IBM SMF (System Management Facility) on z/OS, Part I - M83
Channel: moshix
Date: 23/08/2018

What is the SMF (Systems Management Facility) system of MVS and z/OS? 

We see that it collects information about system and job activity and performance. Information from the SMF datasets can be extracted and reports can be easily created. We see how to do all that. 

SMF has variable records of many types:

Here is a list of the most common SMF record types:

RMF records are in the range 70 through to 79. RMF's records are generally supplemented - for serious performance analysis - by Type 30 (subtypes 2 and 3) address space records.

RACF type 80 records are written to record security issues, i.e. password violations, denied resource access attempts, etc. 

TopSecret, another security system, also writes type 80 records. 
ACF2 provides equivalent information in, by default, type 230 records but this SMF record type can be changed for each installed site.

SMF type 89 records indicate software product usage and are used to calculate reduced sub-capacity software pricing.

DB2 writes type 100, 101 and 102 records, depending on specific DB2 subsystem options.

CICS writes type 110 records, depending on specific CICS options.
Websphere MQ writes type 115 and 116 records, depending on specific Websphere MQ subsystem options.

WebSphere Application Server for z/OS writes type 120. Version 7 introduced a new subtype to overcome shortcomings in the earlier subtype records. The new Version 7 120 Subtype 9 record provide a unified request-based view with lower overhead.

You can find the JCL (Job control language) source code I use in this video in my github here: https://github.com/moshix/mvs

To apply for a free MVS logon visit: moshix.duny.net with your browser and fill out a simple form. 

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