[Veritas-vx] SUMMARY: Clean Up device Trees and path_to_inst

Tue Feb 25 11:20:07 CST 2003

Many thanks to all those who responded so quickly.

Some suggested using "devfsadm -C", which can't help because this is Solaris
2.7+, and I'm running 2.6.
One solution is to remove everything but the boot disk from path_to_inst.
Bertran Hutin send me a clever script which uses the "diskinfo" SUNWexplo
tool to remove useless entries.

Finally the best answer came from Louis C. Watta and Rodolfo Casás : the
solution is to specify "/pseudo/vxio at 0:0 <mailto:/pseudo/vxio at 0:0> " (or
whatever in /etc/system) as the boot 
device instead of the default one (/dev/dsk/cxtydz) when Solaris asks for it
(during "boot -ar").

***************** Rodolpho's method *****************

  {0} ok boot -arv

  Boot device: /pci at 80,4000/scsi at 2/disk at 1,0  File and args: -arv

  Enter filename [kernel/sparcv9/unix]:

  Size: 358864+104274+152610 Bytes

  Enter default directory for modules [/platform/FJSV,GPUSK/kernel
/platform/sun4u

  s/kernel /kernel /usr/kernel]:

  Name of system file [etc/system]:

  SunOS Release 5.8 Version Generic_108528-15 64-bit

  Ethernet address = 0:0:e:25:3:16

  The /etc/path_to_inst on your system does not exist or is empty.

  Do you want to rebuild this file [n]? y

  Using default device instance data

  root filesystem type [ufs]:

  Enter physical name of root device

  [/pci at 80,4000/scsi at 2/disk at 1,0:a]: /pseudo/vxio at 0:0

  WARNING: forceload of drv/scsi failed

  mem = 4194304K (0x100000000)

  avail mem = 3969310720

  root nexus = Fujitsu Siemens GP7000F 800 2-slot 3x SPARC64 III 330MHz

.........................................................................
.....

1º - cd /dev/dsk    ; rm *
2º - cd /dev/rdsk    ; rm *
3º - cd /dev/vx/dmp    ; rm *
4º - cd /dev/vx/rdmp    ; rm *
5º - cd /devices     ; rm -fr pci*
6º - cd /dev/cfg    ; rm *
7º - boot -r

***************** Louis's method *****************

You need to explicitly tell the OS where the veritas disk is. So when it
comes up and asks for bootdisk you need to give it the device that is
assigned in /etc/system. There's an infodoc #15069 on it in sunsolve.  Then
you can boot -ar and rebuild your path_to_inst with veritas installed.
infodoc -----
The workaround to this problem is as follows:
1.	From single user mode, edit the /etc/path_to_inst file.
Comment out the following line using the # sign.
#path_to_inst_bootstrap_1
2.	Look in the /etc/system file, searching for the line labeled "
rootdev: ".
For example:
rootdev: /pseudo/vxio at 0:0 <mailto:/pseudo/vxio at 0:0> 
Write down this line exactly.
3.	Now do a boot -arv again
4.	Answer 'yes', when it asks if you want to rebuild the path_to_inst
file.
5.	When asked for the physical root device, do not take the default,
but instead, enter the device name you found above in step #2 (for example,
/pseudo/vxio at 0:0) <mailto:/pseudo/vxio at 0:0)> .

We usually do the following to clean out the dev tree.
boot -s
rm /dev/vx/rdmp/*
rm /dev/vx/dmp/*
Then selectively delete devices in /dev/rdsk and /dev/dsk that we know 
don't exist anymore. We've had issues with full out removing /dev/rdsk/*
move path_to_inst path_to_inst.old
shutdown
boot -ar

This is one area where Sun could really improve. We've run out of devices on
several hosts because of Sun's poor ability to remove disks.  Looks like
they are trying to with the boot -p option but I've only ever seen it remove
things once.

---
Sebastien DAUBIGNE 
sdaubigne at bordeaux-bersol.sema.slb.com
<mailto:sdaubigne at bordeaux-bersol.sema.slb.com>  - (+33)5.57.26.56.36
SchlumbergerSema - SGS/DWH/Pessac