Auditing old installation and the use of symbolic links

It is common for the installer to symbolically link key directories to different types of storage.

  1. Review the storage configuration of the old RTM server. Table 1 provides samples of different storage types that can be symbolically linked to key directories.
    Table 1. Sample installer symbolic links of key directories to different storage types
    Location Symbolic link target
    /var/lib/mysql High speed storage for the database. /var/ partitions are generally small and therefore this location is linked quite frequently.
    /opt/IBM/cacti/rra High speed storage for RRD files.
    /opt/IBM/cacti/log Storage that is backed up by system backups.
    /opt/IBM/[cacti|rtm|flexlm|advocate] Often symbolically linked to other locations due to policies by the admin to not locate binaries in /opt.
    /opt/IBM/cacti/backup NFS in order to allow for database backups to be themselves backed up automatically.
  2. Make sure that the following locations on the new system have enough space.
    /opt/IBM/cacti/rra
/opt/IBM/cacti/backups
/var/lib/mysql
  3. Determine how much space each directory occupies. For example:
    du -hs /opt/IBM/cacti/rra

    If this location is symbolically linked to another directory, for example, /rtmrrd/rra, run the following command:

    du -hs /rtmrrd/rra