Failing to profile ASP.NET application

KJTurner

I am trying to profile an ASP.NET application (v1.1 of the .NET framework) but I am getting the following errors in the Event log:

1) Unable to get the private bytes memory limit for the W3WP process. The ASP.NET cache will be unable to limit its memory use, which may lead to a process restart. Error: 0x80070003
2) <snip> The following information is part of the event: Failed to CoCreate profiler..

I'm using version 3.0.0.042 of ANT Profiler (evaluating)
I'm using a Toshiba Tecra M2 laptop running Windows XP, running the profiling under a Windows Server 2003 R2 session in MS Virtual PC.

I have no other profile tools installed/running in the environment.
I am able to profile a .NET Winforms application no problem.

Any sugggestions?

Tom Harris

Hi there,

we have not run any tests on profiling in a virtual environment. Is it only ASP.NET apps that are causing you problems?

Thanks,

Tom Harris

Red Gate Software

KJTurner

Yes, it's only ASP.NET applications that I am having problems with. I was able to successfullly profile a .NET WinForms application.

I have colleagues who have been able to profile applications in virtual environments.

-Kevin

Brian Donahue

Hi Kevin,

Yes, you can certainly use ANTS Profiler on a virtual machine, but the results for performance profiling can be less than reliable. The timing relies on the CPU ticks -- when the virtual machine's process is not in the CPU, it is in a sort of 'black hole' where the ticks aren't counted, the the result is methods that apparently ran for a few billion seconds. (a couple of decades!)

The problem with the coCreation of the profiler dll is a tricky one -- it could be simply that you need administrator rights on the server. You'll definitely need these rights if you are profiling on Windows 2003/IIS6; the w3wp.exe process cannot be started for a web app without administrator priviliges.