Helping us help you - Logging a TCR issue with IBM Support

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Hello all,

When you log a PMR for a TCR issue with IBM support, whether it be for problems running a report, problems launching the reporting portlet or any other related questions, there's a number of questions that we'll ask you to help us troubleshoot the issue.  If you can provide that information to us right from the start, it'll save everyone a lot of time.

This blog will list some of the most common questions IBM Support will ask, and will provide you with links so that you have the documentation/instructions you need to collect it for us.

The Questions and why we ask them.

1.  Is this a brand new install of TCR or an upgrade?
Why - Because this will help us narrow down the logs to check, initially.  It will also help guide the investigation as there are issues that might occur during an upgrade that we would not need to look for during a fresh installation.  

2.  What version of TCR are you running?  You can get this information for us by running the "listiu" command.  See below for the formats.
    Unix - /usr/ibm/common/acsi/bin/listIU.sh -v
    Windows - %ProgramFiles%\IBM\Common\acsi\bin\listIU.cmd -v
Why - There are multiple versions of TCR in circulation, with different versions of TIP and Cognos bundled with them so knowing exactly which version you're running will help guide our investigation.
    
3. What database are you using for your content store?  If you're using Derby please be aware that this is only meant to be used for testing purposes and is not supported in a production environment.  Please see the following technote from IBM - /support/pages/node/726221
Why - Again, there are multiple options for the database here, and knowing which version it is will help us eliminate obvious issues like using a non-supported database, and will enable us to provide you with quick checks you can carry out to make sure everything is working okay.

4.  Has this been working before and now stopped, or did it never work at all?
Why - An important one here.  It will help us narrow down the times we need to be checking in the logs.  If it's recently stopped working, for instance, we know we need to look at the most recent logs to try and find out what might have changed.

5.  Are you getting an error?  Please supply a screenshot or a complete error message.
Why - Without an accurate error message, even the messages in the logs may not be of any use as the error logged in the background is often different from the one that the end user has displayed.

6.  What web browser are you using to access TCR?  If possible, can you test with another browser before you contact support?
Why - Only certain browsers are officially supported with TCR, and some versions can cause issues so knowing exactly which one you're using will again help speed the investigation.

7.  If this is a report issue, which reports are giving you problems?  Is it only the reports for one specific product or all reports in general? Please be specific as this will impact how the PMR is handled.
Why - If it is a problem with one specific set of reports, then your PMR will be passed to the team that created the report bundle for initial investigation.  The more information you can give us and the more specific you can be, the quicker the team will be able to focus their investigation efforts.

8.  Where did your reports come from?  Were they supplied by IBM with the product, or were they created/modified by yourself?  
Why - At this point any customised report, be it user created or user modified, is not officially supported by IBM.  We'll take a look at it for you and do our best to offer assistance but it's on a best effort basis only and we can't promise a resolution.

9.  Regarding logs, the best way to get us all the logs and config files we might need is to use the "tcrpdcollect" script.  You can find it here -

http://www-01.ibm.com/support/docview.wss?uid=swg21589755

When the script completes, it'll give you a file called tcr-collect-%COMPUTERNAME%.jar.  Please take a moment to doublecheck the contents of this file to make sure that the Cognos and TCR log directories have been properly collected.  If this fails, then please collect the contents of the following directories and send them to us instead -

TCR 1.2/1.3:
- <TIP_HOME>/profiles/TIPProfile/logs
- <TIP_HOME>/products/tcr/Cognos/c8/logs/

TCR 2.1/2.1.1:
- <TIP_HOME>/tipv2/profiles/TIPProfile/logs
- <TIP_HOME>/tipv2Components/TCRComponent/cognos/logs

TCR 3.1
- <REPORTING_HOME>/logs
- <TIP_HOME>/products/tcr/Cognos/c8/logs/

If you log a PMR with IBM support without supplying this information, then the chances are that the first email you receive in reply will ask for most if not all of this so that the engineer can begin their investigation.  The more of this you can provide right at the start, the quicker we can begin working the issue and getting your installation working properly.

Thanks for reading.

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