Audit Trail Module Overview

• Feb 24, 2022
• 6 minutes to read

The eXpressApp Framework supplies the Audit Trail System for WinForms and ASP.NET applications. This system is intended to provide you information on changes that are being made to the application’s persistent objects. For example, you can retrieve information on the kind of change (object is created, changed, etc.), who made this change, with what object, the previous and new property values, and so on. A change is registered between two sequential events of object saving to a data storage. To have this system in your application, you should use the Audit Trail module, which represents it. This topic explains the mechanisms for trailing object changes, and provides ways to customize them.

Note

• Currently, we do not to provide built-in support for Entity Framework (EF) in this module, because its implementation heavily depends on our XPO ORM, and we do not have a sufficient number of customer requests in this regard. If you use EF for data access in your XAF application and require a similar functionality for your project, feel free to contact us and describe your business requirements so we can provide you with alternative solutions. In general, you can integrate any custom or standard solution for Entity Framework, which you would implement to solve the same requirement in non-XAF applications. We will also continue monitoring user demand in this regard and it is possible that we will review our current decision in the future.

• We have designed this module to manage up to a hundred of audited changes in one transaction. It will take significant time to save thousands of audit data records. We recommend that you investigate whether or not this performance specificity is important before using this module in your application.

The AuditTrailModule is represented by the DevExpress.ExpressApp.AuditTrail.v18.2.dll assembly. To use the module in an application, add it to your application project or one of the application modules via the Application Designer or Module Designer, respectively. In addition, check that the DevExpress.Persistent.Base.v18.2.dll assembly is referenced in your application, since it contains XAF-independent services used by the Audit Trail module.

Important

• You can add a module in the Solution Wizard when creating a new XAF solution by selecting a module in the Choose Extra Modules step.

• To add an extra module in code, add it to the XafApplication.Modules or ModuleBase.RequiredModuleTypes list (adding a reference to the module assembly is insufficient).

After the necessary assemblies listed above have been referenced, all persistent objects in the application will be audited. In addition, their simple, reference and collection properties, which are persistent, will be audited as well. The changes made to these objects and their properties will be logged in the database.

The following table lists the changes which are logged by the Audit Trail module:

Change	Description
ObjectCreated	The audited object has been created.
InitialValueAssigned	An initial value has been assigned to the audited object before the first save.
ObjectChanged	The audited object’s property has been changed.
ObjectDeleted	The audited object has been deleted.
AddedToCollection	The audited object has been added to a collection.
RemovedFromCollection	The audited object has been removed from a collection.
CollectionObjectChanged	An object from the audited object has been changed.
AggregatedObjectChanged	The object aggregated by the audited object has been changed.
CustomData	Custom data has been added to the audit log.

In code, changes are represented by the AuditDataItem class. This class’ properties are logged. By default, they are saved to the database by an AuditDataStore object. This object creates an AuditDataItemPersistent persistent object and saves it to the database. To save changes represented by the AuditDataItem objects in another storage, inherit a custom class from the AuditDataStore class and override the Save method (see the Customize the Audit Trail System topic).

To analyze the audit log, you need to know what database tables represent it. With the Audit Trail module, the following tables are added to the database:

• AuditDataItemPersistent

  Represents the table where the AuditDataItemPersistent objects are stored. Each time one of the changes listed above is made, a new record is added to this table. The table’s AuditedObject field contains references to the corresponding records in the AuditObjectWeakReference table. The OldObject and NewObject fields contain references to the corresponding records in the XPWeekReference table. These fields’ string representations are stored into the OldValue and NewValue fields, respectively.

  Note

  • The AuditedObject is null for deleting operation when the deferred deletion option is disabled for the audited type. Use the DeferredDeletionAttribute to enable it.
  • For collection modification entries (AddedToCollection, RemovedFromCollection, CollectionObjectChanged, AggregatedObjectChanged), a reference to the modified persistent object along with the object’s string representation are always stored into the OldObject / OldValue fields.
  • The Security System creates a default user that cannot access or change the audit data records. To allow a user to access these records, grant a type permission for AuditDataItemPersistent, AuditedObjectWeakReference, and XPWeakReference.

• XPWeakReference

  Contains data on the objects that have been changed. Object identifiers are stored as strings.

• AuditedObjectWeakReference

  Contains data on both the objects that have been changed and the objects that have taken part in a change. Object identifiers are stored in the GuidId or IntId field, depending whether they are stored as Guid or integer values. So, the AuditedObjectWeakReference table represents a more convenient way to access object data than via the XPWeakReference table.

It is possible to lose some of the object changes, if these changes are performed within a session that is not audited. This can occur if you manually create a Session or UnitOfWork. To avoid such a failure, use the Application.CreateObjectSpace method, when you need to create your own Session or UnitOfWork:

C#

IObjectSpace objectSpace = Application.CreateObjectSpace(typeof(MyBusinessClass));

VB.NET

Dim objectSpace As IObjectSpace = Application.CreateObjectSpace(GetType(MyBusinessClass))

Do not write a statement like the following:

C#

Session session = new Session(...);

VB.NET

Dim session As Session = New Session(...)