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Developer Backdoor Stuff

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Topic

Kristen
Test

22859 Posts

Posted - 2007-08-29 : 14:58:05

We have some Developer Backdoor Stuff in our apps. Just wondered if other folk have any suggestions?

(We make a web application)

If logged on user is recognised as "Developer" then:

Toolbar added to the top of the page. Provides access to "Edit page", "Edit CSS" and so on (general page manipulation type stuff)

Bottom of the page has:

Status. Version of the software, status of the page (Dev, Ready-for-testing, Bug-found, Accepted), Name of Server/Database connected to (useful if LIVE site accidentally connected to TEST db!!)

Feedback. List of the Feedback that anyone has left on the page (this is threaded, like a forum, with the ability to REPLY to a particular issue, plus Developer can change the status from "Open" to "Test" and author from "Test" to "Closed"). Also a link to "add new feedback" (so Client testers can put a comment in and, HOPEFULLY!, other folk wanting to report the same issue will see it has already been raised!)

(Then we have a report for Open Feedback; Feedback Assigned to specific person [e.g. "Me" = current-todo-list]; a list of pages still at Test status - i.e. a list of pages yet-to-be-approved by the Client)

Actions. This provides a list of things the application has done. For us this is mostly the EXEC syntax for the SQL calls, so we can re-try then, manually, in Query Analyser etc. Repair/refactor/improve them, "unit-test", and re-run the page. Also a Log of everything [that the App has been programmed to log!] which has happened on that page

There are probably a few other odds & sods but those are the main ones that spring to mind.

Thanks,

Kristen

spirit1
Cybernetic Yak Master

11752 Posts

Posted - 2007-08-29 : 15:12:08

looks like you've got it covered pretty well...

we also have something like this plus we have timers in pages so we can measure particular page part load time.

_______________________________________________
Causing trouble since 1980
blog: http://weblogs.sqlteam.com/mladenp

Kristen
Test

22859 Posts

Posted - 2007-08-29 : 15:14:33

Thanks.

We have the elapsed timer thing - we have a dummy-image on the rendered page that "calls home" - so we get Start time (@ server), time server finished, and then "time user's browser finished rendering and called home". We can extract that from our logs - e.g. which pages never called home, average time to build and average time (thereafter) to render - by browser-type if we so wish.

Kristen

spirit1
Cybernetic Yak Master

11752 Posts

Posted - 2007-08-29 : 15:16:17

interesting.
how do you do the call home part exactly?

_______________________________________________
Causing trouble since 1980
blog: http://weblogs.sqlteam.com/mladenp

Kristen
Test

22859 Posts

Posted - 2007-08-29 : 15:32:28

<IMG SRC="ImageThingie.ASP?MagicID=1234" height=0 width=0>

ImageThingie.ASP has a response mime type of JPG or whatever, uses the Query params to do whatever is necessary (in this case record the server-time against the magicID record, representing the "time to render")

We also use this in Bulk Mail to record who read it (assuming they have an open Internet connection AND have allowed images in Outlook etc), and how often. But an IMG tag with a .ASP etc. filename (or even parameters for that matte - if you decide to "fake" an ASP file via a .JPG filename

) - indeed, even unique filename JPGs can do that - increases the Spam Counter for things like SpamAssasin.

Ditto with any "link" that they click on in the EMail - they are all routed to GO.ASP?ID=1234, and the "1234" bit tells us a_Who, b) WHICH link, and C) The real URL to redirect the user to.

Kristen

Kristen
Test

22859 Posts

Posted - 2007-08-29 : 15:33:52

(We also have a JavaScript Error catch-routine which calls home - with the details of the JavaScript error, and the ID of the Log for the page-render - so we can tie it to session and what the user was doing at the time)

spirit1
Cybernetic Yak Master

11752 Posts

Posted - 2007-08-29 : 15:35:10

very nice! i just might steal that