Collecting System Configuration Information

2. Review the category and plugin descriptions listed on the System Configuration Collector Categories table to determine which of the categories in the list provide the information you want to collect for your particular situation.

If you have already contacted PTC Technical Support, the technical support engineer can provide guidance about which categories to select.

If the engineer provides you with a new plugin to install, you must complete that installation before selecting categories. For details on creating and installing plugins, see Creating a System Configuration Collector Plugin.

The Collect System Information window opens.

Sending collected information to PTC Technical Support requires that the PTC Service Contract Number (SCN) is set in the wt.support.scn property of the wt.properties file. For additional information, see Prerequisites for Sending Information to Technical Support.

Selecting the Collect, save, and send option activates the Case Number and Description fields:

Windchill uses the case number when creating a local directory for the saved information and when sending the information to technical support. The sent information is tagged with the case number so the technical support engineer can easily find all of the information you send that is related to a case.

If you have not opened a case with PTC Technical Support or you do not want to send the collected information directly to PTC Technical Support, select Collect and save.

Selecting the Collect and save option activates the Directory field. In this field, enter alphanumeric characters that are then used as the name of the subdirectory under which the collected information is locally stored. The characters you enter must be characters that are allowed in directory names. For example, do not include spaces or special characters such as * or &.

To collect information multiple times for the same issue before sending the collected information, enter the same directory name each time.

5. Select the range of days for which any logs are collected. The date and time specified assumes the time zone of the client machine from which the Collect System Information page is displayed. If the client machine and all Windchill servers are using the same time zone, then the logs collected include logs with a last modified file timestamp between 12:00 AM on the starting date and 11:59 PM on the ending date that you select from the client.

If the machine on which you are selecting dates has a different time zone than the time zone set on a Windchill server, the last modified file timestamp range that is used shifts so that the files collected correspond to the files last modified during the specified client dates and times selected in the Collect System Information page. For example, assume that the client time zone is set to Tokyo (GMT +09:00) and the user selects 05/01/10 for both start and end dates. The user then expects that the files to be collected are files with a modified timestamp from 5/1/10 12:00 AM to 5/1/10 11:59 PM Tokyo time. However, if the server is in New York and its time zone is set to New York (GMT -05:00), there is a time shift of 14 hours required. The time corresponding to 5/1/10 12:00 AM Tokyo time is 4/30/10 10:00 AM New York time and 5/1/10 11:59 PM Tokyo time is 5/1/10 9:59 AM New York time. Therefore, logs collected from the New York server are the logs with last modified dates from 4/30/10 10:00 AM to 5/1/10 9:59 AM New York time.

For additional information about Windchill logging, see Managing Windchill Logging.

6. If one or more of the plugins require logging on to the Windchill database, the Database Administrator User and Database Administrator Password fields activate. You must then enter the database administrator user and password in the fields provided to enable Windchill to execute the plugins that require logging on to the database. Specify the database administrator user name and password that enables the plugin to query the database.

If you do not have access to the database administrator user name and password values, you can leave the fields blank. However, then any plugin that requires database administrator user name and password values will fail with a message indicating that the required credentials were not supplied.

Click Cancel to return to the System Configuration Collector Categories table without starting the collection process.

When the collection process starts, the Collection Status window opens and the selected categories are listed at the top of the display. As each plugin executes, the display updates with status messages that describe the activities. If you have selected to send the collected information, messages describing this activity also display in the window.

While plugins are executing, you can click Cancel Operation to stop the collection of information. Additionally, if the System Configuration Collector is sending the collected information, you can click Cancel Operation to stop sending the collected information.

Clicking Cancel Operation does not always stop plugins that are currently executing nor stop the sending of a file that is currently being sent. It prevents any plugin that has not begun executing from starting and prevents additional files from being sent. See Stopping Windchill Actions that Collect or Send Information.

After all plugins have been processed or after processing a cancellation, the Cancel Operation button becomes inactive and the Close button is activated. After reviewing the contents of the widow, click Close.

If you selected the Collect and save option, you can navigate to the specified directory and inspect the contents of the files that are saved there. At a later date, you can send the collected data using the Send Saved System Information tab. See Sending Previously Collected Information.