__init__

SmartInspect Python3 Library

Overview

This API provides Python code execution tracing and diagnostics support via the SmartInspect library. More information on SmartInspect can be found here: https://code-partners.com/offerings/smartinspect/

Warning: Enabling diagnostics tracing could significantly impact application performance, depending on the logging level. For example, a DEBUG logging level will generate a significant amount of trace data compared to an ERROR logging level.

Diagnostic data can be captured in various ways: Real-Time Console, File, Memory, or Text. Diagnostic data is buffered in a message list, and sent by a separate worker thread. This approach ensures that performance impact of the diagnosed application is minimal while diagnostics are enabled.

Diagnostics tracing options can be set via an application configuration settings file.

The Real-Time Console method of sending diagnostic data is the ideal way to diagnose applications that utilize services, such as ASP.NET or Windows Services. For real-time monitoring, diagnostics trace data is sent from your application to the SmartInspect Console viewer over the TCP/IP network. The SmartInspect Console can be started on the same machine where your application is running, or on a different machine that is accessible via the TCP/IP network.

Documentation

  • Documentation is located in the package library under the 'docs' folder; use the index.html as your starting point.
  • You can also view the latest documentation online at readthedocs.io.

Requirements

  • Python 3.4 or greater (not tested with Python 2).
  • pycryptodome package - used for log file encryption support.
  • pywin32 package - for named-pipe support (Windows platform only - use pip install pywin32 to install manually).
  • watchdog package - for detection of changes to smartinspect.cfg file settings.

Dependencies

  • SmartInspect Redistributable Console, Version 3.3+.

    The Console Viewer is required to view SmartInspect Log (.sil) formatted files, as well capture packets via the SITcpProtocol or SIPipeProtocol connections. The Console Viewer (aka Redistributable Console) can be downloaded here: https://code-partners.com/offerings/smartinspect/releases/

Quick-Start Sample Code

The following code snippets will get you started with establishing a connection to a logging Console or file. Please refer to the smartinspectpython.sisession.SISession class for all of the various "Logx" methods to log data.

Example 1 - Logging via tcp to a running SmartInspect Console on localhost

# our package imports.
from smartinspectpython.siauto import *

# set smartinspect connections, and enable logging.
SIAuto.Si.Connections = "tcp(host=localhost,port=4228,timeout=5000)"
SIAuto.Si.Enabled = True    # enable logging

# get smartinspect logger reference.
_logsi:SISession = SIAuto.Main
_logsi.Level = SILevel.Debug   # set Message level logging

# log some test messages.
_logsi.LogSystem(SILevel.Debug, "System Information on application startup")
_logsi.LogMessage("Hello World has started")


Example 2 - Logging to rotating hourly log files in SmartInspect Console format

# our package imports.
from smartinspectpython.siauto import *

# set smartinspect connections, and enable logging.
# this will keep 24 log files, that rotate every hour.
SIAuto.Si.Connections = "file(filename=\".\\logfiles\\AppLog.sil\", rotate=hourly, maxparts=24, append=true)"
SIAuto.Si.Enabled = True    # enable logging

# get smartinspect logger reference.
_logsi:SISession = SIAuto.Main
_logsi.Level = SILevel.Debug   # set Message level logging

# log some test messages.
_logsi.LogSystem(SILevel.Debug, "System Information on application startup")
_logsi.LogMessage("Hello World has started")


Example 3 - Logging to rotating hourly log files in Plain Text format

# our package imports.
from smartinspectpython.siauto import *

# set smartinspect connections, and enable logging.
# this will keep 24 log files, that rotate every hour.
SIAuto.Si.Connections = "text(filename=\".\\logfiles\\AppLog.txt\", rotate=hourly, maxparts=24, append=true)"
SIAuto.Si.Enabled = True    # enable logging

# get smartinspect logger reference.
_logsi:SISession = SIAuto.Main
_logsi.Level = SILevel.Debug   # set Message level logging

# log some test messages.
_logsi.LogSystem(SILevel.Debug, "System Information on application startup")
_logsi.LogMessage("Hello World has started")

Licensing

This project is licensed under the terms of the MIT End-User License Agreement (EULA) license.

View Change Log

Change Log

All notable changes to this project are listed here. Detailed changes are listed in the module where the change was made.

Change are listed in reverse chronological order (newest to oldest).

[ 3.0.37 ] - 2025/03/27
  • Fixed more bugs related to multi-threaded apps that log to encrypted log files. Also added configuration file change monitoring automatically when the SmartInspect.LoadConfiguration method is called.
[ 3.0.36 ] - 2025/03/26
  • Fixed a bug with multi-threaded apps that log to encrypted log files; multiple log files were being created that contained an ending "a" suffix in the base file name. The problem only seems to manifest itself when encryption options are specified.
[ 3.0.35 ] - 2025/03/02
  • Updated setup.py to adhere to PyPI.org requirements for uploaded binary distribution filenames to comply with the binary distribution format. This changes the wheel filename that is generated from smartinspectPython-3.0.35-py3-none-any to smartinspectpython-3.0.35-py3-none-any (same filename, just lower-case project name).
  • Updated SISession.EnterMethod to accept a colorValue argument to color the entry in the log viewer.
  • Updated SISession.EnterMethodParmList to accept a colorValue argument to color the entry in the log viewer.
  • Updated SISession.LeaveMethod to accept a colorValue argument to color the entry in the log viewer.
[ 3.0.34 ] - 2025/01/15
  • Updated Python version from v3.9 to v3.11.
  • Updated SISession class to replace deprecated thread.isDaemon() with thread.daemon reference. This was causing deprecation warning messages to be displayed in Python 3.11 clients.
  • Updated SISession class to replace deprecated threading.currentThread() with threading.current_thread() reference. This was causing deprecation warning messages to be displayed in Python 3.11 clients.
[ 3.0.33 ] - 2024/02/02
  • Updated SISession.EnterMethodParmList to always return a SIMethodParmListContext instance regarless of logging level.
[ 3.0.32 ] - 2024/02/02
  • Added SIMethodParmListContext class to SIAuto for import * support.
[ 3.0.31 ] - 2024/02/02
  • Added new methods to SISession class: EnterMethodParmList, LogMethodParmList.
  • Added SIMethodParmListContext class to support logging of input parameter lists.
[ 3.0.30 ] - 2023/12/08
  • Modified pretty print settings for SISession.LogXml to not add an xml declaration if one was not present on the input xml being logged.
[ 3.0.29 ] - 2023/12/08
  • Added pretty print capability to the following SISession methods: LogDictionary, LogXml.
[ 3.0.28 ] - 2023/11/25
  • Changed SIConfigurationTimer class to use the watchdog (1.0.1) package to monitor file system change events. Prior threading.Condition code was consuming large amounts of cpu when monitoring the smartinspect configuration file for changes.
[ 3.0.27 ] - 2023/10/31
  • Changed code in the SIProtocol module to see if a directory prefix is specified for the log file. If not, then it will not try to create a directory structure. Prior to this fix, it was always expecting a directory specification.
[ 3.0.26 ] - 2023/10/20
  • Added new methods to SISession class: LogXml, LogXmlFile.
[ 3.0.25 ] - 2023/10/18
  • Added SIAuto to __init__.py __all__ value so that it is included in the global import list.
[ 3.0.24 ] - 2023/10/18
  • Changed various SISession methods to not log internal errors if an object to be logged was null. Prior to this fix, the console viewer would only display a "LogX: X argument is null" message and drop the title text completely. This fix will allow the title text to be logged, as well as indicate to the user that the supplied object to log was null. Methods changed were: LogDictionary, LogEnunmerable, LogBool, LogByte, LogChar, LogComplex, LogDateTime, LogFloat, LogInt, LogObject, LogObjectValue, LogSqliteDbSchemaCursor, LogString, LogThread.
  • Changed all SISession methods to immediately check for "if (not self.IsOn(level)): return" so Python returns execution immediately if the level criteria is not satisfied. Prior to this, Python would have to interpret all lines of code until it reached a "return" value if the "if (self.IsOn(level)):" syntax was used. This should yield a slight performance increase due to less interpretation time spent.
[ 3.0.23 ] - 2023/10/15
  • Changed SIPacket methods GetThreadId and GetProcessId to verify the returned size of their values do not exceed 32-bits. Prior to this fix, the console viewer would report a value of zero if the values exceeded 32-bits in length. Python frequently returns thread id's larger than 32-bits on most operating systems. Although the value is incorrect, it is better than a zero value. The only way to truly fix this is to expand the thread id and process id sizes in the console viewer; until then, this is the best we can do.
[ 3.0.22 ] - 2023/09/29
  • Set Logger.propagate = False so that our exception capture process does not forward the message on to other loggers.
  • Changed methods in SISession that support SystemLogger functionality to allow bypass of logging to the system logger.
  • Updated documentation sample code and examples.
[ 3.0.21 ] - 2023/09/27
  • Added SystemLogger functionality to allow logging to system logs.
  • Changed SIColors class initialiation method to accept either an integer or SIColors enum for value argument.
  • Updated documentation sample code and examples.
[ 3.0.20 ] - 2023/09/03
  • Changed alpha byte from 0xFF to 0x00 for all color definitions in the SIColors enum class.
  • Changed all Session.LogX method signatures to use the SIColors enum type, or an integer value in ARGB format.
  • Updated internal build processes to use Python Virtual Environment.
[ 3.0.19 ] - 2023/09/01
  • Minor internal naming changes to functions in various modules to conform to Python best-practice naming standards (e.g. use single underscore instead of double underscore for internal methods).
[ 3.0.18 ] - 2023/08/31
  • Major changes to the package! All classes were renamed to start with an "SI" prefix, to avoid naming conflicts with other namespaces.
  • Renamed the KnownColorValues class to SIColors.
  • I was hesitant to do this, as it will cause breaking changes to applications that utilize the package. It was required though, to avoid namespace conflicts with like-named modules in system / other packages.
[ 3.0.17 ] - 2023/07/11
  • Minor internal only changes to build process.
[ 3.0.16 ] - 2023/07/11
  • Changed Session.GetMethodName method to use inspect.stack(0) instead of inspect.stack() to improve performace.
[ 3.0.15 ] - 2023/06/30
  • Changed 'Development Status' to '5 - Production/Stable', and uploaded to Pypi.org site.
[ 3.0.14 ] - 2023/06/28
  • Changed Session class to use temporary logger to capture exception details in LogException method.
[ 3.0.13 ] - 2023/06/23
  • Changed Session LogAssigned method to properly format the LogMessage title value.
[ 3.0.12 ] - 2023/06/17
  • Changed Session.EnterMethod, LeaveMethod to include source file.
  • Added default title to Session.LogAppDomain method.
  • Added exception handling in Session.LogSystem for user name value. It was failing on Windows WSL systems, returning some sort of permissions error.
[ 3.0.11 ] - 2023/06/17
  • Added *args support to Session class methods: LogDebug, LogVerbose, LogMessage, LogWarning, LogException, and LogFatal methods.
[ 3.0.10 ] - 2023/06/15
  • Added Session.LogPngFile, LogPngStream methods for SI Console 3.4+ support.
[ 3.0.9 ] - 2023/06/15
  • Changed the Session.CurrentMethodName, CurrentMethodNameClass, CurrentMethodNameClassNamespace properties to static methods.
[ 3.0.8 ] - 2023/06/09
  • Added InfoEvent event and RaiseInfoEvent methods to SmartInspect and Protocol classes. This allows SmartInspect to convey informational events to interested parties. For example, the SI Console Server banner is available, as well as when a SIConfiguration settings file is changed and reloaded if using SIConfigurationTimer class.
[ 3.0.7 ] - 2023/06/05
  • Documentation updates.
[ 3.0.6 ] - 2023/06/02
  • Documentation updates.
[ 3.0.5 ] - 2023/06/01
  • Fixed an issue with Session.GetMethod() not returning a method name.
[ 3.0.4 ] - 2023/05/31
  • Fixed an error related to using the "pack()" method that was not using the endian format characters (e.g. < >). This was causing packet sizes to be off on non-Windows platforms.
[ 3.0.2 ] - 2023/05/31
  • Added conditional import of pipeprotocol module, as named-pipes are only supported on the Windows platform. This was causing module not found error when trying to execute on non-Windows platforms.
[ 3.0.0 ] - 2023/05/30
  • Version 3 initial release, ported to Python from the SmartInspect for .Net framework.