User access problems

The task of determining and responding to user access problems can be done by the IMS MTO, the network support group, or a user liaison group.

If your installation has a user liaison group that helps end users with problem determination, you need to explain what information that group should obtain from the end user before they contact the IMS MTO. This information includes a description of the problem's symptoms (such as poor response time or no response at all), details of any system or application program error messages received, terminal status lights, and so forth. Be sure to give the user liaison group guidelines on whether to call the network support group, application support group, or IMS MTO.

After they have gathered all information from the end user, they should develop a plan for determining the cause of the problem and, if possible, correcting it. Typically, user problems can be classified as:

If the general system response is poor, the MTO should follow the procedures described in Monitoring the system.

If the end user is getting no response at all or has a locked keyboard, the problem might be in the network or in the status of the application program resources required by the transaction. For example, an OLDS might need to be archived to free additional logging resources. Use one of the following commands to determine if any of the required resources are unavailable:

If the end user is receiving application program error messages or invalid output, the MTO should follow your procedures for contacting the appropriate application support group. You should define the documentation that MTO need to provide to the support groups, including a dump of the message region (if one was produced), or exact details of the original transaction the user entered. For IMS or VTAM® system messages, the MTO should follow the appropriate error recovery procedures.