Getting Access to APPC/MVS Resources for Tracing Activity

What you need to do to access APPC/MVS resources depends on a number of factors:
  • If your installation uses RACF or an equivalent security product to protect APPC/MVS resources, you might need access to one or more of the following:
    • The API trace facility resource
    • The API trace data sets
    • The APPC/MVS LUs and TPs to be traced.
    z/OS MVS Planning: APPC/MVS Management contains more details about these security requirements.
  • If your installation has many application programmers, it might choose to have a system programmer set up the all data sets for API tracing activity. If so, you need to have UPDATE access to the data sets before you can start tracing. Otherwise, you may create your own trace data sets; in this case, no special authority is required.
  • Again, for a large population of application programmers, your installation might have to require you to share the same trace data set with other programmers. If you and others share the same data set, and want to trace TPs concurrently, be aware of the following:
    • Although APPC/MVS allows multiple ATBTRACE START requests while the data set is open and traces are active, all requests have to be issued from the same user ID from which the first request was issued. Otherwise, the data set is considered in use, and the START request fails.
    • Depending on your installation's security policies, more than one user may issue a STOP request for the data set. Although this flexibility can prove useful in critical situations, it might pose problems if more than one programmer has requested concurrent tracing activity for the data set. A STOP request stops all active traces for the data set, so issuing a STOP request might adversely affect someone else's work.