IBM® Transaction Analysis Workbench is a tool that provides a unified platform for z/OS® transactional problem management.
Transaction Analysis Workbench enables you to look at individual z/OS subsystems or combine them into a single unified view, including the ability to replay or track the flow of the transaction within and between various z/OS subsystems.
It does not require special agent software to collect data for analysis. Instead, Transaction Analysis Workbench uses the logs and other historical data that each subsystem generates during normal transaction processing and system operations.
Summary of features for Transaction Analysis Workbench for z/OS
Analyze records from multiple z/OS subsystems, including IBM CICS®, IBM Db2®, IBM IMS™, IBM MQ, SMF, IBM WebSphere® Application Server for z/OS and IBM z/OS Connect. Over 1,500 log record types.
Include the logs and other historical data that each subsystem already generates during normal operation. No special agent software is required.
See all of the events in a heterogeneous transaction, for example CICS-Db2, CICS-DBCTL, IMS-Db2, in a single consolidated view.
An ISPF-based log browser shows all log records in a single, consistent interface. You can browse summarized records from multiple logs merged in time sequence, then view all fields of a single record and target details of a single field. Users familiar with the ISPF editor will quickly be familiar with the ISPF-based log browser. Scroll, find text strings, bookmark records, navigate by log record timestamps, filter records based on field values and create extracts from original logs.
You can generate various batch reports that are designed to help solve common transaction analysis issues. For example, combined CICS-DBCTL transaction analysis reports can help determine whether long response time is caused by problems in IBM CICS® or IBM IMS™.
Connect and understand events of logs from transactions that span subsystems. In the ISPF log browser, enter TX next to any log record. The browser displays the records related to the same transaction and hides other records. It tracks the transaction across available logs to provide a cross-subsystem timeline of events and highlights delays often absent in subsystem-specific tools. Tracking can also help developers understand the behavior and interrelationships of systems.
IBM Transaction Analysis Workbench offers an optional framework for analyzing problems in sessions. A session encapsulates information about a problem and its analysis. It includes the time period, systems involved and corresponding log files. If you create a session, other users can share that session rather than creating their own. You can also tag log records of interest and add notes to the history of a session to help other users resume work on a session that you created.
When creating a session for a problem, you can optionally select a session template that describes a workflow. A workflow is a sequence of tasks for analyzing a problem. Each task can be a written instruction or JCL for a batch job. Experts can develop workflows to help other users, such as help desk staff, begin to analyze a problem or at least select the log files necessary for analysis rather than immediately assigning the problem to an expert.
Automated file selection eliminates the tedious process of manually locating the log data required for analysis. You specify a time period and the systems that you are interested in and IBM Transaction Analysis Workbench locate the corresponding log files and attaches them to your problem session.
You can run IBM Transaction Analysis Workbench for z/OS batch jobs that forward log data to off-host analytics platforms such as the Elastic Stack or Splunk. View your log data in Kibana or Splunk dashboards that complement on-host analysis.
A consistent user interface for all log records helps make it easy to extend analysis skills into unfamiliar log types and subsystems. Learn to use the log browser to analyze log records from subsystems that are familiar to you, then reuse those skills to analyze other record types.
The ISPF dialog user interface presents a hierarchy of options for interactively browsing logs, managing sessions, generating JCL to run batch jobs and defining various repository records related to analysis, such as system definitions and filters.
Repositories are the data sets where Transaction Analysis Workbench stores data related to transaction analysis. Users can share repositories. Some repositories can be shared with other products.
The report and extract utility is a batch program that creates reports and extracts for further processing with Transaction Analysis Workbench and JavaScript Object Notation (JSON) or comma-separated values (CSV) files for use with other applications. The ISPF dialog generates JCL to run the utility.
The automated file selection utility is a batch program that locates the log files for a session based on a time period and a system definition.
A knowledge module is an executable load module that Transaction Analysis Workbench uses to interpret and process a particular type of log record.
You can use the Transaction Analysis Workbench plug-in for IBM Explorer for z/OS to view or create sessions, submit z/OS batch jobs for session workflow tasks and view the output of those batch jobs.
Transaction Analysis Workbench operates on any hardware configuration that supports the required software.
Before installing and configuring Transaction Analysis Workbench, ensure that the following software requirements are fulfilled:
Browse the step-by-step tutorials to help you get started with Transaction Analysis Workbench.
This tutorial shows you how to create a session for a problem, manually specify a log file for the problem, and then browse the log file.
This tutorial shows you how to create a batch report for a session.
This tutorial shows you how to define an IMS system to Transaction Analysis Workbench, and then use that system definition to locate the related IMS log files (SLDS or OLDS) for a particular time interval.
This tutorial shows you how to define a DB2® system to Transaction Analysis Workbench, and then use that system definition to locate the related DB2 log files for a particular time interval.
This tutorial shows you how to use the Eclipse plug-in to create a session based on a template, and then perform the workflow tasks inherited from the template.
This video gives an overview of Transaction Analysis Workbench for z/OS and how you can use it to analyze transaction logs on-host.
This video demonstrates dashboards on two analytic platforms—Splunk and Elastic.
This video provides an overview of how to analyze transaction logs on-host using the ISPF dialog.
This video demonstrates using the ISPF dialog to analyze an IMS-Db2 transaction problem.
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