Was trace, log, and message

Tracking, logging, and messages

This help file provides an overview of the tracing, logs, and messages generated from the product code. See also:

• View tracing, logs, and messages

   

• Tracking, logging, and message settings

   

• Track and debug applications

   

The application server product provides its own information at various levels, including advanced information from the console to more detailed server execution logs and comprehensive tracking.

Learning:

• Tracking, logs, and messages

   

• Messages and tracking events

   

• Console message Area

   

• Critical Event Viewer

   

• Collect tracking events

   

• Record

   

The tracing system described in this file will track the WebSphere Application Server components to assist IBM support personnel in diagnosing and troubleshooting faults. ItNoTrace application code, such as small service programs and enterprise beans installed on application servers in WebSphere.

However, OSS provides object-level tracking (OLT) and debugging tools to track and debug your applications. See tracking and debugging applications for details.

Tracking, logs, and messages

It is an important diagnostic tool for reviewing the WebSphere Application Server product code when messages, logs, and trails process your applications.

When you run code on application server,MessageProvides a high-level view of important events (such as successful completion and severe errors.

When the Management Server is initialized and running,LogsProvides information about server management. When an error or problem occurs, you can view the log to view the details of the fault.

To minimize the impact on performance, the log will collect enough information to help the service personnel determine which component has a problem. In this case, if other diagnoses are required, they can open the trail.

TrackingIs a data combination that is spread across WebSphere product code statements. When the code is executed, the trace information is sent to a file or stream you specified, so that you and IBM support staff can analyze it.

When you need more detailed information than messages and logs, tracking is very useful, but it is best not to use it frequently because it affects performance.

Tracking System Support:

 

• Tracks special events in products or components. This is a well-known event tracking, which can include method entry/exit tracking and debugging tracking between other types.

   

• Dump the status of a product or its components. This is a well-known execution status dump.

Messages and tracking events

IBM WebSphere Application Server provides message events and tracking events:

 

• Message eventIt is generated after the system or user code responds to system events that occur in the application server environment. They are always collected. You can decide whether to view them.

  Message events include:

  Audit

  Indicates an important event that must be recorded.

   

  Warning

  Indicates that a problem has occurred and must be corrected to prevent more serious problems in the future.

   

  Termination

  Indicates that the process has been terminated normally (return 0 to shell ).

   

  Fatal

  It indicates that the process has encountered a fatal error and has ended abnormally. When a process terminates in this way, the tracing service writes its internal ring buffer to a local file and returns-1 to the shell.

   

   

• Tracking eventsGenerated by the system or user code. They are collected only when you specify to collect them.

  The application server product has built-in tracking statements. In this case, your development team should include the tracing statements in the applications that you will use IBM WebSphere Application Server to manage.

  You have set to enable or disable collection of these tracking events on the console:

  Portal

  Indicates that a process has entered a method.

   

  Exit

  Indicates that a process has exited the method.

   

  Debugging

  Provides debugging information.

   

  Event

  Indicates that important events, such as status changes, have occurred.

   

   

The following sections discuss the facilities used in application server to review messages and track events.

Console message Area

The console message area is located at the bottom of the WebSphere console, which provides the highest level of tracking information. When a message event occurs, it is displayed in the message area.

When you need more information and the message area cannot meet your needs, you can review the messages recorded in the critical event viewer.

Critical Event Viewer

The critical event viewer collects recent message events. You can configure the critical event viewer to display any audit, critical error, exceptional termination, warning, and other event information.

The log restrictions feature of the critical event viewer specifies the number of critical events to be recorded. They will be stored in the management warehouse (database. If your database has become too full, set the "log limit" value to the minimum value based on your actual situation.

You can access the critical event viewer from the console menu in the management console. For more information about using it, see Tracking Task help.

When you need more detailed information than in the console message area and critical event viewer, you can perform a trail on one or more application servers.

Collect tracking events

WebSphere internal tracking will appear at two levels:

• On the Management Server (usually one node exists)
• In the Application Server

IBM WebSphere Application Server Version 3 createsTracking running environmentInstance. The tracking runtime environment collects data from the tracking events generated in the application server and the managed server code.

We recommend that you use tracking as little as possible because additional resources are required to collect tracking events. It may have a negative impact on the performance of the application server or node that executes the trail.

However, in many cases, you may find that tracing is useful and necessary. The following is an overview of the locations set for tracking in the management console:

 

• Console-> trail-> enable

  You can use this console menu bar option to track the WebSphere console class.

   

• Application Server tracking feature

  You can specify tracking settings for a single application server. For each server, you can send tracking data to a specified file or stream, such as the standard output stream of the server.

  These settings are part of the application server features. Once you start the server, the trail starts.

   

• Manage Server tracking features

  You can specify tracing settings similar to those of the application server for each management server. You can specify the file or stream for sending data.

  This setting is located in the admin under the bin directory of the Application Server Installation root directory. config File (for example, C:/WebSphere/appserver/bin/admin in Windows NT. config ). For more information, see tracking feature help.

   

• Tracking Management settings

  Each server has a circular buffer to collect tracing information for the server. You can use the tracking management dialog box to dump tracking information for the currently selected management server or application server. You can also specify the server class to be tracked.

  These settings are available only when you right-click a running node or application server on the topology tree and click track. See Tracking Task help for more information.

   

Record

Records occur at the management server level. Log files are stored in the/log directory of the WebSphere Application Server Installation root directory.