IV62717: MISSING OPTION FOR MONITORING THE DISK CONTRIBUTION TO SWAP SPACE ON SOLARIS

IBM Tivoli Monitoring 6.3.0 Fix Pack 5 (6.3.0-TIV-ITM-FP0005)

APAR status

• Closed as program error.

Error description

• All of the attributes in the Unix Memory group (UNIXMEM)
  that monitor the server swap space (Total_Swap_Space_MB,
  Used_Swap_Space_MB , Avail_Swap_Space_MB, Used_Swap_Space_Pct,
  Avail_Swap_Space_Pct) take into account both the space defined
  for swap on the disk and the space reserved in physical memory
  as pseudo-swap space.
  
  This is in synch with the output of the "swap -s" command,
  and is the documented / designed behavior of the UNIX OS
  agent as described in the User's Guide for the monitoring
  agent.
  
  With this design, it is not possible to monitor the
  relative contributions to swap space that come from the
  disk and from the physical memory .
  
  To provide the ability to monitor the disk contribution only,
  a new parameter will be added that removes the "pseudo-swap"
  space as measured by the physical memory that can be used
  as "swap" by the OS.
  
  Affected Platforms / Versions:
  This issue affects the UNIX OS agent at any version,
  on the Solaris platform only.
  .
  On HP-UX the same issue was addressed by APAR  IV37296.
  
  Diagnostics:
    Compare the Avail_Swap_Space_MB attribute value against
    the sum of  the 'free' swap spaces reported by the
    "swap -l" command.
    They may differ because "swap -l" returns only the swap
    spaces defined on disk, whereas "swap -s" reports all
    the contributions including physical memory being used
    as pseudo-swap space.
  
  Example:
  # swap -l    (values are in 512-byte blocksize)
  swapfile                 dev    swaplo   blocks     free
  /dev/zvol/dsk/rpool/swap 182,2   16     8388592   8388592
  # swap -s
  total: 36138696k bytes allocated + 20032k reserved =
    36158728k used, 67252376k available
  .
  Note that all the swap space from "swap -l" iss available
  (free = blocks), but only 65% is available according to "swap
  -s"
  output (and the Avail_Swap_Space_Pct attribute).
  .
  Initial Impact:
    Medium, customer might receive unexpected alerts from servers
    with plenty of available swap space on disk if they are
    unaware that the default behavior of the UX agent is using
    "swap -s" and includes the pseudo-swap space from memory
    in the calculation.
  
  Additional Keywords:
   UNIXMEM
   SWAPAVAIL
   SWAVAP
  

Local fix

Problem summary

• On Solaris, the Monitoring Agent for UNIX OS can not monitor the
   swap space defined on disk.  All of the attributes in the Unix
  Memory group (UNIXMEM) that monitor the server swap space
  (Total_Swap_Space_MB, Used_Swap_Space_MB , Avail_Swap_Space_MB,
  Used_Swap_Space_Pct, Avail_Swap_Space_Pct) take into account
  both the space defined for paging on the disk and the space
  reserved in physical memory as pseudo-swap space.
  
  In order for this APAR to be properly implemented in your
  environment, a new environment variable has been added.  See the
  "Install Actions" section of the APAR conclusion for more
  details.
  

Problem conclusion

• Introduced new environment variable that allows to skip the
  contribution of physical memory pseudo-swap space.  Default
  behavior is unchanged.
  
  Install Actions:
  
  Set KUX_SWAP_COUNTER_WITHOUT_MEMORY=true, allowed values
  true|false (case insensitive), false is the default.
  
  
  The fix for this APAR will be contained in the following
  maintenance packages:
  
  | FixPack    | 6.3.0-TIV-ITM-FP0005
  

Temporary fix

Comments

APAR Information

• APAR is sysrouted FROM one or more of the following:

• APAR is sysrouted TO one or more of the following:

Fix information

• Fixed component name

  ITM AGENT UNIX

• Fixed component ID

  5724C040U

Applicable component levels

• R622 PSY

     UP

• R623 PSY

     UP

• R630 PSY

     UP

• R610 PSN

     UP

• R620 PSN

     UP

• R621 PSN

     UP