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Not really new as it was previously called CtxBSOD v2.1 but was renamed to better show its purpose. In addition to renaming I added a command line option to dump a system remotely or from a command line locally without using its GUI interface. The main motivation for me to write this tool was the absence of similar tools for 64-bit Windows. SystemDump can dump a 64-bit server too! 

You can download it form Citrix support web site (requires free registration):

http://support.citrix.com/article/CTX111072

Main features:

• The tool has both GUI and command line interfaces.
• You can type a message/text (or copy it from clipboard) before forcing a memory dump. This message is saved in a dump and a support engineer can read it after loading the dump in WinDbg.exe. This is implemented to encourage writing the symptoms and conditions explaining why the dump has to be forced.
• The tool can stay on top of any window (if you need this to quickly dump the server after a reproduction or during the process of an activity).
• It is supplied with Program Database (PDB) symbols for the driver (32-bit and 64-bit) which is useful when you want to have all symbols present on the bugcheck thread.
• The bugcheck clearly shows that the dump is manually generated.
• The tool can force a memory dump on both 32-bit and 64-bit platforms.
• Before forcing a fatal error on a server, the tool warns about potential damaging consequences: Users are disconnected and all the data which is not saved will be lost. It asks for a confirmation.
• You can specify a period of time (in minutes) when to force a memory dump.

The latter feature is implemented entirely in kernel. Additional command that not covered in the article is

>SystemDump.exe abort

allows you to abort the action if you ran the tool using command line options.

I attached the UML component diagram showing the architecture of this tool. I recently developed a presentation about device drivers architecture and Citrix kernel drivers where I used this tool as one of examples.

- Dmitry Vostokov -

           

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Coming Soon:

Debugging Notebook: Essential Concepts, WinDbg Commands and Tools

Crash Dump Analysis for System Administrators and Support Engineers

New Magazines:

Debugged! MZ/PE: MagaZine for/from Practicing Engineers

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Memory Dump Analysis Anthology, Volume 3

First Fault Software Problem Solving: A Guide for Engineers, Managers and Users

x64 Windows Debugging: Practical Foundations

Also available:

Windows Debugging: Practical Foundations

DLL List Landscape: The Art from Computer Memory Space

Dumps, Bugs and Debugging Forensics: The Adventures of Dr. Debugalov

WinDbg: A Reference Poster and Learning Cards

Memory Dump Analysis Anthology, Volume 2

Memory Dump Analysis Anthology, Volume 1

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Baby Turing

This entry was posted on Tuesday, September 12th, 2006 at 5:11 am and is filed under Crash Dump Analysis, Software Architecture, Tools. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.