Course Code: 908
Length: 5 Days

This course presents OpenVMS performance under three subsystems: Memory Management, I/O, and CPU.

This course features:

• Isolating performance bottlenecks to one of the three subsystems.
• Effects of SYSGEN parameters on each of the subsystems, when to change these parameters, and when other management modifications or the purchase of new hardware will be required.
• Sufficiency (keeping the system running), as well as tuning considerations.
• The relative merits/drawbacks of using AUTOGEN.

Who Should Attend
OpenVMS system managers, applications programmers and system programmers.

Prerequisites
Before taking this course, students should be able to:

• Set up accounts.
• Use SYSGEN/SYSMAN to change a system parameter.
• Run AUTOGEN.
• Use the INSTALL utility.
• INITIALIZE and MOUNT a disk.

Benefits of Attending this Class
Upon completion of this course, students will be able to:

• Interpret performance metrics supplied by:
• The MONITOR utility
• DCL commands including:
• $ SHOW SYSTEM
• $ SHOW STATUS
• $ SHOW MEMORY
• The INSTALL utility
• Identify bottlenecks in the following subsystems:
• Memory Management
• I/O
• CPU
• Size working set parameters.
• Monitor page file space.
• Describe the advantages of balancing disk I/O.
• Improve the performance characteristics of indexed files using the CONVERT utility.
• Identify factors contributing to time spent executing in processor modes.
• Describe file locking design considerations to attain good performance.
• Monitor distributed lock traffic and impact its performance.
• Identify the impact of changing key system parameters.

Course Contents

• GENERAL PERFORMANCE TOPICS
• LAYOUT OF VIRTUAL ADDRESS SPACE
• IMAGE ACTIVATION AND PAGING
• INTERPRETING PAGING METRICS
• WORKING SETS AND AUTOMATIC WORKING SET ADJUSTMENT
• LOCALITY AND PAGING PERFORMANCE
• SHARED IMAGE COSTS AND BENEFITS
• THE MODIFIED PAGE LIST AND MODIFIED PAGE WRITING
• THE SWAPPER AND MEMORY RECLAMATION
• SYSTEM FAULTS
• GENERAL I/O FLOW
• ANALYZING THE EFFECTS OF FRAGMENTATION
• CONTROLLER OPTIMIZATONS
• FILES-11 ODS-2 CONCEPTS
• CONTIGUITY AND THE FILE SYSTEM
• FILE SYSTEM CACHES
• RMS STRUCTURES AND DESIGN CONSIDERATIONS
• RMS UTILITIES
• RMS I/O BUFFERING CONSIDERATIONS
• MONITOR RMS
• UNDERSTANDING CPU PERFORMANCE
• UNDERSTANDING TIME SPENT IN MODES
• OPENVMS SCHEDULING AND PRIORITIES
• PIXSCAN AND DORMANTWAIT
• PIXSCAN
• DORMANTWAIT
• LOCKING CONCEPTS
• DISTRIBUTED LOCKING CONCEPTS
• THE MSCP SERVER