writing file in %TEMP% fails silently

vba vb6 windows-server-2008

11,323

Solution 1

The problem was loglevel checking. It never actually got to the open or print statements.

I had three log levels defined 0 = no log 1 = everything 2 = errors only

It was set to 2 And LogError called LogMessage which checked if loglevel <> 1 and thus never ran.

Solution 2

Try this

Sub GetTmpPath()
    'This will give the Temp Path
    MsgBox IIf(Environ$("tmp") <> "", Environ$("tmp"), Environ$("temp"))
End Sub

So you can try using it as

    Ret = IIf(Environ$("tmp") <> "", Environ$("tmp"), Environ$("temp"))

    g_strLogPath = Ret & "\Sample.Log"

    Open g_strLogPath For Append As #intFileNumber

11,323

Author by

Will Rickards

Software Developer

Updated on July 14, 2022

Comments

Will Rickards almost 2 years

I have this function which writes to my log file. It is failing silently. In that there are no errors raised in this function, it just fails to create or write to the file. I'm trying to write to %TEMP%\myappname.log. It also fails in %USERPROFILE%\Desktop\myappname.log. Server is Windows Server 2008 R2 Standard. I've encountered this with writing to the application folder with other programs so moved to writing to the %TEMP% directory and this solved it. But this system won't even let me write to the %TEMP% directory. Yes I tried running as administrator too and it didn't help. %TEMP% in this case resolves through ExpandEnvironmentStrings to C:\Users\sa\AppData\Local\Temp\2 So g_strLogPath is C:\Users\sa\AppData\Local\Temp\2\myappname.log.

Public Function LogMessage(ByVal strInput As String, Optional ByVal blnDate As Boolean = False) As Boolean

   Dim intFileNumber As Integer

   On Error GoTo ErrorHandler

   If g_lngLogLevel <> 1 Then
      Exit Function
   End If

   If Len(g_strLogPath) = 0 Then
      SetLogPath
   End If

   If blnDate Then
      strInput = Format(Now, cstrLogDateFormat) & " : " & strInput
   End If

   intFileNumber = FreeFile
   Open g_strLogPath For Append As #intFileNumber
   Print #intFileNumber, strInput
   Close #intFileNumber

   LogMessage = True

   Exit Function

ErrorHandler:

   MsgBox _
      "Error: " & Err.Number & vbCrLf & _
      "Location: Module1.LogMessage" & vbCrLf & _
      "Line: " & Erl & vbCrLf & _
      Err.Description, vbExclamation + vbOKOnly

End Function

Will Rickards almost 12 years

User is local to the machine (not a network account). User is member of local administrators group. It should have full permissions. I can install programs just fine.
Will Rickards almost 12 years

This function seems to return a blank string. I use ExpandEnvironemntStrings with %TEMP% to get the temp path. It works fine. Problem isn't getting the temp location it is writing to it. The app can't write to it, user can write to it.
Siddharth Rout almost 12 years

Msgbox TempPath & "Sample.txt" If you put this in the Sub TmpPath() what do you get? and then try to use it as Open g_strLogPath For Append As #intFileNumber What happens?
Will Rickards almost 12 years

A blank string is returned by TempPath
Siddharth Rout almost 12 years

What does this give you? MsgBox IIf(Environ$("tmp") <> "", Environ$("tmp"), Environ$("temp"))?
Will Rickards almost 12 years

C:\Users\sa\AppData\Local\Temp\2
Will Rickards almost 12 years

Got the TempPath function to work. It outputs: C:\Users\sa\AppData\Local\Temp\2\
Siddharth Rout almost 12 years

Gr8. You can use either. Just ensure that you check what the last character is. If it is "\" then you don't add the "\" to the file name.
Will Rickards almost 12 years

I think you're missing the point. I have no trouble getting the temp path to write to. All your methods just give me the same path I was getting before. But actually writing the file is failing, without any error. I suspect some policy on the machine is causing it.
Siddharth Rout almost 12 years

Can you step through the code? and the moment it passes the line Open g_strLogPath For Append As #intFileNumber open that temp folder and check if the file is created? Also check what is the value of g_strLogPath
Will Rickards almost 12 years

Couldn't step through but put msgbox right after. Found problem was with loglevel checking. Thanks
Deanna almost 12 years

Normal practice is to have the logging levels on order of verbosity. You seem to have "everything" and "errors only" swapped.
Deanna almost 12 years

Antivirus apps are well known to knobble writes to the temporary folder.
wqw almost 12 years

@Deanna: Doubt real-time protection treats TEMP folder differently. OP is using remote desktop (that's why he gets 1, 2 and so on at the end of TEMP) and probably has some wrong settings on RDS, group policy or file permissions.
Deanna almost 12 years

@wqw: McAffee at least had the option to disable executables in the %TEMP% folder, and that's far fromt he worst I've seen.
Will Rickards almost 12 years

I never want to turn logging of errors off so I just switched it to a boolean verbose logging flag. And only output the stack trace type stuff when verbose but output the errors always.