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Reporting Bug or Asking for Support

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Help Yourself

First, try to troubleshoot your issue yourself.

How to Effectively Report Bug or Ask for Support

When posting your request for support or reporting a bug, please include as much of the following information as you know. If you do not know some of these information or if you suppose that some are irrelevant for the issue, please mention that as well.

  • Version of WinSCP you are using (you should be using the latest version if possible).
  • If the problem started to occur after upgrade, mention the last version of WinSCP which was working for you1.
  • Version of Microsoft Windows you are running WinSCP on.
  • Transfer protocol (SFTP, FTP, SCP or WebDAV).
  • Mention if you use GUI or scripting/automation. If you use GUI, specify interface style you are using (Commander or Explorer).
  • If you experience an error, include full error message. You may use Ctrl+C to copy the message, then paste it (Ctrl+V) to the post. Also check list of common error messages.
  • Try to describe precise steps that lead to the problem (where do you click, what keys do you press, what do you see, etc.). If you are not able to reproduce the problem with the steps, it is probably not worth to report it as I will not be able to reproduce it (and solve) too.
    Particularly, if the problem relates to user interface, consider recording your steps or even full video. E.g. using Steps Recorder in Windows 7 or newer2 or Start recording function of Game bar in Windows 103 or Recordit or similar service.
  • If your problems relates to interaction with remote server, please post a full log file showing the problem.
    To generate log file, enable session logging, log in to your server and do the operation and only the operation that causes the error.
    Always attach your log to the post as a file, never paste the log into post text. When posting extensive logs please compress them before attaching.
    Note that passwords and passphrases are not stored in the log.4 You may want to remove other data you consider sensitive though, such as host names, IP addresses, account names or file names (unless they are relevant to the problem).
    If you do not want to post the log publicly, you can mark the attachment as private.
  • For scripting/automation-related issues, include your full script, command-line you use to run WinSCP, and output you see on WinSCP console.

Register on the forum before you post. I may be able to deal with your issue only after some time, so I would appreciate if I have a contact to you.

Example of Bug Report

Subject: Open session in new window

While session is opened and the main window is shown, hold Shift and click on a saved session (in Session > Saved Sessions menu) in subfolder in order to open the session in new window. It does not work. Instead error message pops up saying: “Host does not exist”.

Using WinSCP 4.1.4 with “Commander” interface on Windows XP SP3. It happens for any stored session in subfolder, regardless of protocol or server. So I’m not posting session log file as it seems irrelevant.

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Example of Support Request for Scripting

Subject: Trouble setting server timeout via command line

I have a client with a slow FTP server, it takes 25 seconds or so to connect. Whenever I attempt to add the -timeout=xxx switch to the end of my open command, WinSCP just bails out. No session log file is even created. If I remove the -timeout switch, it connects.

Here is the command line:
winscp.exe /console /script=test.txt /log=log.txt

Here is the script:
option batch abort
option confirm off
open sftp://user:pass@site/ -timeout=60
option transfer binary
get *05152008*
close
exit

After running the script I get following in console:
batch abort
confirm off
Too many parameters for command ‘open’.

Using WinSCP 4.0.7 on Windows 2000. Session log file is attached.

  1. Even better would be if you can try to install all intermediate versions (if any) to find exact version of WinSCP that introduced the problem.Back
  2. To start Problem Steps Recorder in Windows 7, go to Start menu and type psr into a search field. To start Steps Recorder in Windows 10 and 8, type psr into Search Windows box.Back
  3. To open Game bar, press Win+G and check Yes, this is a game. To undo, click Settings in Game bar and uncheck Remember this as a game.Back
  4. In the current stable release, password specified on command-line are stored. In the current beta release, this is fixed.Back

Last modified: by martin