Enabling Connector Logging

Silicon Connector has two parts behind the scenes. A low-level plug-in that extends InDesign’s capabilities for linking, and an extension that provides a UI to the DAM.

Connector Extension Logging

If you’ve found an issue, one of the things that will help us diagnose the problem is to provide us with a log file. These screenshots are from Silicon Connector for Box but most Connectors have a similar method.

From the extension flyout menu, select Preferences.

Check the box next to “Write to log file”.

Perform the minimum actions that produce the problem.

Get the log file from your Documents folder. On Mac, it is at Users/username/Documents/box_connector_files/box_log.txt. Other Connector versions will have a similar location.

You can click the Clear Log File button or delete the log file if you want to create one that includes only the logging data from specific steps. Connector will create a log file if logging is enabled and there isn’t a file already there. For example, if you have had logging turned on but you need to provide a log of an authentication step, delete the file if it exists, then perform the authentication steps. Email the log file before doing anything else so the log file contains only a log of those specific steps.

Connector Plug-in Logging

To enable logging for the Plug-in, add the following files to the InDesign CC 2019 application’s root folder:
LogHTTPCalls
LogHTTPState

-> download a zip of both files <-

The existence of these files is what triggers logging so the files can be a text file without anything in it and without the txt extension. Make sure the files don’t have an extension.

When InDesign runs, and the user attempts to place a link or opens a file with links, the following two files will be saved to the user’s Documents folder:
HTTPCalls.log
HTTPState.log

The log files are never cleared and will be appended for subsequent runs of InDesign. If you want to start fresh, just delete the log files. When you no longer require logging, be sure to delete or rename the files that enable logging in the InDesign application’s folder.

To make the log files more concise, we recommend enabling logging just before reproducing the problem, then providing SPI or your Connector vendor with the log files immediately after the error.