Customizing event messages

  • Article

Updated: February 1, 2010

Applies To: Unified Access Gateway

This topic describes how you can customize and filter Forefront Unified Access Gateway (UAG) event messages, as follows:

  • Configuring message filtering─Forefront UAG issues three types of event messages: information; warning; and error. You can set a message filter to specify what types of messages should be displayed.

  • Customizing event messages─Forefront UAG event messages are defined in an XML file. You can edit this file in order to customize messages.

Configuring message filtering

To configure message filtering

  1. In the Forefront UAG Management console, click Filter on the Messages menu.

  2. Specify whether messages should be displayed in the message pane of the Management console, the Windows Event Viewer, or in both locations.

Note

To clear messages displayed in the Management console, in the console, select Messages, and then click Clear Messages on the message pane of the console.

Customizing event messages

Forefront UAG event messages are defined in an XML file. A working knowledge of XML technology is required to edit it.

The following procedures describe how to customize event messages:

  • To edit the message definitions file─Use this procedure to edit the default message definitions file, and create additional custom messages, if required.

  • To configure the pages from which you want to send messages─By default, all the applicable Forefront UAG interfaces are configured to send relevant event messages, as required. If you add new messages to the file, or if you want to send messages from custom interfaces, such as a custom login script, configure the page from which you want to send the message.

To edit the message definitions file

  1. Access the CustomUpdate folder at \von\conf\CustomUpdate. If the folder does not exist, create it.

  2. Copy the file MessageDefinition.xml from the folder \von\conf, and place it in the CustomUpdate folder you accessed in step 1.

  3. In the MessageDefinition.xml file, change the existing messages or configure additional messages, as required.

    Note

    If you add new messages to the file, or if you want to send messages from custom scripts, you must also configure the functions that will send the messages, as described in

  4. When you have finished editing the file, open the Forefront UAG Management console. Click Activate to activate the configuration and then click Activate.

    After the configuration is activated, the messages you configured here are logged in the required logging format.

To configure the pages from which you want to send messages

  1. In the page from which you want to send the message, add the following function:

    SetMessage < Message_ID >,< Optional_param_list >

    where:

    • < Message_ID > is the unique message ID defined in the message definitions file, in the <Id> element.

    • < Optional_param_list > holds the definition of message parameters, as follows:

      If no parameters are defined in the message: null

      If the message contains one or more parameters:

      Array(<message_param>,<message_param>…)

      where <message_param> is the parameter you define in the message definitions file, in the <Param> element.

  2. If the message contains one or more parameters, for each parameter, create an object in the file, where the name of the parameter is identical to the name you use in the function you defined in step 1.

    Tip

    Following is a sample function:

    …\von\InternalSite\samples\set_message.asp

  3. If you are adding the function to your own page, such as your own login page, include this file in the page:

    …\von\InternalSite\inc\MonitorMgr.inc