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MVP Assistant - a new tool, including new Log Viewer

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EDIT (11/16/2022)

Since this thread is pinned, it comes up at the top when someone adds to it. It's an old thread and while the information may be worth reading (or not), please refer to this thread for up to date information on the MVP Assistant:

https://forum.acronis.com/forum/acronis-cyber-protect-home-office-forum-formerly-acronis-true-image-2021/mvp-assistant-new-20-rescue-media-builder-new-version-232

-Bruno

 

Original post follows...

The MVP Assistant is a program written to provide new utilities to the True

Image Home user community. It includes a new Log Viewer with enhanced capability, as well as a documentation interface and configuration information useful to the users as well as MVPs and others helping to solve issues.

The MVP Assistant is available through the Community Tools KB article, which is accessed from the Third-party tools button on the Tools page of the Acronis True Image Home user interface.

I hope the users will find it useful. I do expect with the diverse user configurations and needs, there may be things that will need improvement. I see this as a work in progress.

 

EDIT (9/27/2021)

With the advent of Acronis Cyber Protect Home Office, the version on the Community Tools page will not work.

From now on, I will try to always post here the link to the latest version and also update the title to readily know when a new version is available.

LATEST VERSION: MVP Assistant Version 1.1.6.0

 

 

3 Users found this helpful
Forum Hero
Posts: 59
Comments: 9379

+ 1

Great tool for those looking to get under the hood!

Ekaterina, this needs to be a sticky on all the Forums.

Forum Hero
Posts: 207
Comments: 5129

It is a great tool. I have used it with great success when dealing with errors during beta testing of ATI 2021.

I have only had one problem when using it - not with the app itself but with an enormous log file which it took ages to load. It related to the manually instigated cleanup of a Acronis Cloud backup, which took about 15 hours to complete. The log file was split into 4 files - absolutely enormous. The cleanup took so long because there were several earlier cleanups that deleted the selected backups but did not release the space.

Ian

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Ian, I have found conditions where the log files can be many megabytes with many tens of thousands of log entries. In these cases it can be quite time consuming to parse the entries. Processing of the log files involves two steps... 1) parse the file into specific fields, and 2) turn that into HTML to display. You will see a progress bar at the bottom moving through each of the two phases. If you hit the ESC key during the parsing, it will stop that phase, but still turn what it has into HTML to display.

Legend
Posts: 110
Comments: 29180

+1 that this should be a sticky topic in the forums!

This is the only tool we have that can show the new backup_worker logs in a clear & readable way, plus lots of other good features included!

Forum Star
Posts: 23
Comments: 1249

Another excellent job by one of our MVPs'.

Beginner
Posts: 1
Comments: 18

Just wanted to say many thanks to all involved for providing this tool. It is a real eyeopener to see how much information is logged.

Beginner
Posts: 5
Comments: 8

Great tool. Thanks for the effort you put into it.

Is it possible to delete multiple log files at the same time? The only way I see to delete a single log file is to select it, go to the Log Files menu and select Delete file. This is laborious when you want to delete a bunch of old log files.

Also a right-click context menu for log file actions (like delete file) would be a real time-saver.

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LesFromIL wrote:

Great tool. Thanks for the effort you put into it.

Is it possible to delete multiple log files at the same time? The only way I see to delete a single log file is to select it, go to the Log Files menu and select Delete file. This is laborious when you want to delete a bunch of old log files.

Also a right-click context menu for log file actions (like delete file) would be a real time-saver.

Les, it is possible to delete multiple log files. It is documented in the Help for the Delete From ... menu item under the Repositories menu.

The process is not quite like Explorer. I didn't want it to be too easy to delete the log files. The concept is to first limit the log viewer to only show the logs you want to delete and then bulk delete them.

1. Under the Log Type->Culling Options menu, select the log types and dates for logs you  want to delete. I suggest playing around with the culling options to see how you can easily select logs to view.

2. Once you are only viewing the logs you want to delete, then you can select the Repositories->Delete From menu command. If this command is disabled, go to the Settings page for the Log View to allow bulk deletion of system log files. This is disabled by default to prevent accidental deletion.

You can also choose whether or not to put the deleted logs into the Recycle Bin or just permanently delete them.

Also, take a look at the capability of Repositories. You can, for example, create a repository of old logs and then copy the logs from the active logs to your own personal repository before deleting them. That's a way to back them up in an easy to access location.

Let me know if you have more questions.

 

 

Forum Member
Posts: 8
Comments: 37

I've recently downloaded the MVP Assistant and it's very useful, thanks to the devs for creating it.

One thing I do note, I think I have the latest version 1.0.1, under the "MVP Guidlines" - Forums - This forum for ATI 2021 is missing from the list.  In fact there is no mention of 2021 anywhere - is this still under development or do I have an out-of-date version of MVP Assistant?

Legend
Posts: 110
Comments: 29180

Alan, any of the MVP Guidelines can be customised to how each user might want it to be, so you can add in the link for the 2021 forum, user guide etc.

To add the 2021 forum for example, select the 2020 forum then simply change the URL from 2020 to 2021 then right-click on the section header for the forum entries and use the option to 'Insert the displayed article' - once done, you can rename the entry as needed, and also use drag & drop to re-order entries etc.

For the user guides, then open the Acronis Product Documentation page, where you can then find the 2021 guides and do the same to insert them after displaying them.

You have the most recent version of the Assistant that Bruno has created & had approved by Acronis.  Any further development will depend on what Acronis decide to produce to follow on from ATI 2021, which they haven't disclosed to anyone as yet!

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AlanS wrote:

I've recently downloaded the MVP Assistant and it's very useful, thanks to the devs for creating it.

One thing I do note, I think I have the latest version 1.0.1, under the "MVP Guidlines" - Forums - This forum for ATI 2021 is missing from the list.  In fact there is no mention of 2021 anywhere - is this still under development or do I have an out-of-date version of MVP Assistant?

You have the "latest" version. It took a long time to get it on the Acronis third-party tools page so it is not easy to update there. At some point soon I would like to fix a few minor bugs and make it available, but that won't be through the same channel.

While most people use it for the Log Viewer, the Guidelines section is very handy and highly customizable. The "merge" feature was put in so that MVPs could release a subset of guideline links that can be merged into the tree (Steve... hint, hint).

In the year this has been out there, I've received almost no input on the System or True Image Configurations sections. The System section can provide a breakdown of disks and partitions, amongst other info. The TI section can show all the backup tasks to easily see task summaries, script contents and Scheduler Manager data.

There's a lot there, folks.

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Great, many thanks both.

Legend
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Copy of my own updated 'guidelines.config' file attached if Alan wants to test the 'merge' option.

Attachment Size
582227-281506.zip 4.04 KB
Forum Star
Posts: 183
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Steve, the nice thing about merging is that one can create multiple smaller merge files, e.g. one to contain user guides, one to link to .tibx KB articles, one for installation issues, etc. By using smaller bits, it can be easier to merge what's needed and easily place them into the existing structure.

When a config is merged, it does not matter if the branch already exists or not.

aby
Beginner
Posts: 3
Comments: 13

Unfortunately if you upgrade to the latest version of Acronis which I did due to the ongoing catastrophic failure of backups to the cloud, the path names have changed to the new product name so a lot of the functionality of these tools is disabled.

Legend
Posts: 110
Comments: 29180

Aby, see forum topic: MVP Assistant update for Acronis Cyber Protect Home Office where Bruno has posted a link to where you can download an updated version of the Assistant tool that works fine with both ATI and ACPHO versions.

Beginner
Posts: 7
Comments: 8

In the new MVP assistant, I looked through every log category and I didn't find any backup process logs. Which log do you select to see them? Apparently, the regular Log Viewer wasn't updated, because it says no logs were found. I liked the old one, because it took you directly to the proper logs. Thanks in advance.

Legend
Posts: 110
Comments: 29180

If you have Disks & Partitions backups created on ATI 2020 or later using .tibx files, then look in the Backup Worker logs.

If you have Files & Folders backups using .tib files (or Disk backups from earlier versions using .tib files) or using Cloning then look in the Demon logs.

Other logs are shown by the MVP Assistant under the 'Active Logs' heading of the Log Viewer page of the Assistant.

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Posts: 183
Comments: 1870

From here out (at least for a while), I will post new version information as an edit in the original post for this sticky topic so as to make it very easy to know when a change has been made and quickly get it.

TDP
Beginner
Posts: 4
Comments: 10

As Acronis expands its product to reach into antivirus market it stuns me that the MVP community need to backfill with external programs where basic backup features are missing in the True Image/Cyber product. Fancy getting an error "the backup failed due to an error" and not being able to click on the message to get to the error detail.

Thanks very much user community, great work ... but not thanks Acronis.

 

 

Forum Member
Posts: 10
Comments: 38

Bruno,

As I can see, in 1.1.4.0, the problem with sorting Demon logs by date still exists.

Regards,

Valery

Legend
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Comments: 29180

Valery, have you upgraded to ACPHO on your PC, and if so, have you run the Repair Log Dates option from the Log Viewer menu?

Repair Log Dates...: When upgrading from True Image Home to Cyber Protect Home Office, all existing log files are brought into a new folder but the file dates reflect the time of the upgrade. This command does a one time pass on log files in the CyberProtectHomeOffice folder to read the log files and change the creation and last modified dates to reflect the actual date range of the log file entries. It only processes log files created within the first hour after the creation of the new folder so as to limit processing to files carried over from True Image Home. Once a complete pass has been made, the option is no longer visible. It should be run once soon after the upgrade is done and should also be run with no restrictions on the files displayed (via culling options). Note that it is possible that a large multi-megabyte file can take a long time to parse. If this happens, the ESC key can be used to interrupt it.

Forum Member
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Comments: 77

I was researching a problem.  I saw a problem with the error 9/8/2022 10:46:51:433 AM -04:00 18708 E00040007: Error 0x40007: Error occurred while opening the file.

That confused me because it appears that ACPHO was trying to access the FULL file and could not.  The FULL file is available and is valid and I can recover files from it.  ACPHO created a new FULL file instead of the next incremental file

My procedure is to have ACPHO email me the log for a backup.  When I looked at that log vs MVP Assistant display, I discovered that an error occurred while trying to open the FULL file showing error 0xfff0: A device which does not exist was specified.  

I discovered that Log Viewer displays the additional information if I select the Trace option.  Should this option be set?

I am using MVP Assistant version 1.1.6 and ACPHO build 40107.

Legend
Posts: 110
Comments: 29180

William, there is a new version of the MVP Assistant that is now available.

MVP Assistant - New 2.0 with Rescue Media Builder (New Version 2.1.1)

The trace option in the log viewer depends on how much more detail you want to see, it can be helpful if you are prepared to wade through all the extra information, much of which is only intended for the Acronis developers.

I discovered that an error occurred while trying to open the FULL file showing error 0xfff0: A device which does not exist was specified.  

Check your Source and Destination settings are shown correctly and match the drive letter shown in the log, especially with USB drives where the allocated drive letter can change?

Beginner
Posts: 0
Comments: 2

My backup is failing at exactly the same spot with "Operating system error: The request could not be performed because of an I/O device error"

Currently have a ticket with support on going which is quite slow in getting responses, I just wish it was possible to speak with someone remotely rather than back and forward on emails. After doing some searching on my own, I want to try a solution/test.

I now believe that this might be down to a corrupt file of some sort - One option is chkdsk which should find the culprit if so but I can't shut down this server currently.

Is it possible using this log finder to see which file the backup is running before it gets to the failure? 

An example of how I would like to see the logs would be something like a running order of which file paths are backing up

  • E:\folder\folder\file 1 - SUCCESS
  • E:\folder\folder\file 2 - SUCCESS
  • E:\folder\folder\file 3 - SUCCESS
  • E:\folder\folder\file 4 - SUCCESS
  • E:\folder\folder\file 5 - FAILED

Is this possible?

 

Thanks

Legend
Posts: 110
Comments: 29180

Matthew, welcome to these public User Forums.

You mention that your backup is running on a server above, what Acronis product are you using for the backup?  The MVP Assistant tool will only work with True Image (2018 - 2021) and Cyber Protect Home Office, both of which are not really intended to run on server systems (with some minor exceptions).

A device I/O error is more likely to be an issue with either the drive or file system on the drive, so the recommendation to run CHKDSK is valid.  If the drive is giving any bad sectors then the log may give an indication otherwise you may need to use drive diagnostic tools from the maker.

Beginner
Posts: 0
Comments: 2

You are right, I am using Cyber Protect. Stumbled across this specific forum when googling how to read the logs after I collected them for support without noticing. My apologies. 

Chkdsk is the likely option but I cannot reset the server for the time being, I was hoping if I could see if the backup failed on a specific file which it appears to be doing, I could move/exclude it temporarily to see if that works

 

Thanks

Legend
Posts: 110
Comments: 29180

Matthew, if you have an Acronis system report zip file that you could share via a cloud link (OneDrive, Google Drive, Dropbox etc) then I would be happy to take a look to see if there is anything to indicate where the issue lies?  You can send me a link via the option below my name to 'Send message'.

Beginner
Posts: 0
Comments: 3

 If you choose not to update your software, certain functionalities will be unavailable beginning in March.