Unfortunately our Veritas Clusters are rather new, and when setting them up we didn't have a clear plan as to how things where to be laid out. This means that we have far to many Resource Groups making the linking of the resources difficult. Some details discovered did cover some of the things, but not everything, such as the clean up and removal of those redundant RGs. So I decided to include that extra information here, for my reference later. First a note ; if you have access to the GUI. This job is 100% easier, as it's just a move... [More]

Tags:  linux veritas cluster vcs symantec aix power

So we've built a Symantec Cluster Server (VCS), but we are not happy with the resource names. Maybe its not really clear what they are for, but with a simple edits of a file we can change all that. The  /etc/VRTSvcs/conf/config/main.cf contains all the details and resource names, so make sure we take a copy. If its wrong, then its going to be difficult to figure out where we went wrong. Also the cluster keeps these in sync, so if we edit it on one node, it will update the details on the other. The steps are:   # hares -display... [More]

Tags:  aix veritas vcs linux cluster power symantec

Continuing with my cluster builds, but before the true cluster configuration is done, I need to setup and service address. This is the address that the application requires to move between the nodes, this could be so that you login via one know address, or to ensure and continued access portal. What ever the requirement, its needed to get the application set-up ready so that I can configure the application under VCS control. Below is a quick guide on how to set this up, more complicated and intelligent solutions exist. So you can use node... [More]

Tags:  cluster aix symantec linux vcs veritas power

Today after I getting all the filesystem mount points configured and set up in a cluster I was was asked change them. Annoying but not something I was initially sure how to do. Little bit of searching and clarification of the VCS commands this is what I was able to figure out. First lets take a look at the mount we are about to move: # hares -display cfsmount1 | grep -i MountPoint cfsmount1    ArgListValues         server1   MountPoint       ... [More]

Tags:  aix vcs cluster symantec power veritas

So time ago, I wrote a document on how to install VCS on IBM Power. At the time I was with the IBM Redbooks team writing a number of publications and found some of the information that I needed a bit short. Since then I've not had a lot of opportunities to build more clusters, that is until this month. Currently I'm building 3 different clusters on IBM Power all using VCS, but this time using Symantec Storage Foundation Cluster File System HA ( SFCFSHA ). So as things are a little different, I'm going to cover the build process... [More]

Tags:  vcs linux cluster sfcfsha veritas aix symantec power

It has been discovered that some disk devices on the VIOs are appearing as N/A against the driver type.  Normally this is due to the disks being imported with cfgmgr BEFORE the drivers are installed. Removing and adding these disk back in, or a reboot would normally resolve this, but in some cases even this would fail. Turns out that if LANG on the system is not set to en_US then the 3PAR driver is not shown: # echo $LANG C # lsdev -Cc disk | tail -1 hdisk4 Available 0H-04-12      N/A... [More]

Tags:  3par storage power aix hp

I've already covered the basics of creating a Symantec Cluster Server on IBM POWER using Symantec Storage Foundation to create a filesystem and then fail it over. So now I'm going to cover the next part, adding a application resource.  In this example I'm not going to be using true application, rather I'm going to get the system to stop and monitor a daemon, nfsd. Why did I do this? Because I didn't want to go into the configuration of various different applications, how they start, stop and everything else. This is... [More]

Tags:  cluster symantec aix veritas power

Over the years I've worked with a few different clustering solutions, mainly Sun Cluster (Now Oracle) and IBM PowerHA (called HACMP when first started). Never in all these years have I even touched Veritas which is now Symantec Cluster, so its been a bit of a learning exercise for me.  Fortunately my experience of other clusters has helped in some way to get this done, but at the same time it has also hindered, this due to a mix up of concepts.  PowerHA is the only cluster that I've built from scratch, and even performed... [More]

Tags:  aix cluster power veritas symantec

Over the last few months working with IBM PowerVC I've had to get used to using NPIV, not my first choice of virtual storage adapter due to its large memory footprint (130Mb per adapter compared to vSCSI for 1.5Mb). But given its ease of use for PowerVC allowing my colleagues to deploy IBM Power servers without me, it more then makes up for this. When I initially started using NPIV it took a little while to get the adapters set-up, a number of documents that I followed made some assumptions. This meant that I was looking at more then one... [More]

Tags:  linux lop aix storage powervc powervm powerlinux npiv power

As much as IBM Systems Directors once setup up is a great tool for managing your IBM Power systems, it in that initial set-up period is a complete pain to debug. I as much as anyone else completely hate it when its not working.  As its the base virtualisation framework for Cloud on Power I've spend a lot of time with it over the years and there always seems to be a new problem and error that I've not seen before.  So just as I continue to work on issues, I'm going to try to continue to log the errors and fixes that... [More]

Tags:  isd cloud sce vios storage linux agent power aix director smartcloud

For some time I've followed my own little document on how to set-up IBM Systems Director after reading the Implementing IBM SmartCloud Entry on POWER Systems using the PS703 BladeCenter H Reference Configuration guide. This has given me the basic framework some time ago on how to setup IBM Systems Director (ISD), Storage Control, and SmartCloud Entry that I use here at the IIC Hursley.  Things have changed considerably since then, in fact its now much easier to setup ISD... [More]

Tags:  aix storage director cloud isd power sce

In this article I'm going to cover what you need to do to setup Infiniband on IBM Power for Linux, in the example here it will be on Redhat, but when I get the time I will cover SUSE too.  Simply I had a system that a customer wants to test on and Redhat was their choice.  Now in my previous article I covered how the various GX++ adapters can be shared between the virtual machines in the system for AIX and this part is the same for Linux ( see here ). But I will cover those bits so you don't have to look in a different... [More]

Tags:  linux power powerlinux networking network infiniband

Re-installing a VIOS today to the latest version I hit a issue, it was that my HMC was complaining a server with the same name was already installing. The message was 'Install Virtual I/O Server Failed - <name> Error reading nimol configuration. The client "<name.domain>" already exists.'  As you can see from the image below:   It would seem that this is a bug with HMC 7.7.8.0, in that if you have ended a install before it completes, some of the clean up doesn't get done.  Fortunately there is a... [More]

Tags:  7780 power vios error hmc

If you see the following error, then like me you might be wondering what the issue is - U nable to connect to HMC <hmc-name>.   AEVCOM021E Explanation: Connection failed to the Hardware Management Console. Response: Review the explanation and try the request again. It would seem that PowerVC has performed more stringent checking then I have, and in this case it doesn't like my HMC, its a model 7042C06. If you have been paying attention and looking at my previous blogs you will see that the supported models are  CR5/C08 or... [More]

Tags:  error vios powervc power hmc linux powerlinux

As part of the IBM PowerVC work I've been doing there is something extra preperation work that needs to be done, namely the update of the Hardware Management Console and VIO Server. When the code is released you will need to be at: HMC V7.7.8 or later, CR5/C08 or later models. VIOS V2.2.3 or later.   So when you update your HMC, I recommend you take a look at this article as it will give you some tips on what you need to do: IBM Systems Magazine Blogs: Remote HMC Upgrades .   Once that update is complete, you can move onto the VIO... [More]

Tags:  power hmc install powervc vios

So I've done the first part of my PowerVC set-up, in this case install of the base code onto the Redhat 6.4 system I prepared.  If you're not sure how to do this then I have a number of related articles that cover setting up the repositories, IBM Power Tool, and the networking.  So be sure to have a look at those before you get started then you know you have the right packages on the image: IBM PowerVC: First you need to put the base code on the system, so find the package: gzip -d powervc-install-ppc-rhel-1.2.1.0.tgz and get... [More]

Tags:  linux power vios hmc powervc powerlinux

Its now been a week since the Linux on Power event, on the day we had 45 ISVs  about 60 attendees this included 8 Distributors and partners.  A number of good networking sessions went on during the breaks, and I've been told that several of the ISVs said they hadn't appreciated what we had been doing with PowerLinux or why, so now they understand they would investigate in more detail for their organisation.  We also ran a impromptu consultation for a new ISV on the Wednesday, as they had heard about the event too... [More]

Tags:  linux powerlinux event presentation power

So all of your virtual machines (LPARs) have gone offline and you can't contact them any more, but is your VIOS still on the network, so what could be the matter? In my case the 'Shared Ethernet Adapter' on the VIOS has gone defined. So logon to the VIOS via the console and lets check the state of the adapters: padmin $ lsdev -type adapter name             status      description... [More]

Tags:  aix network powervm sea powerlinux linux iseries vios power

So you have a extensive IBM AIX environment with all of your SSH keys set-up, but now you have built a number of Linux servers which you want to add into this key range. So you copy over the existing authorized_keys file from your AIX system to a Linux host, then go to log in and find that nothing has changed; the ssh session still prompts you for the root password: [aix1:root] /root # ssh rh1 root@rh1's password: Last login: Mon Nov  4 13:48:44 2013 from aix1.domain.com [root@rh1 ~]# So why is it not working?  Simply their could... [More]

Tags:  aix power powerlinux ssh linux