downloading messages on *nix systems fetchmail seems to be the standard and is very capable, but I chose mpop for both simplicity and Windows compatibility (but it is cross-platform). If mpop hadn't done the trick for me, I probably would have ended up doing something with the Python-based getmail, which was created when fetchmail's development stalled for a time (it's since resumed).
Mpop is controlled either via command line or configuration file, so I simply created multiple configuration files and specify via command line which file to load. I'm using it in "Exchange pickup directory" mode, which means it simply downloads the messages and drops them as text (.eml) files in a specified directory.
For extraction of the message attachments, UUDeview appears to be the standard (I'm using the Windows port of UUDeview) across just about any system you could want with just about any features you could want. My main alternative to this was a much-less-capable Python script that I'd developed for a different client back in 2007, but I'm happy to go with a precompiled executable over either installing Python or packaging with any of the Python-to-exe options.
Finally there's the configuration - along with the two mpop configuration files mentioned above (which I could do away with by using command-line options), I also have two 2-line .cmd files launched every 10 minutes by scheduled task - the first line to launch mpop to download into a working directory and the second line to launch UUDeview and extract attachments of specified types (.pdf or .tif) then delete each file from which it extracted attachments. Output is sent to another directory from which staff can directly attach files as needed.
This is overall not the most elegant way to reach these ends, but it was quick, simple, functional and reasonably robust - at each stage if something goes wrong it fails such that no data is lost. The only places where data could be lost are any non-attachment messages being sent to the dedicated fax email addresses, and even those will sit in the processing directory and be caught eventually.

Resources