Supplemental documentation are expanded sections of the GemStone/S documentation, that provide more details than can be included in the main set of documentation, or are of specialized use, or provide general starting points for understanding and using a feature rather than a detailed and specific set of instructions.

Supplemental documentation is part of the official documentation and expected to work in the most recent product versions, but may contain output from older versions or not include newly implemented features.

Tech tips are guidelines and rules of thumb that apply to GemStone/S development and administration. These are not part of the official documentation, but contain useful information.

Supplemental Documentation

Security and Encryption

  • Data Encryption using AWS Keys

    GemStone v3.6.3 and later includes an API to Amazon Web Services key management, allowing you to encrypt data using keys stored securely in the cloud, and manage those keys.

  • Data Encryption using Azure Key Vault

    GemStone v3.7 and later includes an API to Azure’s Key Vault, which provide key management services for data encryption.

Performance and Tuning

  • Statistics Definitions

    This has not been updated for recent versions of GemStone. See the help information in VSD for the latest details.
    Documentation on the various GemStone cache statistics and OS-specific system statistics that are written by Statmonitor and by GBS tools, and viewed using VSD. This document includes statistics that may be generated in any version of GemStone/S 64, and Gemstone/S, GBS. The information on these statistics is also available within VSD itself.
    This is an Appendix of the VSD Users’s Guide in version 5.4 and earlier.

Debugging

  • Object State Change Tracking using Tranlog Analysis

    GemStone’s transaction logs (tranlogs) hold the details of GemStone commits: which includes the full details of object creation and object modification. By analyzing transaction logs, you can determine which user and when a specific change in any object in your repository was made.
    This is an Appendix of the System Administration Guide in older version of GemStone/S 64 Bit

Monitoring

  • Shared Cache Monitoring using Prometheus

    Prometheus can query the GemStone statprom executable to extract cache statistics from a GemStone local or remote shared cache. The configured statistics are recorded in Prometheus, and can be viewed using applications such as Grafana.

  • Object Read Tracking

    GemStone can be configured to track object reads, for specific objects and specific UserProfiles. This feature is enabled for the Stone, specific objects are controlled using GsObjectSecurityPolicy features, and UserProfiles with or without specific privileges have their reads tracked for the specific objects. Object read tracking writes results to .csv files.

Hot Standby

  • Upgrade Via Hotstandby

    When upgrading a system that includes a Hot Standby, you must normally restore a new backup of the upgraded master into the standby slave following upgrade. To reduce the downtime for the standby, you can upgrade the slave, perform a failover with roll reversal, and allow the new slave system to be upgraded via replaying the tranlogs from the new master.

    Optimization

    • Canonical Object Framework

      For objects that have a finite set of possible values (such as Dates in older versions of GemStone), and which are used frequently within an application, it can be useful to canonicalize the instances, and so reduce the number of duplicate instances. The Canonical Object Framework provides a framework to implement canonicalization for instances in your application environment.

      TechTips

      Performance and Tuning

      • TechTip: Garbage Collection in GemStone/S 64 Bit

        The internal workings of GemStone Garbage Collection, and how to analyze performance and configure your GemStone system to collect garbage efficiently and with the least impact on a production system. GemStone/S 64 Bit only, v3.5 and later

      • TechTip: Tuning the NotConnected Set

        In 32-bit GemStone/S, the NotConnectedSet avoids constraints on gem memory, at the risk of causing unexpected repository growth. This tip describes how to diagnose and avoid problems related to the NotConnectedSet. 32-bit GemStone/S only

      Configuration

      • TechTip: Netldi Port Use

        Describes how the netldi uses ports during the login process, and with advice for configuring port use to accomodate firewalls.

      Debugging

      • TechTip: Diagnosing Out-of-Memory Errors

        In GemStone/S 64 Bit, it is a fatal error when a gem runs out of memory. You need to configure the amount of temporary memory per gem, and write your application to keep the memory requirements reasonable. This tip describes how to go about this.

      • TechTip: How to Get a Stack Trace on Windows

        Diagnosing internal errors may require C level process stack traces. While UNIX platforms have built-in tools, Windows requires using WinDbg. This tip provides instructions on how to install WinDbg and get a server stack trace on Windows.

      • TechTip: Debugging RPC Logins

        A step-by-step description of the interprocess communications involved in an RPC login, helpful when encountering errors during login. This document is somewhat out of date, (the PageManager now offloads some of the Stone’s tasks), but overall steps remain the same.

      • TechTip: Remote Linked Logins

        A step-by-step description of the interprocess communications involved in a remote linked login, helpful when encountering errors during login. This document is somewhat out of date (the PageManager now offloads some of the Stone’s tasks), but overall steps remain the same.

      • TechTip: Analyzing Object Security Policies

        This tip provides a topaz script that will give you a report on the layout, owners and permissions of all object security policies in your repository.

      Older Legacy Material

      • Historical Archive Product Manuals

        For reference, much older documentation is available for reference, Archive Product Manuals.