How to turn on Aux trace in CICS

The CICS INTERNAL trace stays on always. But it doesn't get externalized, so the trace data may not be available when you need it. When trace data is needed, you can turn on Aux Trace by changing the Auxiliary Trace Status to "Stopped" to "Started" using CETR transaction. The Aux Trace data set has initial value of A which is defined as DFHAUXT in the CICS started task. When A gets filled, it automatically switches to B which is defined as DFHBUXT in the started task. When B gets filled the status changes to STOPPED. You can do a STANDARD trace or a SPECIAL trace (with only the components that you want to trace - Standard usually captures lot more data than required). To set up values for special tracing, press PF4 and set the values under "special" as needed. The component abbreviations are defined in the help screen (press PF1). Once you make the required changes in this screen, press PF5 to define the transaction for which you want Aux trace turned on.

CETR                CICS Trace Control Facility                   
CICTTOR
Type in your choices.
Item                              Choice       Possible choices
Internal Trace Status       ===>  STARTED      STArted, STOpped
Internal Trace Table Size   ===>  400     K    16K - 1048576K
Auxiliary Trace Status      ===>  STOPPED      STArted, STOpped, Paused
Auxiliary Trace Dataset     ===>  A            A, B
Auxiliary Switch Status     ===>  NO           NO, NExt, All
GTF Trace Status            ===>  STOPPED      STArted, STOpped
Master System Trace Flag    ===>  OFF          ON, OFf
Master User Trace Flag      ===>  OFF          ON, OFf
When finished, press ENTER.
PF1=Help    3=Quit    4=Components    5=Ter/Trn    6=JVM    9=Error List

From the main CETR screen, press PF4 to get to the Component Trace Options screen where you can set the options for Standard and/or Special trace options.

CETR                    Component Trace Options                   
CICxxxx
Over-type where required and press ENTER.                         PAGE 1 OF 4
Component Standard                           Special
--------  --------------------------------------------------------------
  AP      1                                  1-2
  BA      1                                  1-2
  BM      1                                  1
  BR      1                                  1-2
  CP      1                                  1-2
  DC      1                                  1
  DD      1                                  1-2
  DH      1                                  1-2
  DM      1                                  1-2
  DP      1                                  1-2
  DS      1                                  1-2
  DU      1                                  1-2
  EI      1                                  1-2
  EJ      1                                  1-2
  EM      1                                  1-2
  FC      1                                  1-2
  GC      1                                  1-2
PF:  1=Help   3=Quit   7=Back  8=Forward  9=Messages   ENTER=Change

From the main CETR screen, press PF1 to get to this Trace Help screen where you can see the meanings of component abbreviations.

CETR             Help:  CICS Component Trace

(3) MEANINGS OF COMPONENT ABBREVIATIONS.

AP . . . Application domain            IE . . . ECI over TCP/IP domain
BA . . . Business Application Manager  II . . . IIOP domain
BM . . . Basic Mapping Support         IS . . . ISC
BR . . . Bridge                        KC . . . Task Control
CP . . . CPI-C interface               KE . . . Kernel
DC . . . Dump compatibility layer      LC . . . Local Catalog domain
DD . . . Directory manager             LD . . . Loader domain
DH . . . Document Handler domain       LG . . . Log Manager domain
DM . . . Domain Manager domain         LM . . . Lock Manager domain
DP . . . Debugging Profiles domain     ME . . . Message domain
DS . . . Dispatcher domain             MN . . . Monitoring domain
DU . . . Dump domain                   NQ . . . Enqueue Manager
EI . . . Exec interface                OT . . . Object Transaction domain
EJ . . . Enterprise Java domain        PA . . . Parameter Manager
EM . . . Event Manager domain          PC . . . Program control
FC . . . File control                  PG . . . Program Manager domain
GC . . . Global Catalog domain         PI . . . Pipeline Manager domain
IC . . . Interval control              PT . . . Partner Management

PF 3=End  7=Back  8=Next  ENTER=End

From the main CETR screen, press PF9 to get to this "Transaction and Terminal Trace" screen where you can set the transaction name and/or terminal name that needs to be traced.

CETR                    Transaction and Terminal Trace            xxx
CICxxxx
Type in your choices.
Item                              Choice       Possible choices
Transaction ID              ===>               Any valid 4 character ID
Transaction Status          ===>               STandard, SPecial, SUppressed
Terminal ID                 ===>               Any valid Terminal ID
Netname                     ===>               Any valid Netname
Terminal Status             ===>               STandard, SPecial
Terminal VTAM Exit Trace    ===>               ON, OFf
Terminal ZCP Trace          ===>               ON, OFf
VTAM Exit override          ===>  NONE         All, System, None
When finished, press ENTER.
PF1=Help      3=Quit      6=Cancel Exits      9=Error List

To print the trace data use the following job or use IPCS to analyze the trace data.

//PRINT    EXEC PGM=DFHTU640   <-- Program namechanges depending on the CICS version
//STEPLIB  DD   DSN=xxx.SDFHLOAD,DISP=SHR
//DFHAUXT  DD   DSN=xxx.DFHBUXT,DISP=SHR
//DFHAXPRT DD   SYSOUT=*
//DFHAXPRM DD   *
ABBREV
/*
//*TASKID=(74082)
//*TYPETR=(APE160,AP3180)

SYSIBM.SQT* tables and SQLCODE -526

This is going to be a small post ...

If you plan to use the IBM Data Server Driver for JDBC and SQLJ or the DB2 ODBC driver, you must create the SYSIBM.SQT* Tables & SYSIBM.SQL* Stored Procs that provide support for those drivers.

GRANT ALL access to PUBLIC to these tables. Trying to GRANT individual access like GRANT SELECT won't work (you'll get SQLCODE -526).

Trace Master - CICS abend AEYB

My colleague was trying to debug a CICS program in TraceMaster (a Macro4 Prodcut). He got this message:

DFHAC2206 15:45:50 CICTTOR Transaction xxxx failed with abend AZI6. Updates to local recoverable resources backed out. DFHAC2261 System OPR sentmessage (sese code 0824089E). 'DFHAC2206 15:45:50 CICTOPR Transaction xxxx failed with abend AEYB. Updates to local recoverable resources backedout.'

CICS manual describes the condition for code "AEYB" as "INVMPSZ". This "occurs if the specified map is too wide or too long for the terminal." So I had him change the Screen Size on Trace Master profile from "2" for 24x80 to "3"for 32x80 and SAVEd the profile (this is important, Trace Master doesn'tsave the profile automatically).

That fixed the problem.

However, he started getting a "X PROG" after starting the debug session. We looked at the program source code and found what the problem was. Apparently TraceMaster doesn't like FREEKB option. It failed while executing this statement:

EXEC CICS SEND
FREEKB
CONTROL
CURSOR (EIBCPOSN)
END-EXEC.

We don't understand why the program is doing this to free the keyboard because the SEND of the map has the FREEKB option on it. This problem got resolved when we bypassed this statement while debugging in TraceMaster. This extra 'SEND CONTROL' command seems to be confusing it. To bypass this command, we set a breakpoint at this statement and then did a GOTO (PF13) to the exit to skip the SEND to get it to work.

Mainview Tips

Here are some tips if you are an user of Mainview for z/OS

• VIEWS command gives you a list of all the VIEWs installed/available
• Use CON xyza, where xyza is the LPAR name, command to connect to the xyza LPAR
• Use MSG msgnumber command to get an explanation on the Error Messages displayed by Mainview. e.g., msg BBMXC739
• Use CUST command to customize a VIEW
• Use ASU command to update all windows automatically at a particular frequency (similar to the "&n" command in SDSF)
• SYSSUM view shows how busy the LPAR has been in the prev intervals
• To bring up multiple windows, use HS (Horizontal Split) or VS (VerticalSplit) to split the screen as required
• Use CLO n, where n is the window number, to close a window
• Use Wn;MAX to maximize window number 'n'
• Use Wn;REST to restore the window to it's original size
• Type SCREENS to see all the user defined screens
• Use SCR screenname to jump to a user defined screen
• To create your own screen, format the window as desired (multiple windows connecting to different systems etc.) and then type SAVESCR screenname
• Summary VIEWs end with letter Z. e.g., JCPUZ
• Long Term History data VIEWs end with letter L. e.g., JCPUL
• If you are in a view like JCPUZ, you can scroll back and forth in time using the command TIME. Type TIME after getting into JCPUZ. Type 'TIME = = NEXT' to go to the NEXT interval and type 'TIME = = PREV' to go to the PREVious interval without changing the interval data and time. Also, you can assign them to PF keys.

SQLCODE -904 with Reason Code "00D70024"

When you try to access or drop a table, you may get this error if the underlying VSAM data set for the table does not exist. If you are dropping the table, try dropping the tablespace instead (if there is just one table in the tablespace). If you are trying to browse the data, you are out of luck. Try recreating the table from another subsystem and load the data from there. Or, do a LOAD REPLACE with DUMMY SYSREC (it will create the underlying datasets). This will allow you access the table, but the table will be empty.

CA Fast Load Vs BMC Load Plus

Well, I've been compiling this for a while now. Here is a list of CA/Platinum's Fast Load utility keywords and the equivalent BMC's Load Plus keywords.


If you have any questions, or something doesn't make sense, or if you are looking for something else, please let me know (comments/email/chat).


I'm sorry, I couldn't find a way to insert a Word Document (with a table) into this blog, so I pasted the table here as an image.


Thanks !!

NULL VALUES and NULL INDICATORS in DB2

I was looking for storage space required for a column defined as WITH NULL. Got the answer here:

http://mainframe-faqs.blogspot.com/2008/02/null-values-and-null-indicators-in-db2.html

Excellent information here. Just wanted to share it with my readers here.

Thanks Arunam !!

Disclaimer:
THIS IS NOT MY OWN BLOG ENTRY. I'm just linking it to Arunam's blog entry.

DB2 crash with S04F (DSNJ113E)

This happened a couple of days ago. One of our CICS transactions inserted more than 18 million rows (probably loop) in a DB2 table before someone noticed and cancelled it. DB2 started rolling back the data but was slow, so the DBAs tried to issue the CANCEL THREAD command with NOBACKOUT option (this was in a TEST region) but that didn't work. So they just let it roll back. When there was less than 2 million rows to be rolled back DB2 crashed with the following message (S04F):

DSNJ113E +DB2T DSNJR003 RBA 'C35EF8BC2000' NOT IN
ANY ACTIVE OR ARCHIVE LOG DATA SET. CONNECTION-ID=DB2T,
CORRELATION-ID=003.RCRSC 02, MEMBER-ID=0

The operators restarted DB2, but it went down again after some time. DB2 manual suggested that the log record might be missing from the active/archive log. DBAs ran DSNJU004 utility and found that this RBA was available in a archive log data set which was not in the BSDS. DB2 manual suggested to add the dataset to the BSDS using DSNJU003 utility. But before doing that, the DBAs stopped DB2 and ran DSNJU003 using the parameters

CRESTART CREATE,FORWARD=YES,BACKOUT=NO

to reset checkpoint. Then they stopped DB2 with MODE(FORCE) since it didn't stop after issuing a regular stop DB2 command. But that failed. So they issued the following command to stop IRLM:

F DB2TIRLM,ABEND,NODUMP

After stopping DB2, they ran the DSNJU003 utility again and then started DB2.

Most of these are possible because it was a TEST system. Not sure what would we have done if this had happened in a PROD system.

JCL - REGION Parameter

Coding REGION parameter on a JOB step is different from coding it on a EXEC step.

A JOB statement REGION parameter applies to all steps of the job and overrides any EXEC statement REGION parameters.

When no REGION parameter is on the JOB statement, the system uses an EXEC statement REGION parameter, but only during the job step. Code EXEC statement REGION parameters when you want to specify a different region size for each job step.

DB2 "FIRST_DAY" function

DB2 comes with a lot of in-built functions. One of them is called LAST_DAY which returns the Last Day of a month, but there is no FIRST_DAY of the month function. Some of my colleagues asked about it. Here is an UDF (User Defined Function) that'll return FIRST DAY of the month:

CREATE FUNCTION schema.FIRST_DAY (IN_DATE DATE)
RETURNS DATE
LANGUAGE SQL
CONTAINS SQL
NO EXTERNAL ACTION
DETERMINISTIC
RETURN DATE(LAST_DAY(IN_DATE - 1 MONTH) + 1 DAY);