Logging portal activities - Rishan Solutions

Logging portal activities is essential for monitoring, troubleshooting, auditing, and ensuring the security and performance of Power Pages portals. It helps track user actions, monitor system performance, and gain insights into portal usage patterns. Power Pages provides various tools and features for logging activities within a portal, such as tracking user interactions, form submissions, and system errors.

Here’s a comprehensive guide on how to log activities, set up logging, and use it effectively for your Power Pages portals.

1. Overview of Logging in Power Pages

Logging allows you to:

Monitor user behavior: Track user logins, page views, form submissions, and other interactions.
Identify errors and issues: Log system errors, failed authentication attempts, and security violations.
Audit activity: Maintain records of user actions for compliance, particularly for GDPR or other regulatory requirements.
Optimize performance: Capture performance metrics to identify bottlenecks or slow pages.

2. Types of Logging in Power Pages

Power Pages provides several methods for logging activities:

a. Azure Application Insights

Azure Application Insights is a powerful tool integrated into Power Pages that provides real-time monitoring, logging, and analytics for web applications. It tracks various activities, such as:

User sessions
Request response times
Failed requests
Exceptions and errors
Custom events

b. Dataverse Logs

Since Power Pages are often connected to Microsoft Dataverse, logs related to entity data interactions (create, update, delete) can also be recorded. Dataverse logs can help track changes made to data and the associated user actions.

c. Portal Diagnostic Logs

The Power Pages Diagnostics tool can be used to track issues and errors within the portal’s operations. This log typically captures things like:

Failed portal operations
Configuration errors
Issues in plugin execution

d. Custom Logging with JavaScript

You can implement custom logging in your Power Pages portal using JavaScript. This can log activities like button clicks, form submissions, or interactions with custom components.

3. Setting Up Azure Application Insights for Logging

To start logging with Azure Application Insights, follow these steps:

Create an Application Insights Resource:
- In the Azure Portal, go to Application Insights.
- Create a new Application Insights Resource and configure it for your Power Pages portal.
Connect Application Insights to Power Pages:
- In your Power Pages portal, go to the Portal Management section.
- Under Portal Settings, enable Application Insights and input the Instrumentation Key that was generated during the resource creation.
Log Events and Metrics:
- You can log events directly in Application Insights using JavaScript (client-side logging) or use server-side logging for backend operations.
- Application Insights will automatically track common events, but you can configure custom events for specific actions (e.g., form submission, user login).

4. Using Dataverse for Activity Logging

Dataverse provides a powerful platform for logging data changes in Power Pages. Every interaction with Dataverse (like CRUD operations) is automatically logged:

Enable Audit Logs:
- In the Power Platform Admin Center, navigate to Dataverse settings.
- Enable Audit History to start logging changes made to data in the environment. This includes information on who made the change, what was changed, and when the change occurred.
Review Audit Logs:
- Go to Power Platform Admin Center > Audit Log.
- You can query the logs for specific operations like create, update, or delete actions on records within Dataverse entities.

5. Portal Diagnostic Logs

The Power Pages Diagnostics Tool provides logs for troubleshooting and monitoring portal errors and configuration issues:

Access the Portal Diagnostic Logs:
- In the Power Pages Admin Center, go to your portal’s Settings and look for the Diagnostics section.
- You can check the portal diagnostic logs for common issues, errors, or performance problems.
Monitor Portal Errors:
- The logs will contain information on failed requests, timeout errors, and issues related to custom code or APIs.
- You can use these logs to resolve issues related to custom JavaScript, Liquid templates, or third-party integrations.

6. Custom Logging with JavaScript

In addition to built-in logging tools, you can implement custom logging directly into your portal using JavaScript. For example, you might want to log every form submission, button click, or custom event triggered by the user.

Here’s an example of a simple custom logging function using JavaScript:

function logCustomEvent(eventType, eventDetails) {
  // Define the logging endpoint or service (e.g., Application Insights)
  const logEndpoint = 'https://your-logging-service-url.com';

  // Create the log payload
  const logPayload = {
    event: eventType,
    details: eventDetails,
    timestamp: new Date().toISOString(),
    user: getCurrentUser() // Define a function to get the current user information
  };

  // Send the log data to the logging service
  fetch(logEndpoint, {
    method: 'POST',
    headers: { 'Content-Type': 'application/json' },
    body: JSON.stringify(logPayload)
  }).then(response => {
    if (!response.ok) {
      console.error('Logging failed', response);
    }
  }).catch(error => {
    console.error('Error sending log data', error);
  });
}

In this example, the logCustomEvent function can be used to log events like button clicks or form submissions. You can extend this to log specific details and send them to an endpoint for storage and analysis.

7. Best Practices for Logging

Log Critical Events: Ensure that important actions, such as form submissions, user logins, and configuration changes, are logged.
Use a Centralized Logging System: Whether it’s Azure Application Insights or a custom service, centralize your logs for easier access and analysis.
Monitor Error Logs: Keep a close eye on error logs, particularly those generated by system failures, missing configuration, or security violations.
Implement Log Retention Policies: Set up log retention policies to ensure that old logs are archived or deleted after a certain period.
Use Structured Logging: Ensure that logs are structured and contain key details (like event type, timestamp, user info) to make analysis easier.
Monitor Performance Metrics: Track page load times and API response times to identify performance bottlenecks.
Secure Log Data: Logs may contain sensitive user information, so ensure they are securely stored and protected from unauthorized access.