Purpose
The purpose of this document is help in searching for specific content (relating to an error log) in the SAP Netweaver Application Server ABAP workprocess (or any other R/3 related service/process) traces. This can be a very tedious affair if many workprocesses are configured and this document explains how to do this from the SAP server end, rather than logging to the operating system to search in the actual trace file.
Example Scenario
Lets say the configured Single Sign On (SSO) setup between SAP Portal and the R/3 system fails with issues similar to:
Usually in such cases, the BASIS admin analyzes the J2EE and ABAP server logs. Now from the J2EE end, more details can be seen from the diagtool trace ( see http://service.sap.com/sap/support/notes/1045019 for SAP NW 6.40 and 7.00 servers and http://service.sap.com/sap/support/notes/1332726 for SAP NW 7.1+ servers), but when it comes to the ABAP server, the request can be handled by any one of the R/3 dialog workprocesses (usually one productive ABAP instance has 20 or more dialog workprocesses). Now searching all the dev_w0 files can be a cumbersome affair particularly if many ABAP instances are involved.
Solution
Use the ABAP server search function (TCode: /nSM51).
Type in the search text entry. There are some recurring error entries like “note 1055856” , “cannot create SAP logon ticket”, “TWPSSO2ACL”, “ticket issuer not trusted” etc. when there is an SSO issue. Or just use the user ID with which the issue was reproduced (or time or any other valid parameter).
The next screen shows you the exact trace file which has the error:
Navigate to the trace file (using /nAL11 or /nST11) and voila, you get more information:
Now, check the note and help documents to solve this. The only caveat is that this search is instance specific; if you have more than one ABAP server, this needs to be done individually on each instance.
NOTE: http://service.sap.com/sap/support/notes/1769367 : Issuer of SSO ticket is not authorized also provides important information on troubleshooting such issues.
For a similar guide on checking application logs on an Application server JAVA, check: