Bug Validator allows you to generate KVI files that can be used at a customer site with the Bug Validator Client software tool.
 
KVI files allow Bug Validator Client to monitor your application's execution history at customer sites without the need to supply PDB and MAP files to the customer site.

Additionally, Bug Validator Client can be distributed to your customers at no cost, whereas Bug Validator cannot be distributed to your customers.

 

To start the process of generating KVI files

 

Deploy menu Create KVI files... shows the Deploy KVI files wizard

 

 

 

 

Select the application you want to deploy, and then click the Detect Dependent DLLs button. Bug Validator detects the DLLs that will be used by the application, and displays the DLLs in the scrolled list. You can add DLLs to the list or remove DLLs from the list using the Add, Remove and Remove All buttons. You may want to add DLLs that are loaded via LoadLibrary(), and you may wish to remove DLLs that are 3rd party DLLs.

 

Click the Next >> button to move to the next page of the wizard.

 

 

 

The next page of the wizard displays all the PDB and MAP files that could be found for the files specified on the previous page of the wizard. Some DLLs will have both a PDB and MAP file specified. When this happens you must choose which file to use. Microsoft DLLs are always displayed with both the PDB and MAP files disabled. This is because the customer machine may have different versions of these DLLs are KVI files should not be generated when that is the case. To add or remove files from the list use the Add, Remove and Remove All Buttons. The Disable PDB button disables all PDB entries in the list. The Disable MAP button disables all MAP entries in the list.

 

Specify where the generated KVI and KVK files should be saved.

 

Click the Next >> button to move to the next page of the wizard.

 

 

 

The next page of the wizard generates the KVI and KVK files. The progress of the KVI file generation is shown on the progress bars, with the status of each individual file shown in the list. MAP files may fail because they do no contain line number information. PDB files may fail because they refer to a different version of the DLL than the DLL that is being processed.

 

Click the Next >> button to move to the next page of the wizard.

 

 

 

The final page of the wizard shows the generated files. The KVI files should be sent to the customer with instructions about downloading Bug Validator. The KVK files should not be sent to the customer. The KVK files should be kept somewhere safe so that they can be used to decode the logs sent to you by the customer.

 

Currently Bug Validator Client is out-of-date compared to Bug Validator. Until we have updated Bug Validator Client you can use Bug Validator at the client site with KVI files, although this is not ideal as it does expose the symbolic information to the customer. That risk is your decision to take - it is your responsibility to decide if this is a risk you wish to take.