Adventures in TDW land

Tivoli Data Warehouse (TDW) is a very useful and powerful feature of the OMEGAMON suite and of Tivoli monitoring in general.  Each Tivoli monitoring solution from Linux, UNIX, Windows to z/OS connects to the Tivoli infrastructure and may optionally send information to the Tivoli Data Warehouse.

When you enable TDW history collection you specify many options, including what tables of information to collect, how often to collect, what agent types and managed systems to collect from, and if summarization/pruning is required.  While seemingly straightforward, each of these options has important considerations that may impact the usefulness of the resultant data being collected.

With many users there can be quite a few questions.  Where to begin?  What data should be collected?  How should the data be retained and for how long?  Where should the data be stored?  How is the data to be used and by what audiences?

Planning and analysis is important to a successful implementation of the TDW.  One approach that should be avoided is the 'turn it all on' strategy.  The turn it all on approach will inevitably result in the user collecting more data than is needed and this has multiple shortcomings.  First, unnecessary data collection wastes space and resources.  Second, unnecessary data collection makes it slower and more time consuming to retrieve information that is useful. 

As a general methodology, it is usually better to employ a start small, then work your way up approach to enabling TDW history collection.  You can always dynamically enable more collection options, but weeding out large quantities of useless data may be a time consuming exercise.

I will be doing a series of posts on TDW with the goal of documenting a best practices approach to enabling this portion of the tool. 

Interested in IMS 12?

In June IBM will be performing a series of detailed technical webcasts with IMS 12 as the theme. The line-up is as follows:

June 26 - IMS 12
It still offers the lowest-cost-per-transaction and fastest DBMS, with significant enhancements to help modernize applications, enable interoperation and integration, streamline installation and management, and enable growth. These enhancements to IMS 12 can also positively impact your bottom line.

June 27 - IMS Enterprise Suite (including IMS Explorer)
These integration solutions and tooling, part of the IMS SOA Integration Suite, support open integration technologies that enable new application development and extend access to IMS transactions and data. New features further simplify IMS application development tasks, and enable them to interoperate outside the IMS environment.

June 28 - IMS Tools Solutions Packs
With all the tools needed to support IMS databases now together in one package, many new features are available. You can reorganize IMS databases only when needed, improve IMS application performance and resource utilization — with faster end-to-end analysis of IMS transactions.
There will be a question-and-answer session at the end of each days program. The teleconference series

There will be a question-and-answer session at the end of each days program.

These will will be detailed all day technical sessions.  If you are interested in attending, here's a link:
http://ibm.co/KsGilO

An interesting DB2 z/OS webcast

On June 12th there is an interesting webcast on what's new in DB2 z/OS and how it relates to using DB2 for operational analytics.  "New DB2 for z/OS capabilities elevate operational analytics on IBM System z" covers the latest innovations with DB2 for z/OS that will help deliver on the operational analytic requirements of  business. IBM experts will discuss new DB2 for z/OS capabilities that will help elevate analytic strategy on System z while reducing overhead.

It's a free webcast.  The event is June 12, 2012 at 11:00 a.m. Eastern Daylight Time.  If you are interested,  here is a link:
http://ibm.co/JbKKWK

Enabling the IMS Health Workspace in OMEGAMON IMS

OMEGAMON IMS V4.20 added quite a few new workspaces.  You may have noticed a new one called the IMS Health workspace.  This workspace tracks a lot of useful rate/workload counters on a single display, such as enqueue/dequeue rates, CPU rates,  I/O rates, and transaction queue depth.  It's a handy screen to track several useful counters from a single display. 

But what if when you go to the workspace you don't get any information?  There is probably a step you need to take to enable the workspace.  Ironically, in the RKLVLOG for the OMEGAMON IMS TEMA task you may see the following eyecatcher:

KIPDCI35W RKANPAR(KIPIFPRM) MEMBER NOT FOUND                          
KIPDCI38W IMS HEALTH COLLECTOR IS DISABLED; ADD IF1_HEALTH_COLLECTOR=ON IN RKANPAR(KIPIFPRM) TO ENABLE

If you see this eyecatcher, just follow the instructions.  Add the member with the parm as shown in the eyecatcher, recycle the TEMA and you are in business.  Here's an example:

Using SOAP to retrieve history

I've done some prior posts on using the SOAP interface.  SOAP requests are usually used to retrieve real time data from the monitoring infrastructure.   SOAP can be used by a variety of Tivoli tools, and even technologies like System Automation may interface to Tivoli monitoring using SOAP.  What you may not know is that SOAP can also be used to retrieve historical data.

To retrieve history data via SOAP you would use the SOAP CT_GET request, and you need to use the tag (it must be set to “Y”).  There are some subtleties to this process, but it is interesting to be aware that you have the capability.

For an example and more detail here is a link:
http://www-01.ibm.com/support/docview.wss?uid=swg21591533&myns=swgtiv&mynp=OCSSZ8F3&mync=R

A couple recent questions

I've had a couple questions come up recently on the blog recently. 

One question was about TACMD.    For those of you who are not familiar with TACMD,  it is a very powerful utility that you use to manage and configure your ITM monitoring infrastructure.  You have commands that allow you to change settings, import or export information (like workspace panels), customize situations and much more.  You can use TACMD to do things like create situations that you cannot create using the Tivoli Portal GUI interface alone.  So TACMD is very powerful, but you need to know what you are doing when you use it.

The questions was if there are any issues I'm aware of with TACMD on Windows Server 2008?  All I can say is I have not run into any issues with TACMD on Win 2008, but I'm just speaking from my own experience on that.

Another question was related to NetView support in the Tivoli Portal.  For those of you who do not know, NetView can connect to the Tivoli Portal and provides you with quite a bit of network information in the Portal. 

The question was is there a charge for the NetView interface?  The answer is no.  It is provided as part of the tool.   You just need to configure it.

Take the new OMEGAMON for a test drive!

If you haven't had a chance to get your hands on the new OMEGAMON enhanced 3270 user interface, now may be your chance.  We will be doing a series of OMEGAMON V5.1 test drive events in the midwest this month.  It will be a chance for you to get hands on usage of the tool in a live z/OS environment.

 Here's the agenda for the events:

09:00 Registration & Breakfast
09:15 What’s New in OMEGAMON with Enhanced 3270 User Interface
10:00 Exploring OMEGAMON with hands-on Exercises on Live System z
Five Lab Test Drives at your choice:
e-3270 Intro, OM zOS v510, OM CICS v510, TEP, TEP-Advanced
11:45 Q&A, Feedback Summary
12:00 Lunch & Learn – Next Generation Performance Automation
13:00 Closing

The OMEGAMON test drives will happen in the following cities (with more likely to follow):

Chicago (at the IBM TEC center downtown)  -  May 8th
St Louis (at the IBM TEC center Hazelwood) - May 15th
Minneapolis (at the IBM office downtown)    -   May 23rd

Whether you are a current OMEGAMON customer or just want to learn more about OMEGAMON, feel free to attend.  The event is free and we will be providing lunch.  To attend, email my colleague Clifford Koch,
cjkoch@us.ibm.com or call (314)-409-2859.

Missing data from the WAREHOUSELOG table

The WAREHOUSELOG table is part of the Tivoli Data Warehouse (TDW) infrastructure.  It's function is to provide an ongoing log of activity into the TDW.  If data is being sent into the TDW, this log is supposed to maintain a history of what data, how much, and if there were any errors as part of the process.  It can be a useful source of information when trying to debug issues with data not making it into the TDW.

Well, with ITM 6.23 there is apparently a change in how this table may be created or used. As of ITM 6.23, there is a new variable KHD_WHLOG_ENABLE which enables/disables the creation of the warehouse log tables to save resources.  The variable default is set to No  (KHD_WHLOG_ENABLE = N ). 

So now the default as of ITM 6.23 is to not log warehouse activity.  This is a change from how the tool used to work (by the way, I'm not a big fan of changes to defaults that alter how a tool has worked for years).  So if you use TDW, and may on occasion need to look at the WAREHOUSELOG, you may want to double check this setting.

Here's a link to a technote on how this is set:
http://www-01.ibm.com/support/docview.wss?uid=swg21592074&myns=swgtiv&mynp=OCSSZ8F3&mync=R

Plot chart options in the Tivoli Portal

One of the nice features of the Tivoli Enterprise Portal is the ability to select specific monitoring data and plot that data over time.  Some things are easy to plot in that they are single metric numbers (like LPAR CPU percent, for example).  Other things may be a little trickier.  For example what if you want to plot the CPU usage of multiple address spaces and do it within a single plot chart?

Here's an example of how you can do it.  First, set up your plot chart like you usually would (click and drag the plot chart icon from the tool bar to the desired spot on the workspace).  Next, use the filter options in properties to specify what you want to plot.  In this example we are plotting all the tasks that start with DEMO in the name.  Then click on the Style tab and click on the chart icon.

Now here's the magic.  Notice to the right there is a button that says "Attributes across all rows".  Click this button.  This will enable the plot for each task named DEMO*  in a single plot chart.

Here's an example of the options, and the finished plot chart on the lower left.

Independent blog analysis of OMEGAMON V5.1

I' ve posted quite a bit over the past two months about OMEGAMON z/OS and CICS V5.1.  If you're interested in an analysis from an independent (meaning not IBM) source, check out the Ptak/Noel blog.  Their blog post, "IBM OMEGAMON V5.1 = Good reasons for Customer Interest and Excitement" goes into a good overview of the key features offered in V5.1.

If you want to check out their analysis, here's a link:
http://ptaknoel.com/ibm-omegamon-v5-1-good-reasons-for-customer-interest-and-excitement/

Upcoming webcast on z/OS storage management

There will be a webcast next week entitled  "Improve the management of your growing mainframe storage environments". 

Topics covered will include using a common set of tools across many storage systems, tailoring alerts, automating tasks,  preplanning corrective actions, and supporting resource management  through an enterprise-wide view of storage infrastructure. 

The event is April 26th at 11 AM ET.  If you are interested in attending, here's a link:
http://ibm.co/xYrbIn

A couple informational events worth checking out

There are a couple informational events coming up that you may find interesting.

The first is a webcast, "What’s new with IBM workload automation?"  is being presented by Flora Tramantano, Tivoli Workload Automation Product Manager.  The presentation will discuss Tivoli Workload Scheduler for z/OS, and how it uses business policies to aggregate and centrally manage cross-enterprise,  and how heterogeneous workloads may be managed to support business goals and service levels.

The event is May 17, 2012, 11 a.m., Eastern Daylight Time.  To attend you can register at:
http://ibm.co/Hd7XaV

The second event is a a DB2 Technical Update Briefing.  In this event there will be discussions on

• Lessons learned in planning your migration to DB2 10 for immediate CPU savings
• Using DB2 10 to scale-up or scale-out simply, and with less system management
• New capabilities in protecting your data with encryption, obfuscation, audit, security, compliance and vulnerability assessment of data
• Major, new enhancements in DB2 Utilities, for DB2 10 and improvements to performance and availability

There will be discussion on OMEGAMON DB2 capabilities and support for DB2 10.

The event is April 18th in Nashville, TN.  So if you are in the Nashville area, it's worth checking out.  Here's a link to attend.

http://ibm.co/IfvxEs

Added links for all the videos

For convenience I added links for all the videos on the right side of the blog.

More Youtube videos on the new enhanced 3270 user interface

Here are some more Youtube videos to check out that show OMEGAMON V5.1 enhanced 3270 user interface in action.  These videos go through several common usage scenarios.  They're worth taking a look at.  Here's the links:

Navigate between CICS regions within the same CICSplex
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WUlL0ZU4ZYE&feature=related

Locate and purge a task that is causing a CICS SOS condition
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5fKxtVdoayg&feature=relmfu

Detect and diagnose problems with CICS Web Services.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a-KxKwVgLMg&feature=relmfu

Using the Filter and Find in CICS
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lib57ZfVupw&feature=relmfu


Edit Resource Limiting Rules for a CICS region.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KM4eeOHhEcw&feature=relmfu

More on OMEGAMON CICS CICSplex support

I had a comment a couple days ago.  "If you use CICSPlex SM then OMEGAMON for CICS on z/OS v5.1 can consume and use those definitions so that you do not have to maintain two sets of rules."

That's correct, and it's a very important point I obviously did not make very clear in my original post.  If you use CICSplex SM, then those definitions can be used in terms of how the regions will be grouped and appear in the enhanced 3270 ui.  But, I often get asked if you have to use CICSplex SM, and the answer is no.  With the grouping mechanism I mentioned in the prior post, you can use whatever method works for your requirements.

Thanks for the comment and the clarification.

Configuration considerations for OMEGAMON CICS V5.1

When you use the new enhanced 3270 interface with OMEGAMON CICS V5.1, one thing that becomes clear quickly is it's orientation towards a CICSplex environment.  Does that mean you have to be running what would technically be considered a CICSplex to use the tool?  Well, not really.  In many shops CICSplex is a very fluid term. 

From the perspective of OMEGAMON CICS V5.1 a CICSplex can really just mean a grouping of CICS regions.  The nice thing is it's easy to set up the groupings based upon whatever criteria you need.  Here's an example of what I'm referring to.  You can use the setup panels in the enhanced 3270 ui to specify your CICS region groupings.  Notice you can use criteria like Jobname, SMFID, and more to define your groupings.

New OMEGAMON CICS V5.1 FIND command is a handy feature

One of the new commands added in OMEGAMON CICS V5.1 is the FIND command.  With the FIND command you can have OMEGAMON CICS search across the CICSplex and locate CICS related resources defined across various CICS regions.  The resources could include such things as transactions, programs, databases or other components.

Here is an example of how the FIND command may be used.  If you look at the top screen shot,  we are issuing a command, FIND TRAN ABRW.  This command will find all the CICS regions where the ABRW transaction is defined.  The middle screen shot shows the result of the FIND command.  Here we see each region with the ABRW transaction, and you have the ability to drill down on each of these regions for more detail on the transaction,  and its related resources.  The bottom screen shot shows commands you can enter, such as enable or disable the transaction, display the transaction details, or display the program details.

The FIND command is a useful new tool that makes it much easier to understand the relationships of resources across CICS regions.

How good are your passwords?

Like most users of high tech gadgetry and online computer systems, we all have passwords.  In some cases lots of them.  According to one article, "the number one way hackers get into protected systems isn't through a fancy technical exploit. It's by guessing the password."


So what is the most common password out there?  How about Password1?  It actually fulfills a lot of what many security algorithms look for:  an upper case letter, a number, and nine characters.  The problem is something like 5% of all passwords in use contain the word  "password".

So if you are using Password1, you may want to change it.  Here's a link to the article:
http://finance.yahoo.com/news/if-you-re-using--password1---change-it--now-.html

Take advantage of large screen support in your terminal emulator

If you are taking a look at OMEGAMON XE For z/OS V5.1 or OMEGAMON XE For CICS V5.1, one of the nice features of the new enhanced 3270 is the ability to support various screen sizes and formats. 

When you use a commonly available emulator, such as PCOMM, you have a choice of various screen sizes (such as 24x80, 32x80, 43x80, etc).  What size you may use is a matter of preference.  For example, a good size to use in terms of ease of use combined with ease of readability for many users is 43x80.  Or you may prefer a different size.  You have the flexibility to specify it.

Here's a neat tip from my colleague Ernie Gilman.  You can set the screen size up to as high as 62x160.  Why would you do that?  Well one reason is you can get more data on the screen at once without having to scroll the displays.  Here's an example of what I'm talking about:

To get this screen size you need to do two things.  First you need to configure your emulator to support a 62x160 session.  You then need to logon to OMEGAMON using a different logmode (the required logomode is d4a32xx3).  When logging on you can often pass the logmode option as part of the logon string (for example - logon applid(omappl) logmode(d4a32xx3). 

You get more data on the screen.  Try it out, you might like it.

Upcoming webcast on OMEGAMON DB2 and DB2 10

If you are looking at going to DB2 10, you may want to take the time to attend this webcast on "What's monitoring DB2 10? Only OMEGAMON XE for DB2 Performance Expert on z/OS".  The presentation will cover such topics as how to fully monitor the day-to-day functions of DB2 10, how a new feature called Extended Insight improves application response time, and how to combine batch-reporting capabilities with real-time monitoring and historical tracking. 

The presenters will be Steve Fafard and Norbert Jenninger from OMEGAMON DB2 development.  The webcast will take place on April 3rd at 11 AM Eastern time.  Here's a link to attend the event:
http://ibm.co/wg7WlY