To create a live recording

Important: Reverse Debug and Live Recording functionality is licensed and installed separately from undo.io. You can enable reverse debug functionality by downloading the extension from the Micro Focus Marketplace.

This functionality is only supported on the following platforms:

  • Red Hat Linux (x86 and x64)
  • SUSE Linux Enterprise Server (SLES) 12 SP2 (x64 only)
  • Ubuntu Linux 20.04.x (LTS) (x64 only)

Additional restrictions apply. For details, see the Reverse Debug and Live Recording topic in the Known Issues and Restrictions section of this documentation.

Windows Platforms: To use this option, you must connect to Visual COBOL Development Hub running on one of the supported UNIX platforms listed above.
  1. In the Eclipse IDE, click Run > Run Configurations.

    The Run Configurations dialog box appears.

  2. In the list of configuration types, double-click COBOL Application.
  3. In the right-hand pane, in the Name field, type a name for your run configuration.
  4. On the General tab, supply the following:
    COBOL Project
    The project that contains the program you want to run.
    Connection Properties
    If your project is located on a Visual COBOL Development Hub, specify the connection details for the remote project, and (if applicable) the X Server display details in order to run the program.
    Main Program
    If applicable, ensure that Program is part of project build configuration is checked, and that the name of the build configuration appears in the corresponding field: it should contain your project's output path and main program to be run.
  5. On the Environment tab, define the COB_LIVE_RECORD environment variable:
    1. Click Add.
    2. In the Variable field, type COB_LIVE_RECORD.
    3. In the Value field, you need to provide a filename prefix for the output file you want the Live Recorder to create when the program runs. The default directory for the output file is the output directory defined in your COBOL properties (projectDir/New Configuration.bin by default). If you want to put your output file in an alternative location, specify both the full path and the filename prefix. For example:
      /home/user/workspace/myrecordings/tictac
      Tip: Optionally, you can also add the COB_LIVE_RECORD_SIZE variable, giving an integer value to represent the amount of memory (in MB) allocated to recording events that will be written to the output file. If this value (or if the variable is not set, the default of 268MB) is exceeded, the buffer is cycled during recording so that the oldest events are removed to make space for the most recent events; therefore, when debugging such a recording file, debugging won't necessarily start at the beginning of the program.
    4. Click OK.
  6. Run the application:
    1. On the Run Configurations dialog box, click Run.
    2. Let the application run until it terminates normally: the live recording file is not created until the application ends.
  7. From a terminal window or file browser, go to the directory specified by the COB_LIVE_RECORD environment variable, and confirm that the output file has been created.

    The output filename takes the following form:

    filePrefix.nnnn.mfr

    Where filePrefix is the filename prefix you specified for the COB_LIVE_RECORD environment variable and nnnn is a generated process ID.