Using activity reports

Activity reports are used to determine route information about a message. For common uses see What activity reports are used for. The activity information collected using activity reports must be arranged in order before a message route can be determined. Initially determine whether there are enough activity reports on the reply-to queue to enable you to determine the required information. The order that activity reports are put on the reply-to queue does not necessarily correlate to the order in which the activities were performed.

Activity reports must be ordered manually, unless they are generated for a trace-route message, in which case the WebSphere MQ display route application can be used to order the activity reports. For more information on the WebSphere MQ display route application, see WebSphere MQ display route application.

To determine whether there are enough activity reports on the reply-to queue to enable you to determine the necessary information, do the following:

  1. Identify all related activity reports on the reply-to queue, by comparing identifiers of the activity reports and the original message. You should set the report option of the original message such that the activity reports can be correlated with the original message.

  2. Order the identified activity reports from the reply-to queue so that the route, or partial route, that the message took through the queue manager network can be determined. The following parameters from the activity report can be used when ordering them:

    OperationType

    The operations detailed in an activity report indicate the operations that were performed as part of the activity. By considering the types of operations that were performed, it can be possible to determine the activity report that was generated directly before, or after, the current activity report.

    For example, an activity report details that an MCA sent a message from a transmission queue down a channel. The last operation detailed in the activity report has an OperationType of send and details that the message was sent using the channel, CH1, to the destination queue manager, QM1. This means that the next activity performed on the message will have occurred on queue manager, QM1, and that it will have begun with a receive operation from channel, CH1. By using this information we can identify the next activity report, providing it exists and has been acquired.

    OperationDate and OperationTime

    By looking at the dates and times of the operations in each activity report, the general order of the activities can be determined.
    Warning:
    Unless every queue manager in the queue manager network has their system clocks synchronized, ordering this way does not guarantee the activity reports are ordered correctly. The order must be established manually.
    Once ordered, the route, or partial route, that the message took is represented by the order of the activity reports.

  3. Study the activity information from the ordered activity reports, and try to determine the information we need.

If the necessary information about the message has not been determined, it might be possible to acquire further activity reports.