topic Re: Auto Port "Aggrivation" in Operating System - HP-UX

Auto Port "Aggrivation"

Ron Irving — Mon, 04 Aug 2008 15:54:13 GMT

Ok...here's the deal:

We have an rp8420 server for our production environment. We have used 2 LANs for everything, (LAN0, 0/0/0/1/0, core i/o, and 0/0/8/1/0, A7012A.)

A while ago we purchased the key for APA. We have now 'teamed' up LAN1 and LAN3, (1/0/0/1/0, slave core i/o.)

Herein lies the problem. I believe I have set everything up properly. I am using the default setup for a server to switch scenario, lbmac, but it doesn't nor has it ever balanced properly. They start out close, but evventually they'll 'drift' apart so that one LAN does 99% of the work, and the other appears to tag along very slowly.

Is there something I'm missing here?

I've attached the appropriate snipits from the hp_apaconf, and hp_apaportconf files.

Let me know if you need anything else.

thx!!

Ron

Re: Auto Port "Aggrivation"

Ron Irving — Mon, 04 Aug 2008 15:57:29 GMT

Oops...sorry. LAN1 is the one at 0/0/8/1/0

Hope this helps.

ron

Re: Auto Port "Aggrivation"

F Verschuren — Mon, 04 Aug 2008 16:09:46 GMT

for some reasons I can not open the atachment,
make sure in hp_apaconf the setting HP_APA_HOT_STANDBY is OF!
HP_APA_LOAD_BALANCE_MODE=????
see man page for the configuration is sutable for your configuration.
examlpe for a for way apa configration:

cat hp_apaconf
HP_APA_START_LA_PPA=900
HP_APA_DEFAULT_PORT_MODE=MANUAL

HP_APA_INIT_ARGS="HP_APA_LOAD_BALANCE_MODE HP_APA_GROUP_CAPABILITY HP_APA_HOT_STANDBY HP_APA_MANUAL_LA HP_APA_INIT HP_APA_KEY"

HP_APA_INTERFACE_NAME[0]=lan900
HP_APA_LOAD_BALANCE_MODE[0]=LB_MAC
HP_APA_HOT_STANDBY[0]=off
HP_APA_GROUP_CAPABILITY[0]=900
HP_APA_KEY[0]=

cat hp_apaportconf

HP_APAPORT_INIT_ARGS="HP_APAPORT_GROUP_CAPABILITY HP_APAPORT_PRIORITY HP_APAPORT_CONFIG_MODE HP_APAPORT_KEY HP_APAPORT_SYSTEM_PRIORITY"

HP_APAPORT_INTERFACE_NAME[21]=lan21
HP_APAPORT_GROUP_CAPABILITY[21]=900
HP_APAPORT_CONFIG_MODE[21]=FEC_AUTO
HP_APAPORT_INTERFACE_NAME[22]=lan22
HP_APAPORT_GROUP_CAPABILITY[22]=900
HP_APAPORT_CONFIG_MODE[22]=FEC_AUTO

HP_APAPORT_INTERFACE_NAME[29]=lan29
HP_APAPORT_GROUP_CAPABILITY[29]=900
HP_APAPORT_CONFIG_MODE[29]=FEC_AUTO
HP_APAPORT_INTERFACE_NAME[30]=lan30
HP_APAPORT_GROUP_CAPABILITY[30]=900
HP_APAPORT_CONFIG_MODE[30]=FEC_AUTO

Re: Auto Port "Aggrivation"

F Verschuren — Mon, 04 Aug 2008 16:17:14 GMT

the setting atached looks fine (now it works,) however I mis some lines,

please post all lines in the apa conf files (grep -v ^#}

ore check above

Re: Auto Port "Aggrivation"

Michael Steele_2 — Mon, 04 Aug 2008 16:17:28 GMT

Hi Ron:

Refer to this APA Admin Guide. Chapter 6 page 67 - 99 contain about 100 trouble shooting commands.

http://docs.hp.com/en/J4240-90046/J4240-90046.pdf

Let me know if this helps.

Re: Auto Port "Aggrivation"

Ron Irving — Mon, 04 Aug 2008 16:33:51 GMT

thanks all. I posted the lines before, but now I'll post the complete files.

1 of 2

Re: Auto Port "Aggrivation"

Ron Irving — Mon, 04 Aug 2008 16:34:14 GMT

Here's 2 of 2

Thanx!

ron

Re: Auto Port "Aggrivation"

Court Campbell — Mon, 04 Aug 2008 16:44:05 GMT

You are more than likely going to need someone on the network side to setup pagp. Usually both the server and the switch need to be setup. So you are half way there, assuming it's not setup on the switch already.

Re: Auto Port "Aggrivation"

Court Campbell — Mon, 04 Aug 2008 16:50:58 GMT

in hp_apaportconf the lines should be like this:

HP_APAPORT_INTERFACE_NAME[0]=lan1
HP_APAPORT_GROUP_CAPABILITY[0]=900
HP_APAPORT_CONFIG_MODE[0]=FEC_AUTO
#
HP_APAPORT_INTERFACE_NAME[1]=lan3
HP_APAPORT_GROUP_CAPABILITY[0]=900
HP_APAPORT_CONFIG_MODE[1]=FEC_AUTO

then in hp_apaconf your lines should look like this:

HP_APA_START_LA_PPA=900
HP_APA_DEFAULT_PORT_MODE=MANUAL

HP_APA_INIT_ARGS="HP_APA_LOAD_BALANCE_MODE HP_APA_GROUP_CAPABILITY HP_APA_HOT_STANDBY HP_APA_MANUAL_LA HP_APA_INIT HP_APA_KEY"

HP_APA_INTERFACE_NAME[0]=lan900
HP_APA_LOAD_BALANCE_MODE[0]=LB_MAC
HP_APA_GROUP_CAPABILITY[0]=900
HP_APA_HOT_STANDBY[0]=off

and in your netconf your lines should look like this:

INTERFACE_NAME[0]=lan900
IP_ADDRESS[0]=xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx
SUBNET_MASK[0]=255.255.255.0
BROADCAST_ADDRESS[0]=xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx
INTERFACE_STATE[0]=""
DHCP_ENABLE[0]=0

This setup is for trunking. So as I stated earlier you will need to configure your switch if you haven't already.

Re: Auto Port "Aggrivation"

Tim Nelson — Mon, 04 Aug 2008 17:13:53 GMT

Keep in mind that your interfaces will never be perfectly balanced. at least not with lb_mac.

Consider two connections.

One is an ftp session down one leg, the other a telnet session down the other.

The ftp will stay bound to its interface and show higher traffic. The telnet session will show little. Or try three ftp sessions. With only two NICs in the trunk 3 does not go into 2 evenly.

Do a test and try it. Unless something has changed in the world of APA you should see an imbalance.

Re: Auto Port "Aggrivation"

rick jones — Tue, 05 Aug 2008 16:00:16 GMT

The load balancing settings in the APA config files will only affect the packets transmitted from the system. The balancing across the links on inbound will be determined by the settings on the switch.

MAC based transmit hashing will be good when the system is talking to a broad number of MAC addresses, which also implies a broad number of IP addresses. Eg talking to systems on "this" side of the router(s).

IP based transmit hashing will be good when the system is talking to a broad number of IP addresses, regardless of the number of MAC addresses in use - eg talking to systems on the other side of a router.

TCP/UDP port number based transmit hashing will be good when the system is talking to a broad number of port numbers regardless of the number of IP or MAC addresses - eg when this system has a decent number of connections to a small number of IP addresses.

Finally, if you have just the one or even a small (single digit) number of connections, it is quite likely there will not be very good balance - it is the luck of the addresses as it were. Certainly a single connection will only use one link on outbound.