Troubleshooting
===============

This chapter discusses how to debug problems with Obnam. It covers
things such as log files, various levels of logging and tracing, and
common problems with Obnam use. It also explains what things go where
in an Obnam backup repository.


Turning on full logging
-----------------------

Obnam can write a log file. There are several options controlling
that. Knowing these can help get out the most information when there's
a problem that needs to be investigated.

* `--log=obnam.log` tells Obnam where to log. The log is a simple text
  file.
* `--log-level=debug` tells Obnam to log at the most detailed level.
  The default level is `info`, which excludes most debug information.
* `--trace=obnamlib --trace=larch` tells Obnam to log additional debug
  information. The two arguments match all filenames in Obnam and the
  Larch library Obnam uses. This additional information is mostly
  useful to someone who can read and understand the program source
  code.

Note that these settings can make log files be quite large, in the
order of tens of megabytes. The size depends on how many files and how
much data your live data has.


Reporting problems ("bugs")
---------------------------

If you have a problem with Obnam, and you want to report it (please
do!), including the following information is helpful and makes it
easier to figure out what the problem is.

* You should report problems to the `obnam-support@obnam.org` mailing
  list. This is a publicly archived mailing list where various
  people help others use Obnam.

  If you respond to messages on `obnam-support`, **always** keep the
  list in the cc list. This means others will see the response, and
  there's a chance that they can help you better than the particular
  person you're responding to. Also, the archived discussion may be
  helpful to later readers, perhaps years afterwards.

* What is the problem? What did you try to achieve? What actually
  happened?

* The version of Obnam and Larch you're using, and how you installed
  it.
    - On Debian, run `dpkg -l obnam python-larch` on the command line
      and include the output.

* The exact command line you used. Copy-paste it instead of
  typing it again into the mail. Sometimes the problem can be hidden
  if you don't copy the command line exactly. Also, copying by typing
  is boring, and we should avoid boring things in life.

* If there's an error message, copy-paste that into the mail.

* The output of `obnam --dump-config`, which includes the full
  configuration. Include it as an attachment to your mail to
  `obnam-support`. If you have some secret information, such as
  filenames or hostnames, you can replace those with XXXX.

* If you can reproduce the problem while running with
  `--log-level=debug`, `--log=obnam.log` and `--trace=obnamlib
  --trace=larch` options, include a suitable amount from the end of
  the log file. The suitable amount may depend on the situation, but
  if you give the last two hundred lines, and it's not enough, we'll
  ask for more. Again, feel free to replace any sensitive filenames,
  etc, with XXXX.

* The output of the `env` command, in the same terminal window in
  which you ran Obnam. (Again, as an attachment.)

* If your bug is about performance, please run Obnam under profiling,
  and attach the profiling file. To run Obnam under profiling, install
  the Python profile (`python-profiler` package in Debian/Ubuntu), and
  set the `OBNAM_PROFILE` environment variable to the name of the file
  with the profiling output (that's the file you should send by mail).
  For example: `OBNAM_PROFILE=obnam.prof obnam backup` would run the
  backup under the profiler, and write the result to `obnam.prof`.

Thank you for your help in making Obnam better.
