1

Review the configuration

Verify the Mid Tier and AR server configuration. See Health Check from a Midtier perspective

2

Determine the frequency of the performance issue

Determine the following:

• Does the problem occur at start up only? 
• Does the problem occur after running for a predictable interval?

3

Enable logs and reproduce the problem.

To analyse the JVM supporting the Mid Tier:

a)  Take thread dumps during the time of slowness or unresponsiveness. The following options are available:

• Use jVisualVM to gather thread dumps/heap dumps; See How to enable the Java JVisualVM process to collect logging.
• For Mid Tier version 9.1.02 or later, use the Thread Dump feature found on the Log Settings page of the Mid Tier Config Tool. This feature will create 5 separate thread dumps at a set interval. The Mid Tier thread dumps will be stored in the midtier/logs directory on the specific Mid Tier.
• For earlier Mid Tier versions, use this knowledge article to gather the thread dumps without using JMX, jVisualVM or other third party tools.

b)  Enable detailed Mid Tier logs by using the log categories: SERVLET, PERFORMANCE. See Enabling detailed Mid Tier logging.

• Detailed Mid Tier logging gives you the connection of the Mid Tier to AR server processing. The HTTP request can be tracked to the Mid Tier log to determine if the delay is in the Mid Tier layer.

c)  Web server logs. See Gathering webserver logs.

4.

Disable the logging

Use similar steps as per the topic Enabling detailed Mid Tier logging to disable the logging enabled in the earlier step.

Remember to disable the logs from each Mid Tier on which logging was enabled.

6

Collect the logs

Copy the logs to another location where you can review them so that they do not get overwritten. Remember the logs may be large depending on the volume of activity during the logging period.

Mid Tier logs and Mid Tier thread dumps:  Zip up the generated thread dumps and all the logs in the location specified on the Mid Tier Config Tool - Log Settings. The default location is C:\Program files\BMC Software\ARsystem\midtier\logs for a Windows based Mid Tier or /opt/bmc/ARsystem/midtier/logs for a Linux based Mid Tier.  

7

Creating a BMC Support Case

Collect and send logs and detailed information when creating a case with BMC Support:

1. Provide the following information as part of your case:
   • Name of the user who executed the action.
   • A description of the slow transaction.
   • The steps needed to trigger the action beginning at the login process. These steps need to be detailed on a step by step basis, documenting any data loaded or selected along the way.
   • Any error messages received.
2. Gather the logs, thread dumps and config files from Step 6 into a zip file.
3. Attach the zip file to your case (up to 2 GB) or FTP the files to BMC. See How to use BMC's Managed File Transfer (MFT) to send log files to BMC Support to comply with GDPR policies.

8

Analyze the logs

You can review the logs yourself to try to identify error messages or behaviors.

Use the following table to troubleshoot based on your symptoms and error messages.