Configuring and Using the WebLogic Diagnostics Framework

      

Configuring and Capturing Diagnostic Images

You use the Diagnostic Image Capture component of the WebLogic Diagnostic Framework (WLDF) to create a diagnostic snapshot, or dump, of a server's internal runtime state at the time of the capture. This information helps support personnel analyze the cause of a server failure.

The following topics describe the Diagnostic Image Capture component:

 

How to Initiate Image Captures

A diagnostic image capture can be initiated by:

 

Configuring Diagnostic Image Captures

Because the diagnostic image capture is meant primarily as a post-failure analysis tool, there is little control over what information is captured. Available configuration options are:

As with other WLDF components, you can configure Diagnostic Image Capture using the Administration Console (see “Configure and capture diagnostic images” in the Administration Console Online Help), the WebLogic Scripting Tool (WLST), or programmatically.

Listing 4-1 shows an example of WLST commands for generating an image capture. Listing 4-1 Sample WLST Commands for Generating a Diagnostic Image 

url='t3://localhost:7001'

username='system'

password='gumby1234'

server='myserver'

timeout=120

connect(username, password, url)

serverRuntime()

cd('WLDFRuntime/WLDFRuntime/WLDFImageRuntime/Image')

argTypes = jarray.array(['java.lang.Integer'],java.lang.String)

argValues = jarray.array([timeout],java.lang.Object)

invoke('captureImage', argValues, argTypes)

It is often useful to generate a diagnostic image capture when a server fails. To do so, set a watch rule to evaluate to true when the server's state changes to FAILED; then associate an image notification with the watch.

Note: The watch rule is as follows:

Note: (${[weblogic.management.runtime.ServerRuntimeMBean]//State} = 'FAILED')

Note: For more information, see Configuring Harvester Watches and Configuring Image Notifications. Also see “Configure Watches and Notifications” in the Administration Console Online Help.

 

How Diagnostic Image Capture Is Persisted in the Server's Configuration

The configuration for Diagnostic Image Capture is persisted in the config.xml file for a domain, under the <server-diagnostic-config> sub-element of the <server> element for the server, as shown in Listing 4-2: Listing 4-2 Sample Diagnostic Image Capture Configuration 

<domain>

  <!-- Other domain configuration elements -->

  <server>

    <name>myserver</name>

    <server-diagnostic-config>

      <image-dir>logs\diagnostic_images</image-dir>

      <image-timeout>2</image-timeout>

    </server-diagnostic-config>

    <!-- Other configuration details for this server -->

  </server>

  <!-- Other server configurations in this domain-->

</domain>

Oracle recommends that you do not edit the config.xml file directly.

 

Contents of the Captured Image File

The most common sources of a server state are captured in a diagnostic image capture, including:

The Diagnostic Image Capture component captures and combines the images produced by the different server subsystems into a single ZIP file. In addition to capturing the most common sources of the server state, this component captures images from all the server subsystems including, for example, images produced by the JMS, JDBC, EJB, and JNDI subsystems.

A diagnostic image is a heavyweight artifact meant to serve as a server-level state dump for the purpose of diagnosing significant failures. It enables you to capture a significant amount of important data in a structured format and then to provide that data to support personnel for analysis.

Each image is captured as a single file for the entire server. The default location is SERVER\logs\diagnostic_images. Each image instance has a unique name, as follows: 

    diagnostic_image_DOMAIN_SERVER_YYYY_MM_DD_HH_MM_SS.zip

The contents of the file include at least the following information:

Figure 4-1 shows the contents of an image file. You can open most of the files in this ZIP file with a text editor to examine the contents. Figure 4-1 An Image File

An Image File