Problem categories

The problem indicator table contains examples of indicators. Some problems might need to be investigated using more than one diagnostic procedure to find the cause. If there are several indicators, look for the earliest problem that caused the other problems.

For example, you find several abends and a wait state, look for the earliest abend code and begin diagnosis there.

Table 1. Problem indicators by type. Where to find problem indicators by type
Problem type	Indicator	System action	System programmer action
Abend See Diagnosing an abend.	SVC dump taken and a record of the error (in Logrec)	Produces dump	Review dump to determine if further diagnosis is required
	Message received indicating a system or user abend	Produces record of error	Review response of system message to determine the impact of the abend on the installation.
	An ABEND dump is produced	Continue processing	Review the dump to determine if further diagnosis is required.
	SVC dump produced Error recorded to SYS1.LOGREC Error message issued SYSUDUMP, SYSABEND or CEEDUMP produced	System actions are the same as the indicators listed previously. Note: The system might also initiate recovery actions. See SYSLOG and component trace to determine what these recovery action were. Some recovery actions can cause data to be lost, requiring the installation to resubmit jobs or transactions.	Use IPCS to do problem diagnosis on the dump. Look up abend and reason code recorded for more information about error. Look up the message to gather more information about cause of the error and the system programmer action to correct. Review the dump to do problem diagnosis.
Job hang/wait or loop Diagnosing a job or subsystem hang	Job does not end, no further output is produced, and the job can or cannot be CANCEL'ed or FORCE'd	No response	Use the DUMP command to obtain an SVC dump of the hung job. If the DUMP is not successful, consider taking a stand-alone dump.
System hang or wait Diagnosing a system hang or wait state	Disabled wait indicated on the HMC and wait state message issued	The system issues a wait state message and loads a disable wait state PSW. The system might load the following into the PSW: X'070E0000 00000000'	Take a stand-alone dump.
	Many jobs are hung in the system	Resource contention	Enter the DISPLAY GRS,C command to check for ENQ resource and latch contention and take a dump of the holder of the resource including SDATA=GRSQ. Note: Use the DISPLAY GRS,ANALYZE command to aid in the discovery of blockers in the system.
	No response to system or subsystem commands entered	No response	Partition the system from the sysplex and take a stand-alone dump.
Loop Diagnosing a loop	High processor resource being consumed locking out other work; Excessive spin detected with IEE178I or ABEND071 issued, or both.	ABEND071 issued in an attempt to stop the looping program	Use an online monitor, such as Resource Measurement Facility™ RMF™ or IBM® OMEGAMON® z/OS® Management Console, to determine whether the problem originates from a high priority job in normal processing or from a problem.
Loop Diagnosing a loop	A job is using a high percentage of central processor storage	Processing degrades	Use an online monitor, such as RMF, to determine whether the problem originates from a high priority job in normal processing or from a problem.
Enabled wait or performance degradation Diagnosing a performance problem	System processing slows.	Processing degrades	Use an online monitor, such as RMF, to determine where the problem originates.
	There is a series of WAIT messages followed by a burst of activity	Processing continues	Use an online monitor, such as RMF, to determine where the bottleneck is occurring.
Output problem Diagnosing an output problem	Job output is missing or is incorrect.	Processing continues	Use GTF or SLIP to trace input and output.