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Background

In the MET/CAL version 10.2 (and MET/TEAM version 3.0.0) release, a change was implemented to ensure that the MET/CAL procedure being run was fully recorded in the MET/TEAM database. In some cases, this leads to existing procedures producing errors when run on updated systems. This is due to invalid characters in some of the PXE Properties fields.

Purpose

The tool attached to this article allows users to analyze large numbers of PXEs to identify any that need to be updated to remove invalid characters.

Currently checked invalid characters:

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How to Use the Tool

  1. Download the tool from this article and unzip all the files into a folder
  2. Run AnalyzePxeProperties.exe
  3. Click the Select Folder... button
    mceclip2.png
  4. Navigate to the folder containing the PXEs to be analyzed. The tool searches through all subfolders within the selected directory
    mceclip1.png
  5. Wait for the tool to load the list of procedures in the selected directory
  6. Click the Process PXEs... button
  7. Wait for the tool to review all the procedures found
  8. The Show only items with issues checkbox can be used to filter the list view
    mceclip3.png
  9. Each identified procedure should be reviewed, updated to resolve the identified error, and re-built within MET/CAL Editor
  10. The detailed results of the analysis are also saved to a log file inside the folder containing the executable. Each issue is logged beginning with **** for ease of searching the file. For example:
2020-12-18 11:27:58 463 Processing: C:\metdev_warranted\Fluke 715 Adjustment Firmware LT 2.0 5500A\Fluke 715 Adjustment Firmware LT 2.0 5500A.pxe
2020-12-18 11:27:58 467 Loading PXE file...
2020-12-18 11:27:58 468 Opening project file...
2020-12-18 11:27:58 481 Loading project file...
2020-12-18 11:27:58 481 Getting project properties...
2020-12-18 11:27:58 481 Analyzing project Version property: '20180323'
2020-12-18 11:27:58 481 Loading Main Procedure: 'Fluke 715 Adjustment Firmware LT 2.0 5500A.mc'
2020-12-18 11:27:58 494 Finding INSTRUMENT lines...
2020-12-18 11:27:58 494 Analyzing INSTRUMENT line: 'Fluke 715: ADJ (FW < 2.0) /5500A'
2020-12-18 11:27:58 494 **** Procedure INSTRUMENT line contains invalid characters: 'Fluke 715: ADJ (FW < 2.0) /5500A'
2020-12-18 11:27:58 495 Finding REVISION line...
2020-12-18 11:27:58 495 Analyzing REVISION: '$Revision: 22623 $'
2020-12-18 11:27:58 495 Cleaning up...

Alternative Solution

There is an additional fix for this problem, however, the solution may leave MET/TEAM more vulnerable to XSS (Cross-Site Scripting) attacks. The immediate fix is to add the following attribute to the MET/TEAM web.config file:

<httpRuntime requestValidationMode="2.0" />

This setting is explained more in this MS KB article: https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/aspnet/whitepapers/aspnet4/breaking-changes#0.1__Toc256770147

Due to the added security concerns, we do not recommend this is a long term solution, but as a short-term stopgap until PXEs can be analyzed and resolved.

Keywords: MetCal, PXE, MET/CAL, MET/CAL_errors, met/cal errors, Cal_dump_10.2, caldump

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