Debugging Tools for Windows |
Windows 2000 | Wmitrace.dll |
Windows XP and later | Wmitrace.dll |
Trace message format files (.tmf) are structured text files that contain instructions for formatting trace binary trace messages so that they can be displayed in human-readable form.
In order to display the trace message in a trace buffer (!wmitrace.logdump) or write them to a file (!wmitrace.logsave), you must first identify the TMF files for the trace messages.
You can use !wmitrace.searchpath to specify a directory in which TMF files are stored. The system then searches the directory for a TMF file that contains instructions for the messages that it is formatting. (It uses the message GUID to associate the message with the correct TMF file.)
However, you can use !wmitrace.tmffile to specify a particular TMF file. You must use !wmitrace.tmffile if the TMF file name is not a message GUID followed by the .tmf extension. Otherwise, the system will not find it.
If you do not use either !wmitrace.searchpath or !wmitrace.tmffile, the system uses the value of the TRACE_FORMAT_SEARCH_PATH environment variable. If that variable is not present, it uses the default.tmf file. If the system cannot find formatting information for a trace message, it writes a "No format information found" error message, instead of the trace message content.
For a conceptual overview of event tracing, see the Microsoft Windows SDK. For information about trace message format files, see the "Trace Message Format File" topic in the Windows Driver Kit (WDK).