CONTENTS Title Page Copyright Page Preface 1 Overview 1.1 DECps Family of Products 1.2 The Data Collector 1.2.1 Data Collector Support for Performance Advisor 1.2.2 Data Collector Support for Capacity Planner 1.3 Features of the Data Collector and Utilities 1.4 Computer Based Training 2 Controlling the DECperformance Solution Data Collector 2.1 Setting Up the Data Collector 2.1.1 Required Data Collector Privileges 2.1.2 Nonpaged Pool Requirements 2.1.3 Creating a Schedule File 2.1.3.1 Using the Schedule File 2.1.3.1.1 How Privileges Affect the Schedule File 2.1.3.1.2 Examining the Schedule File 2.1.3.1.3 Changing the Weekly Schedule 2.1.3.1.4 Adding, Changing, and Reordering Node Names in the Schedule File 2.1.3.1.5 Changing the Beginning and Ending Dates for the Data Collector 2.1.3.1.6 Modifying Other Data Collector Parameters 2.1.3.1.7 Creating a New Schedule File 2.1.4 How Data Collection is Synchronized in a VAXcluster System 2.2 Starting and Restarting the Data Collector 2.3 Monitoring Data Collection 2.3.1 Checking Data Collection Status 2.3.2 Checking the Data Collector Error Log 2.4 Stopping the Data Collector 2.5 Using the Database Directory 2.5.1 Using the Daily Data Files 3 Characterizing Workloads 3.1 Creating User-Group Workload Definitions 3.2 Defining User-Group Families 3.3 Creating Transaction Workload Definitions 3.4 Defining Transaction Families 3.5 Using Workload Families with DECps Data 3.5.1 Archiving 3.5.2 Graphing 3.5.3 Performance Evaluation - Process Statistics 3.5.4 Dumping Archived Data 3.5.5 DECwindows Interface 3.5.6 Capacity Planner 4 History Files and Archiving 4.1 Setting Up a History File Reduction Scheme 4.2 Archiving DECps Data 4.3 Using History Files 5 Dump Reports 5.1 Interpreting the Dump Reports 5.1.1 Dump Report: Heading 5.1.2 Dump Report: Metrics Record 5.1.3 Dump Report: Parameter Record 5.1.4 Dump Report: Rules Record 5.1.5 Dump Report: Process Record 5.1.6 Dump Report: Disk Records 5.1.7 Dump Report: Tape Record 5.1.8 Dump Report: Communications Record 5.1.9 Dump Report: Configuration and SCS Record 5.1.10 Dump Report: CPU Record 5.1.11 Dump Report: Hot Files Record 5.1.12 Sampling Techniques of Dump Report Items 6 Data Collector and Utilities Commands ADVISE ARCHIVE ADVISE COLLECT ADVISE COLLECT REPORT ADVISE COLLECT SET ADVISE COLLECT SHOW ADVISE COLLECT START ADVISE COLLECT STOP ADVISE EDIT 7 Parameter Editor Commands ADVISE EDIT ADD/FAMILY ADD/HISTORY ADD/WORKLOAD DELETE/FAMILY DELETE/HISTORY DELETE/WORKLOAD EXIT MODIFY/FAMILY MODIFY/HISTORY MODIFY/WORKLOAD QUIT SET AUTO_AUGMENT SET VERSION_LIMIT SHOW/ALL SHOW/AUTO_AUGMENT SHOW/FAMILY SHOW/HISTORY SHOW/VERSION_LIMIT SHOW/WORKLOAD 8 Using the DECwindows Interface 8.1 Starting the DECps DECwindows Interface 8.2 Controlling the DECps Interface 8.2.1 Reading the Parameter File 8.2.2 Writing the Parameter File 8.2.3 Quitting the Session 8.3 Selecting Data for Viewing Dump Reports 8.4 Displaying a Dump Report 8.4.1 Filtering Process Data 8.5 Customizing 8.5.1 Customizing Data Collection 8.5.1.1 Setting Collection Parameters 8.5.1.2 Setting the Collection Schedule 8.5.1.3 Adding or Removing Nodes 8.5.2 Customizing PSDC$DATABASE definition 8.5.3 Customizing Parameters 8.5.3.1 Starting Parameter Editing 8.5.4 Workload Definitions 8.5.4.1 Creating a Workload Definition 8.5.4.2 Deleting a Workload Definition 8.5.4.3 Modifying Workload Definitions 8.5.5 Workload Family Definitions 8.5.5.1 Creating a Workload Family 8.5.5.2 Deleting a Workload Family 8.5.5.3 Modifying a Workload Family 8.5.6 History File Descriptors 8.5.6.1 Creating a History File Descriptor 8.5.6.2 Deleting a History File Descriptor 8.5.6.3 Modifying a History File Descriptor 8.5.7 Parameter Settings 8.6 Viewing the Main Window 8.7 Getting Help 8.7.1 Accessing the Computer-Based Training Course 8.7.2 Navigating in Help 8.7.3 Saving Help Text in a File 8.7.4 Exiting from Help A DECps Messages and Recovery Procedures B Data Collector Overhead C The Default Workload Families D Data Collector Logical Names Glossary EXAMPLES 4-1 History File Definitions and Reduction Scheme FIGURES 5-1 Dump Report: Heading 5-2 Dump Report: Metrics Record 5-3 Dump Report: Parameters Record 5-4 Dump Report: Rules Record 5-5 Dump Report: Process Record 5-6 Dump Report: Disk Records 5-7 Dump Report: Disk Records Part 2 5-8 Dump Report: Tape Records 5-9 Dump Report: Communication Records 5-10 Dump Report: Configuration and SCS Records 5-11 Dump Report: CPU Records 5-12 Dump Report: Hot Files Record A-1 Parts of a DECps Message TABLES 2-1 Nonpaged Pool Allocations 2-2 Data Collector and Node Status Description 2-3 Daily Data Interval Subrecord Contents 5-1 Dump Report Heading 5-2 Metrics Record Headings 5-3 Process Record Headings 5-4 Disk Records Headings 5-5 Disk Records Part 2 Headings 5-6 Tape Record Headings 5-7 Communication Record Headings 5-8 Configuration and SCS Record Headings 5-9 CPU Record Headings 5-10 Hot Files Record Headings 5-11 Items Collected at Minor Intervals 6-1 ADVISE COLLECT Command Options 7-1 Summary of ADVISE EDIT Commands 7-2 Granularity Values 7-3 Periodicity Values 7-4 Effects of Periodicity Settings with a Yearly Granularity A-1 Severity Codes B-1 Estimates for Moderately Loaded Systems C-1 Users in the MODEL_USERGROUPS Family C-2 Images in the MODEL_TRANSACTIONS Family