Gathering Information

Troubleshooting and analysis require information. The more information you have the easier it is to classify a problem and search for its solution. Detailed information will also be necessary should you need to contact others for support, either through a community mailing list or through more formal Sun support channels.

For general information about gathering data, also refer to Sun Gathering Debug Data for Sun Java System Application Server. The document pertains to previous versions of Enterprise Server but much of the information is generic enough that it might still be helpful.

As you continue your investigation, consider the following questions.

When Does the Problem Occur?

• What do the logs show? What kind of error message are you getting? For more information about logs, see Examining Log Files. Logs are a good place to start your troubleshooting.

• What are you trying to do when the problem occurs and how are you doing it? What is the sequence of events?

• Does the problem occur every time you perform the same type of operation, or does it seem random? Can you reproduce the issue?

• Have other events or problems occurred that could possibly be related, such as web sessions closing early, exceptions being thrown in your own application logic, components not being correctly deployed or undeployed?

What Is Your Environment?

• What version of Enterprise Server are you using? What operating system and version? What JDK version? Many problems are caused simply because system requirements for the release are not met. Refer to the Sun GlassFish Enterprise Server v3 Release Notes for the latest information regarding system requirements, and make sure your system meets those requirements.

• What resources does your system have, such as memory, disk, and swap space? If system memory is an issue, look for ways to optimize your configuration and consider taking other actions such as adding memory or decreasing system load.

• Have any patches been applied? If so, what are the product and operating system patch numbers?

• What other products and technologies are installed and being used in the installation?

• How many application servers, web servers, and directory servers are installed? What are the products and versions?

• How is the web server connected to Enterprise Server? On the same system?

• How is Enterprise Server connected to the directory server?

• What JDBC driver is being used to access the database?

What Is Your System Configuration?

• What are your settings?

• On which port is Enterprise Server v3 configured — the default or something else?

• What defaults were changed during installation and what are the values?

• What other settings were changed from the defaults and what are their values?

• What are the parameters related to JVM heap, stack, and garbage collection set to?

• What are the JVM options?

• What is the permgen size? OutOfMemoryError:PermGen space errors are common and indicate that you need to increase the permanent generation space available.

• Is SSL enabled?

• What are your network settings (proxy, firewall, and so on)? What happens if you disable your firewall and attempt the task?

What Is Different?

• What is different that could have provoked the problem or triggered the event? Was something new added or changed? Have any new applications been deployed? If changes have been made recently, consider backing them out and seeing what happens — does the problem still occur?

• Was the feature or functionality working correctly at one time? If so, what changed or happened between then and now?

• Is this working on another system? If so, what is different about that environment?