OSF DCE Administration Guide--Core Components

OSF DCE Administration Guide—Core Components
they should take in a given situation.
Note: User-prompted, interactive, client-generated messaging is handled through
the standard DCE messaging interface.
The serviceability component is used by the DCE components (RPC, DTS, Security, and
so on) for their own server messaging, and it is made available as an API for use by DCE
application programmers who wish to standardize their applications’ server messaging.
(The serviceability API is described in the .)
Messaging uses XPG4 (X/Open Portability Guide) message catalogs to hold message
texts, but it adds an additional layer to the XPG4 functionality. The message catalogs
and other required data (and documentation) files are generated by a utility called sams
(symbols and message strings). Its input is a text file that establishes some
organizational information about the program that is to use the messages, followed by a
series of specifications of the messages themselves. The serviceability mechanism
allows system administrators to control the routing of these messages. Specifically, you
can define message routings based on the severity levels (FATAL, ERROR, and so on)
defined for the messages.
The following sections describe how to control the routing of serviceability messages.
First, you are provided with an overview of serviceability messaging in the DCE. Then
the text describes how you can use message severity levels to control routing. Finally, it
describes the different ways in which you can specify routing for serviceability
messages.
9.4.1 Serviceability Message Severity Levels
Serviceability messages are categorized by their severity level, which provides important
information about the situation that causes the program to issue the message. Every
message’s severity is defined in the text of the message itself (for example, NOTICE
indicates that a message is an ‘‘informational notice’’), and system administrators can
route messages differently on the basis of their severity levels.
The following table lists the possible severity levels and provides an explanation for
each.
TABLE 9-1. Serviceability Message Severity Levels
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Name Meaning
____________________________________________________
____________________________________________________
Fatal error exit: An unrecoverable
error (such as database corruption)
has occurred and will probably
require manual intervention to be
corrected. The program usually
terminates immediately after such
an error.
FATAL
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