Configuring work managers

A work manager acts as a thread pool for application components that use asynchronous beans. Use the administrative console to configure work managers.

1. Start the administrative console.
2. Select Resources > Asynchronous beans > Work managers.
3. Specify a Scope value and click New.
4. Specify the required properties for work manager settings.

   Scope

   The scope of the configured resource. This value indicates the location for the configuration file.

   Name

   The display name for the work manager.

   JNDI Name

   The Java Naming and Directory Interface (JNDI) name for the work manager. This name is used by asynchronous beans that must look up the work manager. Each work manager must have a unique JNDI name within the cell.

   Number of Alarm Threads

   The maximum number of threads to use for processing alarms. Applies to a separate thread pool that is used for running alarms. A single thread is used to monitor pending alarms and dispatch them. An additional pool of threads is used for dispatching the threads. All alarm managers on the asynchronous beans associated with this work manager share this set of threads. A single alarm thread pool exists for each work manager, and all of the asynchronous beans associated with the work manager share this pool of threads.

   Avoid trouble: The number of alarm threads that you specify for this property has no impact on the number of threads you specify for the Minimum Number Of Threads and Maximum Number Of Threads properties. The Number of Alarm Threads property only applies to the thread pool for alarm threads. The Minimum Number Of Threads and Maximum Number Of Threads properties only apply to the main thread pool that handles work requests.

   Minimum Number Of Threads

   Applies to the main thread pool for work submitted to the work manager. The number of threads to be kept in the thread pool, created as needed.

   Maximum Number Of Threads

   Applies to the main thread pool for work submitted to the work manager. The maximum number of threads to be created in the thread pool. The maximum number of threads can be exceeded temporarily when the Growable check box is selected. These additional threads are discarded when the work on the thread completes.

   Thread Priority

   The priority to assign to all threads in the thread pool.

   Every thread has a priority. Threads with higher priority are run before threads with lower priority. For more information about how thread priorities are used, see the Javadoc for the setPriority method of the java.lang.Thread class in the Java Standard Edition specification.

5. [Optional] Specify a Description and a Category for the work manager.
6. [Optional] Select the Service Names (Java EE contexts) on which you want this work manager to be made available. Any asynchronous beans that use this work manager then inherit the selected Java EE contexts from the component that creates the bean. The list of selected services also is known as the "sticky" context policy for the work manager.
   Selecting more services than are required might impede performance.

   Other optional fields include:

   Work timeout

   Specifies the number of milliseconds to wait before a scheduled work object is released. If a value is not specified, then the timeout is disabled.

   Work request queue size

   Specifies the size of the work request queue. The work request queue is a buffer that holds scheduled work objects and can be a value of 1 or greater. The thread pool pulls work from this queue. If you do not specify a value or the value is 0, the queue size is managed automatically. When the queue size is managed automatically, it is computed as the larger of (maximum_number_of_threads) or 20. If this value computes to a zero value, a queue size of 1 is used. Large values can consume significant system resources.

   Work request queue full action

   Specifies the action taken when the thread pool is exhausted, and the work request queue is full. This action starts when you submit non-daemon work to the work manager. If set to FAIL, the work manager API methods creates an exception instead of blocking.

   Default transaction class

   Specifies the transaction class name used to classify work run by this work manager instance when the z/OS® Work Load Manager Service class information is not contained in the work context information.

   Daemon transaction class

   Specifies the transaction class name used to classify "daemon" work initiated by this work manager instance.

7. [Optional] Select Custom Properties > New.
   Other optional fields include:

   Name

   lateWorkTime

   Value

   Number of seconds

   Description

   Specify a description

   Type

   Select java.lang.String

   The lateWorkTime custom property is the number of seconds beyond which late-starting work must cause an informational message to be logged. The informational message is logged once per work manager. The default value is 60 seconds and a value of 0 disables this property.

   Name

   lateAlarmTime

   Value

   Number of seconds

   Description

   Specify a description

   Type

   Select java.lang.String

   The lateAlarmTime custom property is the number of seconds beyond which a late-firing alarm must cause an informational message to be logged. The informational message is logged once per work manager. The default value is 5 seconds and a value of 0 disables this property.

8. Save your configuration.