Solstice Disksuite FAQ(10)

Document ID: 2085

　　SYNOPSIS: Ten common Solstice Disksuite questions

　　DETAIL DESCRIPTION:

　　1. DiskSuite versions and compatibility

　　2. How to populate md.conf file

　　3. How to suppress forceload message

　　4. Replicas on SSA marked as 'bad'

　　5. Checking metadevice states

　　6. Failed boot under DiskSuite control

　　7. Checking replica states

　　8. Explanation of disksets

　　9. Increase the number of metadevices

　　10. Metainit command for RAID5

　　SOLUTION SUMMARY:

　　1. Which version of DiskSuite runs on SunOS 4.1.4?

Online: DiskSuite 1.0 is the only version of DiskSuite compatible

with SunOS 4.X.

While installing DiskSuite 1.0, you may encounter an error:

This software is not compatible with the current operating system.

This is the list of compatible operating systems:

4.1.1

4.1.2

Do you want to continue? [y|n]

Simply answer "y" and continue with the installation.

DiskSuite 1.0 is compatible with SunOS 4.1.2, 4.1.2, 4.1.3, and 4.1.4.

Online DiskSuite 2.0, 2.0.1 and 3.0 are compatible with Solaris 2.1

and later releases of Solaris 2.X.

Solstice Disksuite 4.0 is compatible with Solaris 2.3 and later

Solaris 2.X releases.

Solstice Disksuite 4.1 is compatible with Solaris 2.4 and later

Solaris 2.X releases.

　　2. After setting up Metadevices using metatool, how do I record

the configuration in the md.tab file?"

Run the following command after the configuration is complete

to record the configuration:

metastat -p >/etc/opt/SUNWmd/md.tab

　　3. During the boot process, the message "WARNING: forceload of

misc/md_hotspares failed." appears, what does it mean?

This warning is harmless and can be ignored. The forceload statement

in the /etc/system file is designed to load the device driver as

soon as possible in the boot process. If the device driver is not

needed, it will not load, and reports this type of warning message.

To suppress the message, create an empty hotspare pool with the command:

# metainit hsp001

　　4. Upon reboot, all replicas on the SPARCStorage Array go bad.

How do I prevent this?

Add the following entries to the /etc/system file to avoid this problem:

forceload: drv/ssd

forceload: drv/SUNW,pln

forceload: drv/SUNW,soc

You add forceloads to the /etc/system file so that the SSA 200 disks are

available early in the boot process.

　　5. A disk went bad and needs to be replaced, how do I find the

state of the DiskSuite software?

Use the metastat command to find the state of the Disksuite configuration.

If a component is in need of maintenance, the metastat output will

give the course of action required.

　　6. How do I remove the boot disk from DiskSuite control?

ok boot cdrom

# fsck /dev/rdsk/c0....

# mount /dev/dsk/c0t3d0s0 /a

Note: this assumes that your boot device is target three on

controller zero.

# vi /a/etc/system

comment [*] out entries pertaining to / being a metadevice

(rootdev:pseudo/md:0,blk)

# vi /a/etc/vfstab

change metadevice name to physical disk partition for all

file systems associated with booting

# mv /a/etc/opt/SUNWmd/etc/mddb.cf /a/etc/opt/SUNWmd/prob.mddb.cf

# umount /a

# fsck /dev/rdsk/c0t3d0s0

# reboot

　　7. How do I check the status of the state database replicas?

Use the metadb command to find the state of the Disksuite replicas.

If a replica is in need of attention, the flags will report appropriately.

Often the SDS metatool will report the replicas to be in a critical

state when metadb reports no problems.

# metadb -i

flags first blk block count

a m pc luo 16 1034 /dev/dsk/c1t5d0s4

a pc luo 1050 1034 /dev/dsk/c1t5d0s4

a pc luo 2084 1034 /dev/dsk/c1t5d0s4

o - replica active prior to last mddb configuration change

u - replica is up to date

l - locator for this replica was read successfully

c - replica's location was in /etc/opt/SUNWmd/mddb.cf

p - replica's location was patched in kernel

m - replica is master, this is replica selected as input

W - replica has device write errors

a - replica is active, commits are occurring to this replica

M - replica had problem with master blocks

D - replica had problem with data blocks

F - replica had format problems

S - replica is too small to hold current data base

R - replica had device read errors

　　8. How are disksets used?

A shared diskset is a grouping of two hosts and disk drives in which all

the drives are accessible by both hosts. Disksuite requires that the

device name be identical on each host in the diskset. There is one

metadevice state database per shared diskset and one on the local disks

of each host.

Before you can begin to create or administer disksets, the disksuite

software must be installed on each host in the diskset and each host

must have local database replicas set up. In addition, all disks that

you plan to share between hosts in the diskset must be connected to each

host and must have the same name (shared_diskset name) on each host.

　　9. How do I create more than 128 meta devices?

Edit the file /kernel/drv/md.conf file and change the "nmd" field from

nmd=128 to whatever amount is needed (i.e., 255).

Then boot -r to build these new devices.

　　10. How do I metainit a RAID5 device?

metainit d0 -r c2t0d0s4 c2t2d0s4 c2t4d0s4 c2t0d4s4 c2t3d1s4 -k -i 32b

If you omit the -k option data loss will occur.

This only applies to existing RAID5 metadevices, not new ones.

　　DATE APPROVED: 03/25/98

　　KEYWORDS: disksuite forceload RAID5

　　OS RELEASE: N/A