Chapter 29: Monitoring and Reporting on Workflow

Chapter 29: Monitoring and Reporting on Workflow 

Monitoring Tools 

Monitoring workflow helps you to identify problems with the current or predicted 

workflow, so that you can resolve those problems. You can use the following CA 

Workload Automation AE tools to monitor workflow: 

Forecast Reports 

Generate reports that display information about the predicted workflow to identify 

problems before they occur. 

Note: You can also use forecast reports to plan changes to your workflow in a test 

environment. 

Monitors 

Track events to identify problems as they occur. 

Browsers 

Generate reports that display information about past events to identify recurring 

problems. 

You can solve problems before they occur or as they occur when you can identify the 

issue that is associated with the problem. When you cannot determine the cause of a 

problem, notify the administrator. 

To solve a problem that you identify in real time using a monitor, correct the associated 

issue and restart the job. To address recurring problems or problems with predicted 

workflow that you identify using browsers and forecast reports, correct the associated 

issues and use monitors to track the progress of the workflow. 

Correcting issues that cause jobs to fail requires modifying workflow objects (job 

definitions, machine definitions, and calendar object definitions). You can modify 

workflow objects only when you have write access to those objects. When you cannot 

solve a problem without modifying a workflow object and you do not have write access 

to the problematic object, notify the scheduler. 

Important! Modifying workflow objects sometimes has unexpected impacts on the rest 

of the workflow. We recommend that you plan changes to the workflow in a test 

environment before you implement the changes in the live instance.

 Run a Monitor or Browser 

Notes: 

■ You can also use the CA WCC Forecast and Monitoring applications to monitor 

workflow. For more information about these applications, see the CA WCC 

documentation. 

■ You can use the sendevent command to restart a job. You can use jil to update job 

or machine definitions and the autocal_asc command to update calendar 

definitions. For more information about the sendevent, jil, and autocal_asc 

commands, see the Reference Guide. 

Run a Monitor or Browser 

Monitors and browsers help you identify problems with your workflow by tracking 

events in real-time (monitors) or generating reports that display historical information 

about events (browsers). For example, the scheduler component automatically restarts 

jobs that fail, so examining events that change the status of jobs to RESTART helps 

identify problems with specific jobs. 

Note: By default, CA Workload Automation AE is configured to specify the date and time 

using the "MM/dd/yyyy HH:mm[:ss]" format, but you can configure CA Workload 

Automation AE to use a different format by changing the value of the DateFormat 

parameter in the configuration file. For more information about the parameters in the 

configuration file, see the Administration Guide. 

Limits: 

■ MM: 01-12 

■ dd: 01-31 

■ yyyy: 1900-current year 

■ HH: 00-23 

■ mm: 00-59 

■ ss: 00-59 

Follow these steps: 

1. Open the operating system or instance command prompt: 

■ (UNIX) Run the shell that is sourced to use CA Workload Automation AE. 

The UNIX operating system command prompt opens. The shell that is sourced 

to use CA Workload Automation AE presets all of the environment variables for 

the instance. 

■ (Windows) Click Start, Programs, CA, Workload Automation AE, Command 

Prompt (instance_name). 

The CA Workload Automation AE instance command prompt opens. The 

command prompt presets all of the environment variables for the instance. 

 Run a Monitor or Browser 

  

2. Enter the following command: 

jil 

The JIL command prompt for the local CA Workload Automation AE instance opens. 

3. Define the monitor or browser by entering the following jil command and 

attributes: 

insert_monbro: monbro_name 

mode: monitor | browser 

[alarm: y|n] 

[status_keyword: y] 

[status_keyword: y] 

[...] 

all_status: y|n 

all_events: y|n 

currun|after_time: date_time 

alarm_verif: y|n 

Notes: 

■ The utility also accepts values of m (for monitor) and b (for browser) in the 

mode attribute of the jil monbro definition. 

■ For more information about the insert_monbro subcommand and the jil 

attributes that you can specify when you define a monitor or browser, see the 

Reference Guide. 

status_keyword: y 

(Optional) Specifies whether or not to track status change events that are 

associated with a particular job state. You can set multiple individual status 

filters to track status change events that are associated with any combination 

of the following job states: 

■ RUNNING 

■ SUCCESS 

■ FAILURE 

■ TERMINATED 

■ STARTING 

■ RESTART 

The status keyword is the name of the job state in lower-case letters. To track 

status change events that are associated with one of these job states, enter the 

corresponding status keyword as the jil attribute and set the value of that 

attribute to y. 

Example: To track status change events that are associated with either the 

FAILURE state or the TERMINATED state, specify the following attributes and 

values: 

failure: y 

terminated: y 

all_status: y|n 

Specifies whether to track or report on all status change events. To track or 

report on only status change events that are associated with certain job states, 

set the value of the attribute to n and specify other status filters. Setting the 

value of this attribute to y overrides other status filters. 

all_events: y|n 

Specifies whether to track or report on all events. To track or report on only 

certain types of events, set the value of the attribute to n and specify other 

event filters. Setting the value of this attribute to y overrides other event 

filters. 

currun: y|after_time: date_time 

(Browsers) Specifies the historical time frame on which the browser reports. To 

display only events that occurred during the most recent job run, set the value 

of the currun attribute to y. To display all events that occurred after a particular 

date and time, specify the after_time attribute. To specify the after_time 

attribute, ensure that the currun attribute is set to the default value of n. 

Note: By default, CA Workload Automation AE deletes archived event data that 

is older than seven days, but you can configure the product to store data for a 

longer period of time by editing the DBMaint script. The location of this script is 

specified in the DBMaintCmd parameter of the configuration file. Specify a 

value for the after_date attribute that is within the past seven days or edit the 

script. For more information about the DBMaintCmd configuration parameter 

and the DBMaint script, see the Administration Guide. 

Example: To generate a report that displays a list of all processed events that 

occurred after January 2, 2012 at 5 p.m., specify the following jil attributes: 

currun: n 

after_time: "01/02/2012 17:00:00" Run a Monitor or Browser 

  

alarm_verif: y|n 

(Monitors) Specifies whether the monitor waits for you to acknowledge alarms 

that the scheduler issues. This attribute is valid only for monitors that are 

defined to track alarms. When you set the value of this attribute to y, you are 

prompted to acknowledge any alarms that the scheduler sends. 

A monitor is defined to track alarms when the value of the alarms attribute is 

set to y or when the value of the all_events attribute is set to y. For monitors 

that are defined to prompt you to acknowledge alarms, the monbro utility 

pauses, displays the name of the alarm, and issues the following message and 

prompts: 

Alarm: alarm_name issue MM/dd/yyyy HH:mm:ss Run# run_num 

Message Acknowledged by: user_name 

Comment:[your_comment] 

The utility displays the alarm information and leaves the following two fields 

blank. To acknowledge the alarm, enter your user name in the Message 

Acknowledged by field. Optionally, you can enter information in the Comment 

field (such as "Reported to DB Administrator for follow up"). 

Important! The monitor cannot resume until you acknowledge the alarm by 

entering your user name. 

Note: For more information about the monbro utility, see the Reference Guide. 

4. Enter the following jil command: 

exit 

The monitor or browser is inserted into the database, and the jil command prompt 

closes. 

5. Open the operating system or instance command prompt and enter the following 

command: 

{monbro -N monbro_name|monbro -N monbro_name -P ss} 

-P ss 

(Optional, Monitors only) Specifies the frequency, in seconds, at which the 

monitor polls for events. The monitor polls for events at the default frequency 

when you do not specify this option. The option is not valid with browsers. 

Limits: Integers greater than 0 

Default: 10 

The monitor or browser runs. A monitor polls for events at the specified interval. A 

browser generates a report that displays the event information for the specified 

period based on the specified event filters. 

Example: Define a Browser 

This example defines the browser named job_restarts to generate a report listing all 

events that changed the status of a job to RESTART after September 10, 2012 at 

midnight. 

insert_monbro: job_restarts 

mode: browser 

restart: y 

all_status:n 

all_events:n 

after_time: "09/10/2012 00:00:00" 

Example: Define a Monitor 

This example defines the monitor named track_alarms to track alarm events and to 

prompt the user to acknowledge all alarms as they occur. 

insert_monbro: track_alarms 

mode: monitor 

alarm: y 

all_status: n 

all_events: n 

alarm_verif: y 

Example: Acknowledge an Alarm 

This example shows that the operator acknowledged notification of a JOBFAILURE alarm 

when the job with run number 33:2 failed at 20:15 29 on 09/24/2012 and that the 

operator reported the job failure to the scheduler for follow up and resolution. 

Alarm: JOBFAILURE fail 09/20/2012 20:15:29 Run# 33:2 

Message Acknowledged by: operator 

Comment:Reported to the scheduler for follow up. 

Example: Run a Monitor 

This example runs the monitor named track_alarms so that it polls the database for 

alarm events at 30 second intervals. 

monbro -N track_alarms -P 30 Generate a Forecast Report 

Generate a Forecast Report 

Forecast reports display information about predicted workflow. Forecast reports help 

you identify problems with the predicted workflow to resolve them before they occur or 

to plan changes in the workflow. 

Note: By default, CA Workload Automation AE is configured to specify the date and time 

using the "MM/dd/yyyy HH:mm[:ss]" format, but you can configure CA Workload 

Automation AE to use a different format by changing the value of the DateFormat 

parameter in the configuration file. For more information about the parameters in the 

configuration file, see the Administration Guide. 

Limits: 

■ MM: 01-12 

■ dd: 01-31 

■ yyyy: 1900-current year 

■ HH: 00-23 

■ mm: 00-59 

■ ss: 00-59 

Follow these steps: 

1. Open the operating system or instance command prompt: 

■ (UNIX) Run the shell that is sourced to use CA Workload Automation AE. 

The UNIX operating system command prompt opens. The shell that is sourced 

to use CA Workload Automation AE presets all of the environment variables for 

the instance. 

■ (Windows) Click Start, Programs, CA, Workload Automation AE, Command 

Prompt (instance_name). 

The CA Workload Automation AE instance command prompt opens. The 

command prompt presets all the environment variables for the instance. 

2. Enter the following command: 

forecast {-M machine_name| -J job_name [-M machine_name]} -F "mm/dd/yyyy HH:MM 

[:ss][-T "mm/dd/yyyy HH:MM [:ss]]" [OPTIONS] 

-M machine_name| -J job_name [-M machine_name] 

Specifies what predicted workflow information the forecast report displays. To 

specify predicted workflow for a particular machine, use the -M parameter. To 

specify predicted workflow for a particular job, use the -J parameter. 

Notes: 

■ The report displays predicted workflow for all jobs that are scheduled to 

run on the specified machine when you specify the -M parameter alone. 

■ The report displays a predicted workflow that lists runs of the specified job 

on all machines when you specify the -J parameter alone. 

■ The report displays a predicted workflow that lists runs of the specified job 

on the specified machine and excludes runs on other machines when you 

specify the -J and -M parameters together. 

-F "MM/dd/yyyy HH:mm [:ss]" 

Specifies that the forecast report predicts workflow starting on the specified 

date. 

-T "MM/dd/yyyy HH:mm [:ss]" 

(Optional) Specifies that the forecast report predicts workflow ending on the 

specified date. This option is required only when you want to forecast 

workflow for multiple days. 

OPTIONS 

(Optional) Specifies optional parameters that you can use to control what 

information the forecast report displays. 

Note: For more information about these optional parameters, see the 

Reference Guide. 

The command generates a forecast report that displays information about 

predicted workflow. 

3. (Optional) Depending on the information that you need, repeat the procedure for 

other jobs or machines that are defined within the instance. 

The command generates additional forecast reports.