Selective Plugin Execution

The Selective plugin execution feature allows user to execute only a subset of the applicable plugins. Before we get into the details of how to use selective plugin execution feature let's first understand what is applicable plugins.

ServiceReport supports a variety of FFDC configuration checks across multiple architectures and Linux distros. It is possible that an FFDC configuration check requires for a particular Linux distro but may not be required for others. Similarly, it can happen that a plugin (a group of configuration checks) may only be required for a particular architecture. For example, the FADump plugin is only designed for PowerPC architecture. The initial task of ServiceReport at the beginning of its execution is to identify the plugins which are valid for the current system. All the plugins which are identified as valid for the current system are considered as applicable plugins.

There is a dedicated option available in ServiceReport to print the list of applicable plugins. Use the command specified below to print the applicable plugins of your system.

$ sudo servicereport -l

servicereport 2.2.1

The following plugins are applicable:

   daemon                   Daemon availability check
   kdump                    Kdump configuration check
   package                  Package availability check

As depicted in the above example the system has three applicable plugins which include daemon, kdump, and package.

ServiceReport by default runs all the applicable plugins but with the selective plugin execution feature, users can change this default behavior and restrict the ServiceReport to only run a subset of applicable plugins. Let's see an example.

$ servicereport -p package kdump

In the above example, ServiceReport is restricted to run only two plugins (package and kdump) although three plugins were applicable. To see the selective execution feature in action follow the GIF given below.