Rationale for selecting TIM Trace Options.

Products

• CA Application Delivery Analysis MTP (NetQoS / ADA)
• CA Application Performance Management Agent (APM / Wily / Introscope)
• INTROSCOPE

Issue/Introduction

    Question: 

    What sort of problems can TIM Trace options resolve?

 

    Environment:

    All TIM/MTP APM releases. 

 

    Answer: 

     1) Going up the OSI Stack.

         Using the OSI (Open Systems Interconnection) Model can be helpful in debugging TIM issues.

         The following is a typical bottom-up approach that may not be  needed for all cases

     2) Do I have a network connection and seeing HTTP/HTTPS/Flex traffic correctly?

         This includes answering a series of questions like the following progression:

          - Do I have traffic at all?
          - Is it HTTP/HTTPS/Flex traffic?
          - Is it two way traffic?
          - Is it traffic from the desired web servers?

        Note that the TIM Readiness Guide also covers this. See https://communities.ca.com/docs/DOC-101446785

        To determine this, tracing connections and HTTP Components/parameters are helpful. 
        You can see the IP addresses the TIM is capturing, if the traffic has Opens, Resets, and Closes, note if there are HTTP Requests/Responses, determine if the    network/servers change the IP address along the way, if something is truncating information, and so forth

     3) Am I decoding SSL traffic correctly?

         - TIM is limited what it can give you currently. More information is provided about unsuccessful than successful transactions. What can be provided is the following:

             - Connection and IP information
             - TLS version and ciphersuite used
             - HTTPS decoded requests and responses
             - Out of order and other SSL-related errors

         - This should be supplemented by a PCAP analysis with the private key installed on the packet analysis computer.

     4) Am I having User/User Group Issues?

         - TIM Trace options can be enabled to provide:
         - Session identification values for monitored transactions
         - User values
         - Whether or not a user was assigned to a user group as well as the user group name.
        
     5) Am I having Defect or Transaction Definition issues?

         - TIM Trace options can be set to tell you:
         - If a transaction matches against a transaction definition
         - Which transaction definition was matched.
         - How many defects were created?
         - Which defect type was created and for which business transaction?  

 

  Additional Information: 

   Choosing TIM Trace Options http://www.ca.com/us/support/ca-support-online/product-content/knowledgebase-articles/TEC1281821.aspx

   TIM Trace Options Part 1: Overview https://communities.ca.com/message/241847328#241847328  

   TIM Trace Options Part 2: Settings https://communities.ca.com/message/241853574#241853574

 

Environment

Release: SAMCNS99000-10.2-NetQoS-SuperAgent-Management Console
Component: