Arguably the most effective method for CUCM SDL trace analysis is using GrepWin for multi-file pattern matching paired with Notepad++ for trace analysis.  Once you get past the basics in SDL, TranslatorX becomes unwieldy due to perf issues with importing many files.  Most TAC engineers follow the same approach.  This method works brilliantly on Windows and I wanted to reproduce it on Ubuntu without needing to resort to CLI warrior antics.

To do this I used the following:

• Sublime Text 3 with BetterBookmarks and StyleToken packages installed
• Rummage as an alternative to Grepwin

I like Sublime Text 3, but don’t use it as an IDE for dev, so it’s fulfilled a similar function to what Notepad++ does on Windows for me.

Sublime Text 3 Setup

The Sublime Text setup is easy – simply install the editor (if not already done) and add the BetterBookmarks and StyleToken packages.

StyleToken works similarly to Notepad++’s style highlighting, and BetterBookmarks adds some extras to the native bookmarking, like bookmark persistence.  There are other bookmarking packages, but this one worked reasonably well for me.

I’ve also had pretty good mileage with Sublime Text 3 and the SideBarEnhancements package.

Rummage Setup

Rummage is an excellent cross-platform alternative to GrepWin, which is one of my long-time favourite windows apps.

To install Rummage on Ubuntu, the installation guide should be followed.  An apt-based install is not available, and the app needs to be deployed with pip. Some dependencies are required to support wxPython, and the python3 version should be matched to your OS version.  Please refer to the installation guide for more information. Thereafter, you can simply install rummage using:

$ pip install rummage

Once installed, you may find it useful to add rummage as a script in nautilus, as described here.

Additionally, a .desktop file can be added:

$ vi ~/.local/share/applications/rummage.desktop

The file should look like this:

[Desktop Entry]
Name=Rummage
Comment=Linux alternative to GrepWin
Exec="/usr/local/bin/rummage"
Terminal=false
Type=Application
Keywords=grepwin;grep;rummage;

You may also want to create a custom icon.  This can be done by adding rummage’s own icon, which can be found as such:

$ sudo updatedb
$ sudo locate rummage_hires.png

Then, simply add the following to your .desktop file:

Icon=/path/to/rummage/lib/gui/data/rummage_hires.png

Finally, set sublime as your text editor in the client under File > Preferences > Editor:

"/usr/bin/subl" "{$file}:{$line}:{$col}"

This will allow you to double-click on search results and open them in Sublime Text 3.

You can confirm the above sublime path (which should be correct for an apt-based install) with:

$ which subl

Once this is done, the pattern-grep/analyse/bookmark/highlight/rinse-repeat trace analysis paradigm in GrepWin and Notepad++ is pretty closely approximated.