Correlate End-to-End WCF Transactions Across Integration Platforms
Healthcare company scenario: Patient admission workflow spans 6 WCF services (PatientRegistration, InsuranceVerification, RoomAssignment, MedicalRecordsSync, BillingPreAuth, NotificationService) + HL7 ADT messages to EMR system + database stored procedures + external insurance provider APIs. Support receives escalation: "Patient John Doe admitted 2 hours ago, but insurance verification shows 'Pending', room not assigned, EMR not updated."
Before Nodinite: Engineers check 5 separate systems: WCF trace files, HL7 interface engine logs, SQL Server Profiler, insurance provider API logs (external vendor portal), EMR system logs (separate vendor). Manual correlation by Patient ID + timestamp across systems. 2-3 hours/escalation to find root cause. Often inconclusive (missing data in one system).
With Nodinite: All 6 WCF services configured with activity propagation (propagateActivity="true" in web.config). WCF activity IDs (GUIDs) propagated through entire workflow + HL7 messages ([HL7 Logging Agent][] extracts activity ID from MSH-10 Message Control ID field) + database logging ([Database Monitoring Agent][] logs stored procedure calls with activity ID parameter) + Custom Logging for external API calls.
BPM visualization shows complete patient admission flow in single view with activity ID correlation:
- Step 1 - PatientRegistration WCF (2:15 PM, Success, Patient ID 789456, Activity ID
a3f2b1c4-...) - Step 2 - InsuranceVerification WCF (2:15 PM, In Progress, Sent to external provider)
- Step 3 - External Insurance API (2:16 PM, Timeout after 90 seconds - root cause visible)
- Step 4 - RoomAssignment WCF (Never triggered - blocked waiting for insurance)
- Step 5 - MedicalRecordsSync WCF (Never triggered - blocked)
- Step 6 - HL7 ADT A01 Message (Never sent - blocked waiting for room assignment)
Root cause identified in 3 minutes: Insurance provider API timeout (external vendor issue). Operations team contacts vendor, implements retry logic in InsuranceVerification service, patient admission completes successfully.
Business value: Support escalation time 2-3 hours → 3 minutes (98% reduction). 20 escalations/week × 2.5 hours saved × $60/hour clinical IT rate = $156,000/year saved. Patient satisfaction improved (admission delays reduced 45% → 5%).
Complete Feature Reference
| Feature | Capability |
|---|---|
| WCF Diagnostics Configuration | Configure via web.config <system.diagnostics> section with zero C# code changes. Set trace sources (System.ServiceModel, System.ServiceModel.MessageLogging), trace levels (Information, Warning, Error, Critical, ActivityTracing), listeners (file, Event Log, custom), filter by operation contract. Enable activity tracing with propagateActivity="true" for end-to-end correlation across services. |
| Full SOAP Payloads | Unlimited payload retention with no size truncation (vs. Splunk 10KB limit, Application Insights 64KB limit). Log complete SOAP envelopes (headers + body + faults), WS-Security tokens, MTOM attachments, Binary XML. Store requests, responses, exceptions, activity traces for 7+ years based on Message Type retention policies. |
| File-Based Buffering | WCF applications write traces to file system (configurable folder path). [Pickup Log Events Service][Pickup Service] consumes asynchronously with 1-7 day buffering during Nodinite outages or network failures. Zero data loss, fault-tolerant design. Monitor with [File Monitoring Agent][] for unconsumed files (disk space alerts). |
| Search Fields | Extract business data from SOAP payloads using [Search Field Expressions][] with XPath (XML namespaces supported), JSON Path, or RegEx parsers. Configure 50+ fields per [Message Type][] (Order Numbers, Customer IDs, Transaction amounts, Status codes, etc.). Retroactive reindexing: forgot to extract Invoice Number 18 months ago? Add Search Field Expression, reindex 500K+ events in minutes. |
| Business Intelligence | [Business Process Modeling (BPM)][] correlates transactions end-to-end across WCF services using activity propagation IDs. Visualize workflows with color-coded steps (green success, red failures, yellow timeouts). [Non-Events Monitoring][Non Events Agent] tracks message volumes/patterns (alert on missing expected transactions, volume anomalies >20% threshold, data outages >15 minutes). Power BI integration via [Web API][] for custom dashboards. |
| Cost Optimization | One Nodinite license covers unlimited WCF services/endpoints/servers (vs. per-server licensing from competitors). 85-95% cost savings vs. Splunk/Application Insights ($3,600/year vs. $24K-$36K). SQL Server storage optimization: full-text indexing on payloads, Message Type-specific retention policies (financial transactions 7 years, debug logs 30 days), compression (10TB uncompressed → 2TB compressed). |
Related Monitoring Solutions
- [Windows Server Monitoring Agent][] - Monitor IIS servers hosting WCF services (CPU, memory, disk space, IIS application pools, performance counters, Windows Services)
- [Database Monitoring Agent][] - Monitor SQL Server/Oracle/PostgreSQL databases accessed by WCF services (connection pools, query performance, deadlocks, stored procedure logging)
- [Custom Logging][] - Log from non-WCF .NET applications (console apps, Windows Services, ASP.NET MVC, ASP.NET Core) using same Nodinite Log Event JSON format
Getting Started
| Step | Description |
|---|---|
| 1. Prerequisites | Verify [Prerequisites][]: Windows Server 2012 R2+, IIS 7.5+, .NET Framework 4.5+, file system access for trace output folder (C:\Nodinite\WCF\Traces\ or custom path), Windows user rights for Pickup Service |
| 2. Install Pickup Service | Download and install [Pickup Log Events Service][Pickup Service] on server with access to WCF trace folder. Configure pickup interval (default 10 seconds), folder path, Nodinite [Log API][] connection string |
| 3. Configure WCF Diagnostics | Edit web.config for each WCF application: Add <system.diagnostics> section, configure trace sources (System.ServiceModel.MessageLogging level=Verbose), add file listener to write to shared folder (C:\Nodinite\WCF\Traces\App1\), set DefaultMessageType property, enable propagateActivity="true". See [Configuration][] guide for complete examples |
| 4. Define Message Types | Create [Message Types][] in Nodinite for each WCF operation contract or business transaction type (PurchaseOrderSubmission, InvoiceQuery, PaymentRequest, CustomerUpdate, etc.). Critical for Search Field extraction and business intelligence |
| 5. Configure Search Fields | Add [Search Field Expressions][] to extract business data from SOAP payloads. Use XPath for XML (//OrderNumber, //soap:Body/ns:PurchaseOrder/ns:CustomerID), JSON Path for REST/JSON services, RegEx for custom formats. Test expressions on sample payloads before deploying |
| 6. Create Log Views | Design [Log Views][] for different user groups: Operations team (all services, full payload access), Business analysts (Order Numbers, Customer IDs, read-only), QA team (test environment only, debug-level traces). Configure RBAC with [Roles][] |
| 7. Set Up Alerts | Configure [Non-Events Monitoring][Non Events Agent] to alert on missing expected transactions (e.g., no PaymentRequests received in 15 minutes during business hours = payment gateway outage). Set volume thresholds (>20% increase/decrease = anomaly). Integrate with [Alarm Plugins][] (email, Slack, PagerDuty) |
| 8. Enable BPM | Map end-to-end workflows with [Business Process Modeling (BPM)][]. Define process steps (WCF service calls + database operations + external APIs), configure correlation using activity propagation IDs or business identifiers (Order Numbers). Visualize transactions in real-time for support teams |