>The WriteTrace method does create an XML file called Application (without a .xml extension) in "C:\Program Files\Microsoft Visual Studio 9.0\Common7\IDE".

This is interesting. I have not used it as I have my own logging class although I have looked through the logging code in order to try to understand what is there. I saw the three types and did trace through them. Did you try to set the Name including a path to see if you could write this xml file somewhere else with a name you choose?
Tim