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Archive for November, 2011

How to fix SQL Server Profiler Error opening trace file from 2008R2 server

Posted by robkraft on November 18, 2011

I received a SQL Profiler trace file from a client in order to analyze activity on their SQL Server.  When I attempted to open the file, I received a helpful error message that began, “Unable to locate trace definition file Microsoft SQL Server TraceDefinition 10.50.0.xml…”.  This happened because my client is running SQL Server 2008 R2 but I am running SQL Server 2008.  I had the client sent the Trace Definition file mentioned to me: “D:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft SQL Server\100\Tools\Profiler\TraceDefinitions\Microsoft SQL Server TraceDefinition 10.50.0.xml” and I copied that file into my “C:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft SQL Server\100\Tools\Profiler\TraceDefinitions”.  Copying it to this folder required admin permissions.

I then went back and double-clicked on the trace file (.trc) that the client had sent to me and I received this error:

“Unrecognized command line argument.  All command line arguments will be ignored.  Please run ‘profiler.exe -?’ to see a list of valid command line arguments.” I have not resolved this error, and don’t plan to.  I was able to open the trace file by first opening SQL Server Profiler, then using File Open and selecting the .trc file.

Posted in SQL Server | 1 Comment »