HS3 Log File

[Steve Q]

The solidstate hard drive on my HS3 computer is full. This has happened several times. HS3 continues to run but logging stops and the log is not accessible. I have deleted some non HS3 files to free up some drive space on my C drive and HS3 logging comes back, but this is a small amount of space that will fill up in a month or two.

Is there any way to tell HS3 to write the log to my secondary hard drive? I could not find any settings in setup or the settings.ini file.

Steve Q


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

[lveatch]

One option / first thought is to use a symbolic link. While native to unix OSes, Windows can do them too.... Windows 10's built-in command is "mklink".

You can move your Logs directory to a new drive, shutdown HS3 first. Then use mklink via the command prompt as administrator to create a Logs link to the new drive Logs location.

https://blogs.windows.com/buildingap...3M8UjGG7QyD.97

[Steve Q]

Thanks very much for posting this. The link refers to the "Creator" version of Windows 10. I need to explore this more. I was never able to install the anniversary edition. I tried multiple times. It always fails.

Steve Q


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

[Uncle Michael]

How many days of logs are you saving? My log file is under 50 MB.

I do not keep many days, instead I do regular backups with BLBackup. The backups are frequent enough that there are many overlapping copies. You can save the backup files to any drive you want.

[lveatch]

Thanks very much for posting this. The link refers to the "Creator" version of Windows 10. I need to explore this more. I was never able to install the anniversary edition. I tried multiple times. It always fails.

I don't think you need a special version of Windows to use mklink. It is installed by default on my Windows 8.1 HS box and my Windows 10 laptop.

The link was a good write up / example of how to use.

[Steve Q]

How many days of logs are you saving? My log file is under 50 MB.

I do not keep many days, instead I do regular backups with BLBackup. The backups are frequent enough that there are many overlapping copies. You can save the backup files to any drive you want.

Michael, my setting page is set to 14 days, 50MB. So my log file is not that big. My issue relates to images from my security cameras being stored in the HTML folder in HS3. I need to store them in this folder to make them accessible to HS3 for email attachments and HSTouch pages. These images use up the available space and the drive gets full. When the drive gets full , HS3 stops logging and the log becomes inaccessible. Even after I delete the images and make about 1-2 GB of free space on the 30GB solid state drive, HS3 logging is disabled. Restarting HS3 does not correct the problem. And restarting HS3 when it is unable to log seems to cause it to lose many of its settings. I have to restore HS3 from a backup.

I was looking for a way to gracefully shutdown/recover when the drive gets full.

Steve Q


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

[Steve Q]

I don't think you need a special version of Windows to use mklink. It is installed by default on my Windows 8.1 HS box and my Windows 10 laptop.



The link was a good write up / example of how to use.

I will give it a try with my current version of Windows 10.

Steve Q




Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

[zwolfpack]

Michael, my setting page is set to 14 days, 50MB. So my log file is not that big. My issue relates to images from my security cameras being stored in the HTML folder in HS3. I need to store them in this folder to make them accessible to HS3 for email attachments and HSTouch pages. These images use up the available space and the drive gets full. When the drive gets full , HS3 stops logging and the log becomes inaccessible. Even after I delete the images and make about 1-2 GB of free space on the 30GB solid state drive, HS3 logging is disabled. Restarting HS3 does not correct the problem. And restarting HS3 when it is unable to log seems to cause it to lose many of its settings. I have to restore HS3 from a backup.

I was looking for a way to gracefully shutdown/recover when the drive gets full.

Steve Q


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

Sounds like the log database file gets corrupted when the drive filles up. IMHO, filling up the system disk is dangerous and should be avoided; many bigger problems than a logging failure could result...
Suggestion: if the link thing pans out, try moving those big files to a folder on a separate large drive, then create a link to that folder from within the html directory. Hopefully that would allow you the access you need, and the system disk will stay safe!

[Steve Q]

Sounds like the log database file gets corrupted when the drive filles up. IMHO, filling up the system disk is dangerous and should be avoided; many bigger problems than a logging failure could result...
Suggestion: if the link thing pans out, try moving those big files to a folder on a separate large drive, then create a link to that folder from within the html directory. Hopefully that would allow you the access you need, and the system disk will stay safe!

Excellent suggestion. This would help in many ways. I'll post my findings.

Steve Q


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

[Steve Q]

One option / first thought is to use a symbolic link. While native to unix OSes, Windows can do them too.... Windows 10's built-in command is "mklink".



You can move your Logs directory to a new drive, shutdown HS3 first. Then use mklink via the command prompt as administrator to create a Logs link to the new drive Logs location.



https://blogs.windows.com/buildingap...3M8UjGG7QyD.97

I tried symlink on my HS3 windows 10 computer. I first tried Symlink with some simple text files and yes it worked. I then tried it for the HS3 log file and it did not work. The HS3 log is a database file (.hsd) and I suspect HS3 checks the file properties when it opens the database. The HS3 startup log shows an SQL error "no such table". HS3 then resets the database and starts a new one.

Any suggestions?

Steve Q


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

[lveatch]

I then tried it for the HS3 log file and it did not work. The HS3 log is a database file (.hsd) and I suspect HS3 checks the file properties when it opens the database.

Move the entire HS3 Logs directory to your 2nd drive and link at the directory level.

[Steve Q]

HS3 Log File

Move the entire HS3 Logs directory to your 2nd drive and link at the directory level.

That's what I did. The symlink works for .txt files but it did not work for a .hsd file.

Steve Q

Sorry, I misspoke, I did not move the entire directory, just the Homeseerlog.hsd file.

I will try moving the entire folder. And I will try to create a symlink to the directory; is that possible?

Steve Q


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

[Steve Q]

I believe that most database files use an accessory lock and unlock file which is written to the directory containing the database. Not sure if symlink can handle this?

I think I will try symlink to see if it works with MS excel files.

Steve Q


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

[lveatch]

That's what I did. The symlink works for .txt files but it did not work for a .hsd file.

Steve Q

Sorry, I misspoke, I did not move the entire directory, just the Homeseerlog.hsd file.

I will try moving the entire folder. And I will try to create a symlink to the directory; is that possible?

Steve Q


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

No problem. After you move the entire Logs directory to a new location,
Open a command prompt as administrator and navigate to the HS application directory (where Logs used to be).
Use mklink /D Logs f:\HS3-logs\Logs

These 2 directories are now linked together. What you in one drive / folder "occurs" in the other.

You should now be able to start HS without issue with your Logs writing to a different drive/location.

[Steve Q]

Thanks much, I'm away for a few days. I'll work on this when I return.

Steve Q


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk