Configuring Tracing

Prerequisites

To configure the tracing process, your user must be assigned one of the following roles:

SAP_BC_WEBSERIVCE_ADMIN_BIZ allows you to configure Functional Trace.
SAP_BC_WEBSERIVCE_ADMIN_TEC allows you to configure Functional Trace and Payload Trace, as well as to lock Functional Trace and Payload Trace for some users.

For more information, see Authorizations.

Context

Functional Trace is a utility that allows you to fully analyze a problem situation with a Web service. When activated, it records different calls from, to, and within the SOAP runtime. The recording is based on the configured trace level. The Payload Trace utility can record the whole SOAP request and response, including application data sending over the HTTP channel. It can be activated by a specified payload trace level.

You can use the tracing functionality to perform a detailed analysis of errors in Web services that were discovered with logging and monitoring. You can activate the tracing and set the desired tracing level for a user, terminal, or request URI:

Tracing by user

You can specify the user ID under which the Web service consumer or provider is running. It is suggested you use tracing by user only if you know there is only one Web service application logging to the ABAP back end for the selected user.
Tracing by terminal

It is suggested you use tracing by terminal instead of by user when there is more than one application running for the same user. When you want to use tracing by terminal, make sure the user has set SAP GUI to send the terminal ID for each request to the back end. For more information, see Request-Based Debugging - Concept.
Tracing by request URI

You can specify the request URI, which identifies the Web service endpoint at the provider side. You can use tracing by request URI when conversation security with delay logon is used.

The tracing information is available only in English. The tracing configuration is client-specific.

Procedure

Start transaction SRT_UTIL.
Choose to specify for whom you want to activate tracing.

You need to do this only if there is no corresponding entry in the Users & Terminals & Request URI list.
To choose the user for which you want to set the tracing settings, proceed as follows:
1. Double-click an entry from the Users & Terminals & Request URI list.
2. Choose the Configuration tab.
Activate or deactivate the performance tracing.
Select the functional trace level:
- Inactive stops tracing.
- Use Low to record only calls from and to main components of the SOAP runtime.
  
  When you set this level, the system writes trace data to the database at the end of the processing within the Web service runtime. In case the processing stops for some reason, the system loses the tracing data.
- Use High to record calls from, to, and within the main components of the SOAP runtime.
  
  When you set this level, the system writes trace data to the database immediately at each tracing call. In case of abort, there is no loss of tracing data. Consider that tracing at this level influences the performance of a Web service call.
Activate or deactivate the payload tracing.
When payload tracing is active, you can select the payload trace level:
- Choose whether the payload tracing should be active for consumer proxies, service definitions, or both.
- Choose whether the records should be collected for all Web service interfaces, or for specific consumer proxies and service definitions.
Choose Save Configuration.

Results

When you activate functional tracing or payload tracing, the system starts recording tracing information for the specified user, terminal, or request URI for two hours. By default, the system keeps the tracing information for two days. If you need to keep the tracing information, you can set the expiration day individually for each trace entry.

Note

If tracing is activated over a lengthy time period, this can have a negative effect on performance.

For more information about reviewing the collected tracing information, see Displaying Traces.