JPH04117831A - Transmission system for up-line dump - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE:To simply discriminate the status and the cause of a fault or the like by forming a ULD(up-line dump) data when a fault in a data communication system in which a master station and plural slave stations are interconnected as a fault report data in a sentence form able to be understood by the user. CONSTITUTION:Suppose that a fault takes place in, e.g. a slave station 11-1 and an error unable to be recovered is caused, then in this case, a code data representing a cause of the recovery unable error is written in a prescribed address of a main memory of the slave station 11-1 as a stop code. Then a ULD processing program stored in a ROM 18 of the slave station 11-1 is started. The slave station 11-1 reads a data representing a state of each section or the like on the occurrence of the fault from the prescribed area of the main memory of its own station. Then the slave station 11-1 converts the data into a character string understood simply by the user according to a data conversion table 19c stored in the ROM 19 of itself and generates a fault report.

Description

[Detailed Description of the Invention] [Object of the Invention] (Industrial Application Field) The present invention provides an amplifier line dump suitable for use in a data communication system in which a master station and a plurality of slave stations are interconnected by a data communication line. Transmission method (conventional technology) In a data communication system that integrates advanced technology,
As hardware develops, software information processing also becomes more complex. Such data communication systems have a network system configuration in which a master station (system control station) and multiple slave stations (transmission stations) are connected via, for example, duplicated data communication lines. Common. In this type of system, if an unrecoverable abnormality (failure) occurs in a slave station during system operation, the contents of the main memory of that slave station (its CPU) are usually stored as upline dump data (hereinafter referred to as ULD). After transmitting the data to the master station as data (referred to as data), a download line load (DLL) of the program is executed as a restart process. The master station writes the failure ULD data received from the slave station into a mass storage device such as a hard disk drive, and uses it as cause analysis data later.

Here, FIG. 4 shows an example of a printout of the ULD data (ULD list consisting of) transmitted from the slave station to the master station. In the example shown in FIG. 4, the main memory address 4] for every 16th address, and the main memory data for the old 16th address every 2nd address starting from this main memory address 41 (2 byte data
) 42 are shown being printed out. For example, the first line contains the main memory address AOOOO
(Hexadecimal representation), AOOOO~AOOOOF
Main memory data of 166 addresses up to address (16 bytes)
is printed out for 2 hides (for 2 addresses). The leftmost 2-byte data of the main memory data (42) in the first row is 00 at addresses AOOOO-AOO01.
01 (hexadecimal representation), and the rightmost 2-byte data is A.
This indicates that the content of address OOOE-AOOOF is 1100 (hexadecimal representation). Note that the printout not shown in FIG. 4 is performed using a printer of a supervisory control device connected to the master station and responsible for supervisory control of the system.

(Problem to be solved by the invention) As mentioned above, the conventional ULD (
In the upline dump) transmission method, the slave station's (C
The contents of the main memory of the PU (PU) are used as ULD data as they are.More specifically, the contents of the entire main memory or a portion of the main memory (binary information expressed in octal or] hexadecimal) is simply read along with address information and then ULD is processed as is. It was sent as data to the master station. For this reason, not only is the amount of ULD data large, but the number of workers who can investigate the causes of abnormalities from the ULD data (ULD list consisting of There was a problem in that it was limited to designers, program designers, program creators, etc. In addition, when improvements and enhancements are made to the system and the system is upgraded, the storage address of the same information (e.g. CPU status, station operation flag, etc.) in main memory may change, so the system version number I had to manage the exact address for each. Therefore, in order to deal with problems when they occur, it was necessary to manage trouble analysis documents, and it was necessary to have a system in place at all times, such as keeping track of the whereabouts of key personnel who could perform analysis.

Furthermore, in recent years, the capacity of main memory has continued to increase, and the processing time for information in megabytes has now ranged from several minutes to several seven minutes. However, even if a serious abnormality occurred, a limited number of people had to first analyze the failure ULD list, understand the abnormal condition and cause, and then instruct countermeasures. However, there was a problem in that it took several hours to several days from the output of the ULD list in the event of a failure until the instructions were issued.

This invention was made in view of the above circumstances, and its purpose is to make it possible to easily determine the failure situation, cause, etc. from the ULD data at the time of failure, and also to know the appropriate countermeasures according to the failure details. An object of the present invention is to provide an upline dump transmission method that can reduce the amount of data.

[Structure of the Invention] (Means for Solving the Problems) The present invention provides a data communication system in which a master station and a plurality of slave stations are interconnected via a data communication line, in which each of the slave stations has the following means: In other words, failure report data in a predetermined format has several status information fields in which the status of each part at the time of failure is entered, and guidance messages prepared for each failure type and describing the details of abnormality measures for the corresponding failure. Set the storage means to be stored in advance and the status of each part at the time of a failure in the own station in the corresponding status information field in the failure report data, and further add a guidance message specific to the type of failure. and a transmission means for transmitting the failure report created by the failure report creation means to the master station as upline dump data. It is something.

(Function) According to the present invention, when a failure occurs in a slave station, the failure report creation means of the slave station generates a report from a predetermined area of the main memory of the own station according to the failure ULD processing program stored in the ROM, for example. Read data representing the status of each part at the time of a failure, such as the CPU status indicating the CPU status, the operation flag indicating the operating status, the line status indicating the line status, and even the last received data, and store the data in a ROM etc. The information is embedded in the corresponding status information field in the report data stored in advance in the storage means. At this time, for operating flags, line status, etc., instead of the data (code data) itself, the meaning of the data is replaced and embedded in a character string that can be easily recognized by network monitors and other workers. It becomes possible to create visible failure reports. Furthermore, the failure report creation means selects a guidance message for troubleshooting that is specific to the type of failure (for example, the content of the failure indicated by the line status) from among several guidance messages pre-stored in the storage means. Take it out, add it to the trouble report created above, and send it to the UL
Send it to the master station as D data. When the master station receives this ULD data, it passes the data to the supervisory control device. The supervisory control device stores the received ULD data as a ULD file in a mass storage device such as a Hatware disk device. By dumping the ULD file stored in the mass storage device to, for example, the console CRT (or printer) of the monitoring control device, the network monitor can generate a visible failure report in text format as shown in Figure 3. Display (or print out) the document. As a result, you can easily determine the status and cause of the failure from the displayed (or printed) failure report, and learn the troubleshooting measures and procedures from the guidance message added to the report. I can do it.

(Embodiment) FIG. 1 is a block diagram showing an embodiment of a data communication system to which the present invention is applied.

In the figure, 10 is a master station which is a system control station;
, -1 to 11-3 are slave stations which are transmission stations. Master station 10
The slave stations 11-1 to 11-3 are connected in a loop by, for example, a duplicated data communication line 12. A supervisory control device 13 that monitors and controls the system is connected to the master station 10 . The supervisory control device 13 has ULD data (U
LD file), etc., such as a hard disk device (hereinafter referred to as HDD) ■4
, a console CRT 16 having a keyboard 15, and a printer device (hereinafter referred to as PRT) 17 are connected.

Each slave station 11i (i = 1 to 3) has a ROM 18 1
9 is connected. The ROM 1g stores in advance a UDL processing program 1.8a for performing UDL (upline dump) processing in the event of a failure in the slave station 11-1. In addition, the ROM 19 contains failure report data 1.9a in a predetermined format having several status information fields in which the status of each part at the time of failure is entered, as well as abnormality treatment contents prepared for each failure type and corresponding to the failure. A group of guidance messages (guidance message group) 19b in which are written and a pig conversion table L9c are stored in advance.

This data conversion table 19c represents code information such as line status, operation flag, etc. written in a predetermined area of a RAM-configured main memory (not shown) possessed by the slave station tt-i (its CPU). It is used to replace the meaning with a character string that can be easily recognized by workers such as network monitors. In addition, UDL processing program 18a1 failure report data 19a1 guidance message group 1.9b
and the data conversion table 1.9c may be stored in the same ROM or in independent ROMs.

Next, the operation of one embodiment of the present invention will be explained by taking as an example the case where ULD data at the time of failure is created and transmitted to the master station 10 because a failure has occurred in the slave station 11-1 shown in FIG. This will be explained with reference to the flowchart shown in the figure as appropriate.

Now, one of the slave stations ll-1 to 11-3 shown in FIG.
It is assumed that a failure occurs at the station (station) and an unrecoverable error occurs. In this case, code data indicating the cause of unrecovery is written as a stop code (STOP C0DE) to a predetermined location in the main memory of the slave station 11-1, and then stored in the ROM 18 of the slave station 11-1. The UDL processing program 1.8a that is currently running is started. The stop code at this time is 1.1, which indicates a PX bus error.
．． 01 (hexadecimal representation).

Slave station l1-1. According to the UDL processing program 18a, the station (301) first extracts data (status information) representing the status of each part at the time of failure (abnormality) from a predetermined area of the main memory (not shown) of its own station, for example, ``1''. The stop code, the CPU status indicating the CPU status, the operation flag indicating the operating status, the line status indicating the line status, the last received data, the PX bus status indicating the PX bus status, etc. are read (step S1). . Next, slave station 1.1. -1
．． (Station 301) reads each data (code) of the stop code, operation flag, line status, and PX bus status from the main memory according to the data conversion table 19c stored in its own ROM 19. ) - is converted into a character string that can be easily understood by humans (step S2).

Slave station 11-1. (301 station) finishes the conversion process in step S2, and then stores the failure report data 19 from the ROM 19.
a is read (step S3). This failure report data 1
9a is provided with various status information fields for setting a stop code, CPU status, operation flag, line status, PX bus status, etc. when a failure occurs. When the slave station 11-1 reads the failure report data 19a in step S3, it fills each status information field in the data 1.9a with the status information read in step S] or in the conversion process in step S2. Set the obtained converted character string and create a failure report (step S4
).

An example of a failure report created in this way is shown in FIG. 3 (in the form of an output image). In the same figure, the underlined part is the status information field. For example, the status information field to the right of the character string rsTOP C0DE=J, "cPU status=" contains the stop code (read from the main memory in step S1). Here is 1:
1.01) The CPU status (800B) is set directly in hexadecimal representation. Also, [Lanten F L
The status information field on the right side of A G = J contains the conversion character string for the operation flag data read from the main memory in step S1, that is, the meaning of the operation flag state at the time of failure, which is used by a worker such as a network monitor. The character string ``Untenchuu'' (meaning while driving) is set so that it can be easily understood. Similarly, in the status information field to the right of "Kaisen (line)", the conversion character string "Seladan (meaning line disconnection)" for the line status data at the time of failure is written as "PX bus". In the status information field on the right side, a conversion character string "rBUS error" for the PX bus status data at the time of failure is set. Further, in the line below "Sign data", the final received data read from the main memory in step S1 is set in, for example, hexadecimal representation.

Note that the underlined fields include, in addition to the above-mentioned status information field, fields in which the station number of the relevant station, date of failure, etc. are set.

When the slave station 11-1 creates a failure report, it selects the type of line failure (line disconnection, loopback, synchronization loss, etc.) represented by the line status at the time of failure from among the guidance message group 19b stored in the ROM 19 in advance. ), and set necessary data (fault location, contact information according to the fault type, etc.) in the message and add it to the fault report (step S5).
).

In the example in Figure 3, "Kunyo Gaishori Guidance"
The following line is a guidance message, and this message describes the content and procedure for handling the current line failure, that is, line disconnection.

Note that the portions in which data is set in the guidance meso message in FIG. 3 are underlined.

When the slave station 11-1 executes step S5 above, it transmits the failure report with the guidance message added to the master station 10 via the data communication line 12 as UDL (upline dump) data (ULD data at the time of failure). (Step S6).

When the master station 10 receives the failure ULD data in the failure report format transmitted from the slave station 11-1, it passes the data to the supervisory control device 13. The supervisory control device 13 stores the ULD data passed from the master station 10 (from the slave station 11-1) in the HDDs 1 and 4 as a ULD file.

The ULD file is stored in the HDD l4 of the supervisory control device 13, and is further stored on the console CRT by the network monitor.
16's keyboard 15 etc. are operated, and the ULD file on the ]5 HDD 14 is transferred to the console CRT.
16, the requested ULD file is dumped. As a result, a visible trouble report in text format as shown in FIG. 3 is displayed on the console CRT 18. Of course, it is also possible to print out the trouble report in text format using the PRT 17.

Network monitors can easily determine the failure status, cause, etc. from the failure report displayed on console CRTI 6 (or printed out from PRT 7), and can easily determine the failure status, cause, etc. From the guidance message, you can learn how to deal with failures and procedures. Therefore, when a problem occurs, it is possible to take immediate action even if the person is not a specific person who is familiar with the system, and in particular, preparing guidance such as how to read the problem report as shown in Figure 3 makes it easier. You will be able to perform failure analysis simply by receiving appropriate training. Additionally, since you will always be looking at reports in the same format, you will get used to it and will be able to shorten the analysis time. Furthermore, instead of using the contents of the main memory at the time of a failure as ULD data, it is possible to create a UL that contains only the necessary data.
By using D data, the amount of ULD data can be significantly reduced, the load on the system can be reduced, and the time from when a failure occurs to when the failure is dealt with can be shortened. Furthermore, by incorporating the knowledge and know-how of key personnel familiar with the system into the specifications of the UDL processing program 18a, error-free analysis can be performed and information can be prevented from being omitted from acquisition.

In addition, in the above embodiment, in order to simplify the explanation, it was explained that a guidance message is prepared for each type of line failure.
) It is also possible to prepare guidance messages for each type of failure. In this case, it is preferable to select the guidance message according to the type of failure factor represented by the stomp code, rather than the type of line failure represented by the line status at the time of failure.

[7] Furthermore, in the embodiment described above, a case has been described in which the ULD file is in text format, but the present invention is not limited to this.

For example, the same text format as the ULD file in the above embodiment can be applied to files that are simply a list of trace codes and register contents, such as an output file of trace information of a system used for real-time software development. As a result, the same effects as in the above embodiment can be expected.

[Effects of the Invention] As detailed above, according to the present invention, ULD (upline dump) can be performed in the event of a failure in a data communication system in which a master station and a plurality of slave stations are interconnected via a data communication line.
data, rather than just main memory data at the time of failure.
By making the failure report data in text format that allows the user to easily identify the failure status, etc., it becomes possible to easily determine the failure status, cause, etc. from the same data.
By adding a guidance message that describes how to deal with the failure, it is possible to learn appropriate countermeasures depending on the content of the failure from the message. In addition, compared to the conventional method that uses the contents of main memory as ULD data at the time of a failure, the amount of ULD data can be significantly reduced.
It is also possible to shorten the time from when a failure occurs to when the failure is dealt with.

[Brief explanation of drawings]

FIG. 1 is a block configuration diagram showing an embodiment of a data communication system to which the present invention is applied, and FIG. 2 is a flowchart 1 for explaining UDL processing of a slave station in the embodiment.
FIG. 3 is a diagram showing an example of dumping ULD data in the same embodiment, and FIG. 4 is a diagram showing an example of dumping conventional ULD data. IO... Master station, 11-1 to 11-3... Slave station, 12...
...Data communication line, 13...Monitoring control device, 14...
-Hard disk device (HDD), 16...Console CRT. 17...Printer (PRT). 1.8, 1.9...
ROM. 18a... UDL processing program, 19a... Trouble report data, 19b... Guidance message group,
1.9c...Data conversion table. 11783], (7)

Claims (1)

[Scope of Claims] A data communication system in which a master station and a plurality of slave stations are interconnected by a data communication line, and a supervisory control device for monitoring and controlling the system is connected to the master station, , failure report data in a predetermined format with several status information fields in which the status of each part at the time of failure is entered, and guidance messages prepared for each type of failure and containing the details of abnormality measures for the corresponding failure. A storage means for pre-storing and the status of each part at the time of a failure of the own station are set in the corresponding status information field in the failure report data, and the above guidance message specific to the type of failure is also set. A failure report creation means for creating a failure report by adding the failure report, and a transmission means for transmitting the failure report created by the failure report creation means to the above-mentioned master station as upline dump data. An upline dump transmission method characterized in that a failure report transmitted from a station to a master station is passed to the supervisory control device and outputted to the outside from an output means of the supervisory control device.