Clearing Event Logs

[Guest]

I am getting: Unable to clear the 'Application' event log on '\\computername'. The system can not find the path specified.

I get this message whenever I try to clear the logs on any machine on the network. The machines are XP SP2 on an NT Domain(I know we need to move off NT, but right now we can't) There is a PDC, 2000 File server and 2003 File Server. We don't have any active directory running at this time. Running Hyena v6.3 on the 2003 server. All machines have the Remote Registry service enabled. We can see all of the logs but can not clear them. We also ran dir \\computername\admin$ from a command prompt and get the directory listing. Any help would be appreciated.

Thanks

[cmccullough]

Re: Clearing Event Logs

Right-click on one of these computers and choose Events->Event Viewer. Does that come up? If so, try the Clear Events option there.

[Guest]

Re: Clearing Event Logs

I was able to open Event Viewer. When I tried to clear the events I got a message that said you can only save the events in a .txt or.csv file. Any idea why I can't clear and save them in the normal format ?

[kstanush]

Re: Clearing Event Logs

We need to back up a step and see what really is causing this. Running the native event viewer is going to confuse the issue because not only is it another piece of software, but one written for computers after NT 4.0 was released over a decade ago. Hyena clears the event log by using a published API which works on any Windows computer that has event logs.

I tested this same version, running on Windows 2003 and cleared an NT 4.0 event log. But in my case, the NT 4.0 was a separate domain so I had to Logon As to the controller for it to allow me to see the logs.

To try to duplicate this problem, we need a clear step-by-step list of everything you do once you run hyena.exe

[Guest]

Re: Clearing Event Logs

Here are the steps that I take:

After opening Hyena, I see the domain expanded with areas below it to expand

1. I expand Computers
2. Expand the computer I want to look at logs on
3. Expand the events
4. Double click on Application, Security, or System(in the right hand pane of the window I can see all of the events)
5. Right click on the log I want to clear and select either clear or backup events
6. Select the folder I want to place the file in and when I do that I get the error message in my first post of: Unable to clear the 'Application' event log on '\\computername'. The system can not find the path specified.

Let me know if you need any more specific info.

Thanks

[kstanush]

Re: Clearing Event Logs

I suspect that the path you are entering for the backup of the log is not understood. The event log clearing is done locally by the service running on the remote machine, so the path that you enter has to be understood from a local context.

Hyena will give an error if you enter a UNC path, but you might be trying to save the file either to a local drive on your computer or a network drive, and that won't work. Try entering a path that is local to the remote computer and see if that works. Then, you can try using a mapped drive that is already mapped on the remote computer, and see if that works.