Application Compatibility Logging: Diagnose Security Compatibility in Internet Explorer

Almost all of the major applications create a log that notes down specific actions including the time at which the different modules of the application started, if they loaded successfully or failed, error codes in case of failures, and much more. These application logs give out plenty of information about the functioning of the application if studied properly. In case of severe errors, these application log files help the computer technicians in troubleshooting Windows application. In short, you can use the application logs both to study how an application functions as well as to troubleshoot Windows application.

Microsoft introduced plenty of security features with the Internet Explorer 7 and Internet Explorer 8 versions. These security features sometimes conflict with any webpage, its URL, content, scripts, or anything making the website unavailable to the user. The Application Compatibility Logging feature helps the user determine what is causing the problem.

Microsoft is also offering a debugging tool that allows you to test your webpage’s compatibility with the Internet Explorer 7 or Internet Explorer 8 prior or after hosting it. Named the MS Application Compatibility Toolkit (MS-ACT), the software is available as free download to programmers and web developers so that they can test any program, script or webpage on different platforms (includes different OS other than browsers) before actually deploying it.

The program also helps in identifying and debugging the problems as and when they occur while you use the Microsoft Windows. You must have encountered several instances when IE or a MS program fails and asks you whether it shall send details to Microsoft. The data sent is mainly from the log entries that helps the MS team work towards fixing the problem. The resolution is later released as a security patch or any other form of update.

You may not be able to toggle the application feature ON and OFF from within the Internet Explorer 7 or later versions. The default state is OFF. When it is turned on, the Internet Explorer 7 creates log files per user on the computer and stores it in the Event Viewer under Computer Management. You can access the Event Viewer by right clicking on the My Computer icon and then selecting Manage from the context menu.

Advanced users may alter the Registry key Feature_Enable_Compat_Logging (under Hkey_Current_Users) by setting its “iexplore” (DWORD) to 0 or 1. If the value is set to 0, the Internet Explorer will not create a log file. To enable Internet Explorer 7 application compatibility logging, set the value to 1. However, an average user does not need to go into the details as the Application Compatibility Logging is used normally by the web application developers only.

In the coming section, let us see what all is logged and how does the data help the web program developers when they use MS Application Compatibility Logging Toolkit.

Note: Hereafter, when we refer to Internet Explorer 7, we will also be considering the later versions of the browser, such as the IE 8 beta, IE 8 RC, and IE 8.