How to log WCF message content?

Question

I thought this would be simple, but I can't see how to tell WCF to log message bodies. I have:

<system.diagnostics>
  <sources>
    <source name="System.ServiceModel" switchValue="Verbose">
      <listeners>
        <add type="System.Diagnostics.DefaultTraceListener" name="Default">
          <filter type="" />
        </add>
        <add type="Microsoft.Practices.EnterpriseLibrary.Logging.TraceListeners.EntLibLoggingProxyTraceListener,Microsoft.Practices.EnterpriseLibrary.Logging"
          name="traceListener">
          <filter type="" />
        </add>
      </listeners>
    </source>
  </sources>
</system.diagnostics>
<system.serviceModel>
   <diagnostics>
     <messageLogging logEntireMessage="true" logMalformedMessages="true"
       logMessagesAtServiceLevel="true" logMessagesAtTransportLevel="false" />
   </diagnostics>
   ...etc..,
   ...etc...
</system.Model>
<loggingConfiguration name="" tracingEnabled="true" defaultCategory="General">
   <listeners>
     <add fileName="_trace-xml.log"
                listenerDataType="Microsoft.Practices.EnterpriseLibrary.Logging.Configuration.XmlTraceListenerData,Microsoft.Practices.EnterpriseLibrary.Logging"
                traceOutputOptions="None"
                type="Microsoft.Practices.EnterpriseLibrary.Logging.TraceListeners.XmlTraceListener,Microsoft.Practices.EnterpriseLibrary.Logging"
        name="XML Trace Listener" />      
     ...etc... other listeners
  </listeners>
  ...etc...
</loggingConfiguration>

But all I get logged is stuff about the message, not the message body. What do I need to change to log message content?

Answer 1

Just following this description works perfectly for me: http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms730064.aspx

<system.diagnostics>
<sources>
  <source name="System.ServiceModel.MessageLogging">
    <listeners>
             <add name="messages"
             type="System.Diagnostics.XmlWriterTraceListener"
             initializeData="c:\logs\messages.svclog" />
      </listeners>
  </source>
</sources>
</system.diagnostics>

<system.serviceModel>
<diagnostics>
<messageLogging 
     logEntireMessage="true" 
     logMalformedMessages="false"
     logMessagesAtServiceLevel="true" 
     logMessagesAtTransportLevel="false"
     maxMessagesToLog="3000"
     maxSizeOfMessageToLog="2000"/>
</diagnostics>
</system.serviceModel>

No need to write any code for that ...

Answer 2

I found an versioning issue. When the WCF Service project was built against .Net 3.5 I saw the full message body in the viewer tool. Built against .Net 4.0 I saw no message body.

Answer 3

You can consider another way to see XML SOAP - custom MessageEncoder. The main difference from similar IDispatchMessageInspector / IClientMessageInspector is that it works on lower level, so it captures original byte content including any malformed xml.

In order to implement tracing using this approach you need to wrap a standard textMessageEncoding with custom message encoder as new binding element and apply that custom binding to endpoint in your config.

Also you can see as example how I did it in my project - wrapping textMessageEncoding, logging encoder, custom binding element and config.

Answer 4

Try http://www.csharptutorial.in/12/csharp-net-wcf-how-to-enable-wcf-tracing-and-messagelogging and setup logMessagesAtTransportLevel="true". In your log file you can find <s:Body> tags. Investigate text near them. Later you can add new "XmlListener" and found the message body in more flexible format.

Answer 5

If you need message bodies, you'll have to capture them yourself, programatically. Use a service behavior to install a message inspector and capture messages inside your implementation of IDispatchMessageInspector or IClientMessageInspector.