Administration of managed resources

As described in previous sections, WebSphere MQ Everyplace has a set of resources that can be administered with admin messages. These resources are known as managed resources.

Example administration console

One of the examples provided with WebSphere MQ Everyplace is an administration graphical user interface (GUI). This example uses many of the administration techniques and features described in previous sections of this manual. All the classes for this example are contained in package examples.administration.console.

This example demonstrates the following WebSphere MQ Everyplace administration features:

This is provided solely as a programming example, it is not expected to be used outside a development and test environment. It should be noted that this example works with other examples such as trace, and the client queue manager, and it is also subclassified to provide an administration example for the WebSphere MQ bridge.

The main console window

To start the console use the command:

java examples.administration.console.Admin

This displays the following window:

Figure 4. Administration console window

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This is the central window from which all other interactions are initiated. The window has three sections:

1. Type of resource to manage
The set of buttons on the left side of the window control the selection of the resource that is to be managed. There is one button for each type of WebSphere MQ Everyplace managed resource and one button called Setup. The Setup button provides access to a set of base administration functions such as browsing the reply-to queue and turning trace on and off.

2. Base administration parameters
The central section of the window allows base administration parameters to be altered.

Mode
Whether the queue manager to be managed is local or remote.

Local queue manager
The name of the local queue manager that is initiating the administration actions. This is set automatically when a queue manager is started with the Start QM button.

Managed queue manager
If the mode is set to remote, this is the name of the queue manager to be managed. If the mode is set to local, this is always the same as the local queue manager.

Reply-to queue manager
The name of the queue manager to which administration reply messages are to be sent.

Reply-to queue
The name of the queue to which administration reply messages are to be sent.

3. Managed resource specific action
Each managed resource has a set of actions that can be performed on it. The buttons on the right of the main window show the actions for the resource that is selected on the left of the window. Selecting one of an action button starts the function for that action. Normally this causes the display of another window related to the action.

The selected local queue manager must be running in the JVM that the console is executing in. If it is not already running, it needs to be started using the Start QM button. This displays a dialog that requests the name and path of the ini file that contains the queue manager startup parameters. If the queue manager is already running, the Connect QM button can be selected (this is the case if administration is started from the example server ExampleAwtMQeServer).

Once the queue manager has been started, any of the resources in area 1 can be selected and managed.

Queue browser

An example queue browser, AdminQueueBrowser is provided with WebSphere MQ Everyplace. This example shows how to browse a queue and how to display the contents of messages on the queue. The example can only browse queues that can be accessed synchronously and that the user has the necessary authority to access. The example code is not able to show the messages that are secured using message level security.

AdminQueueBrowser has been subclassified to provide a queue browser with enhanced function for browsing the administration reply-to queue. This is implemented in class AdminLogBrowser. This subclass can be accessed by selecting the Setup button followed by the Browse reply queue button.

The following figure shows the administration reply-to queue window.

Figure 5. Reply-to queue window

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This window has several sections:

1. The name of the administration reply to queue manager and queue

2. Message filter
You can provide a filter to limit the set of messages displayed. This example allows a filter on the MsgID and CorrelID fields of a message. The example also makes the assumption that the fields contain strings that have been encoded in a byte array.

When administration messages are sent from the example console, the MsgID is set to the name of the queue manager to be managed. It is therefore possible to display administration messages only for a specific queue manager.

3. Message view type
You can view messages in the message display panel in the following ways:

List:
A one line summary of each message on the queue.

Full:
The contents of all messages on the queue.

Both:
Two panels, one panel displays a list with a summary line for each message, the other panel displays the contents of a message that has been selected in the message panel.

The number of messages currently being viewed is also displayed.

4. Message display panel
As described in 3, this panel displays messages in various forms. To display a detailed view of a message in a new window, double click the message in the list view.

5. Actions
Several buttons provide actions that are specific to the queue browser:

Refresh
Clears the display and then displays the current contents of the queue. If the queue being browsed is a local queue, a monitor is automatically started. This monitor refreshes the display when new messages are added to the queue. If the queue being browsed is remote then it is not possible to automatically refresh the window when new messages are added. In this case, the Refresh button can be used to get the latest contents of the queue.

Empty Queue
Deletes all messages from the queue.

Cancel
Closes the queue browser window.

6. Message
Error and status messages are displayed here.

Action windows

Once you have selected a managed resource type, and you have clicked an action button, a window opens that displays a list of possible parameters for the action. Some parameters are mandatory, others are optional. The following figure shows an example of selecting the add action on a connection:

Figure 6. Action window

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The action window is the same for most actions. It consists of the following parts:

1. Message area
Error and status messages are displayed here.

2. Names of parameter
Action parameter names.

3. Value of parameter
An input field where you can change the parameter values. The initial value displayed is the default value for the parameter.

4. Send field
The check box for each field is automatically selected when a value is changed. When this field is selected, the field is included in the administration message. By default the administration message only contains values that have changed, it does not contain default values. Default values are understood by the administration message and are not included in the message to ensure that the message size is kept as small as possible. If you change a value back to its default, you must select the send field check box yourself.

5. Action buttons
For each administration action there are three buttons:

Action
The name on this button depends on the administration action. In this example it is Add connection. The action is always to create the administration message and send it to the destination queue manager. The action window is closed.

Apply
Create the administration message and send it to the destination queue manager. The action window remains open allowing the same message to be sent multiple times or it can be modified and then sent.

Cancel
Close the action window without sending the administration message.

Reply windows

You can view the outcome of an administration request with the administration log browser as described in Queue browser. To see the details of the result of the request, double click on the reply message in the list view.

Figure 7. Reply window

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The window has the same basic structure as an administration request action window but has the following differences:

1. Message
Displays the return code and result of the action.

2. Detailed errors
If the return code was RC_Mixed, any errors relating to a particular field are displayed alongside the field.

3. Action buttons

OK
Close the action reply window.


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