# MinIO Server Debugging Guide [](https://slack.min.io) [](https://hub.docker.com/r/minio/minio/)
### HTTP Trace
HTTP tracing can be enabled by using [`mc admin trace`](https://github.com/minio/mc/blob/master/docs/minio-admin-complete-guide.md#command-trace---display-minio-server-http-trace) command.
Example:
```sh
minio server /data
```
Default trace is succinct only to indicate the API operations being called and the HTTP response status.
```sh
mc admin trace myminio
```
To trace entire HTTP request
```sh
mc admin trace --verbose myminio
```
To trace entire HTTP request and also internode communication
Subnet Health diagnostics help ensure that the underlying infrastructure that runs MinIO is configured correctly, and is functioning properly. This test is one-shot long running one, that is recommended to be run as soon as the cluster is first provisioned, and each time a failure scenario is encountered. Note that the test incurs majority of the available resources on the system. Care must be taken when using this to debug failure scenario, so as to prevent larger outages. Health tests can be triggered using `mc admin subnet health` command.
Metadata is stored in `xl.meta` files for erasure coded objects.
Each disk in the set containing the object has this file.
The file format is a binary format and therefore requires tools to view values.
#### Installing xl-meta
To install, [Go](https://golang.org/dl/) must be installed.
Once installed, execute this to install the binary:
```bash
go install github.com/minio/minio/docs/debugging/xl-meta@latest
```
#### Using xl-meta
Executing `xl-meta` will look for an `xl.meta` in the current folder and decode it to JSON.
It is also possible to specify multiple files or wildcards, for example `xl-meta ./**/xl.meta` will output decoded metadata recursively.
It is possible to view what inline data is stored inline in the metadata using `--data` parameter `xl-meta -data xl.json` will display an id -> data size.
To export inline data to a file use the `--export` option.
### Remotely Inspecting backend data
`mc admin inspect` allows collecting files based on *path* from all backend drives.
Matching files will be collected in a zip file with their respective host+drive+path.
A MinIO host from October 2021 or later is required for full functionality.
Syntax is `mc admin inspect ALIAS/path/to/files`. This can for example be used to collect `xl.meta` from objects that are misbehaving.
To collect `xl.meta` from a specific object, for example placed at `ALIAS/bucket/path/to/file.txt` append `/xl.meta`, for instance `mc admin inspect ALIAS/bucket/path/to/file.txt/xl.meta`.
All files can be collected, so this can also be used to retrieve `part.*` files, etc.
Wildcards can be used, for example `mc admin inspect ALIAS/bucket/path/**/xl.meta` will collect all `xl.meta` recursively.
`mc admin inspect ALIAS/bucket/path/to/file.txt/*/part.*` will collect parts for all versions for the object located at `bucket/path/to/file.txt`.
`xl-meta` accepts zip files as input and will output all `xl.meta` files found within the archive.
For example:
```
$ mc admin inspect play/test123/test*/xl.meta
mc: File data successfully downloaded as inspect.6f96b336.zip
