Testing & Debugging in

Informatica PowerCenter

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Agenda
 What do we test in Informatica?
 Preparing to test
 Different types of problems
 Solutions to problems
 Using the debugger
 Where to look for problem causes
 Common problems and their solutions

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Testing – What needs to be tested?
 Format
Examples:
 File
length
 Number formats
 Representation of NULL
 Logic
Examples:
 Calculation results
 Results of logical conditions
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Testing – Preparing for battle
 Prepare test plan
 Grant appropriate file permissions
 Prepare test data

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Types of problems
 Format related
“What is this junk data?!!!”
”My file looks ugly!!”
 Logic related
“Why am I getting a different output? I am SURE my
logic is correct”
 Others
Workflow fails
No session log written

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Fighting it out…
 Format related problems
Solution:
 File length – Check port length/precision
 Number formats – Check port
length/precision
 Representation of NULL – check session
properties

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Fighting it out…
 Logic related problems
Solution: Debugger!!!!!

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Features in the Debugger
 Setting break points
 Evaluating expressions
 Discarding target data

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Using the Debugger

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Fighting it out…
 Other problems

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Where to look?
1. Session property in Workflow monitor
2. Session log
3. Session property in Workflow designer
4. Debugger

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Accessing the session
property in Workflow
monitor

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Accessing the session
Log file in Workflow
monitor

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Changing the logging to
‘verbose’ mode

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Changing ‘NULL’
representation

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Fighting it out…
 Common problems and causes
SNo Problem
1 Workflow fails at the beginning itself
2 Workflow fails at the beginning itself, no
file access problems
3 Workflow fails for some reason
4 Data is being truncated for some
reason
5 Logical equality/inequality operators do
not seem to work
6 Logical conditions are getting executed
wrongly
7 Numbers are being read from flat file.
Corresponding calculation results are
wrong
8 During debugging, all ports get null
value
Solution
Check monitor session properties if file
access problems exist
Check SQL syntax in source qualifiers
Check session log. If necessary, run session
in ‘verbose’ mode
Check port length
Trimming is needed/Check data type
Check if NULL checks have been performed
Check length/precision of ports
Some fatal error has occurred. Eg: division by
zero, invalid date 59
Thank You!

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