IBM Problem Determination Tools for z/OS

IBM Problem Determination (PD) Tools consists of a core group of IBM products that are designed to work with compilers and run times to provide a start-to-finish development solution for the IT professional. This IBM Redbooks publication provides you with an introduction to the tools, guidance for program preparation to use with them, an overview of their integration, and several scenarios for their use.

If an abend occurs during testing, Fault Analyzer enables the programmer to quickly and easily pinpoint the abending location and optionally, the failing line of code. Many times, this information is all the programmer requires to correct the problem. However, it might be necessary to delve a little deeper into the code to figure out the problem. Debug Tool allows the programmer to step through the code at whatever level is required to determine where the error was introduced or encountered.

After the code or data is corrected, the same process is followed again until no errors are encountered. However, volume testing or testing with multiple terminals is sometimes required to ensure real-world reliability. Workload Simulator can be used to perform this type of testing.

After all of the tests are completed, running the application by using Application Performance Analyzer can ensure that no performance bottlenecks are encountered. It also provides a baseline to ensure that future enhancements do not introduce new performance degradation into the application.

This publication is intended for z/OS application developers and system programmers.