topic Re: Linux hpsa scsi driver and hpacucli in Operating System - Linux

Linux hpsa scsi driver and hpacucli

ipv4 — Tue, 07 Dec 2010 16:21:57 GMT

system: HP DL380 G6
controller: P410i 512MB BBWC
hpacucli version 8.60-8.0

Booting my system using the newer hpsa driver works fine (instead of the older cciss driver). My disks are detected as /dev/sda etc etc.

However the HP provided tool "hpacucli" fails to find any controllers. From what I have read this hpsa driver should support the same ioctls as cciss which enable hpacucli to work.

Any suggestions?

$ hpacucli
HP Array Configuration Utility CLI 8.60-8.0
Detecting Controllers...Done.
Type "help" for a list of supported commands.
Type "exit" to close the console.

=> ctrl all show

Error: No controllers detected.

Re: Linux hpsa scsi driver and hpacucli

Alzhy — Tue, 07 Dec 2010 16:44:15 GMT

From what I understand, hpsa effectively supplants the cciss "driver" - hence hpacucli's inability to talk with the P410i.

Re: Linux hpsa scsi driver and hpacucli

ipv4 — Tue, 07 Dec 2010 18:49:40 GMT

Fromt the hpsa.txt file in the kernel tree they claim compatibility with HP ioctls which enable functionality in apps like hpacucli.

From
http://www.mjmwired.net/kernel/Documentation/scsi/hpsa.txt

For compatibility with applications written for
the cciss driver, many, but not all of the ioctls
supported by the cciss driver are also supported
by the hpsa driver. The data structures used by
these are described in include/linux/cciss_ioctl.h

Re: Linux hpsa scsi driver and hpacucli

Alzhy — Tue, 07 Dec 2010 19:13:43 GMT

But it does not say / mention if HP's "contributed" alternative "hpsa" tue scsi driver is compatible with hpacutil.

Likely it does not as it masks the controller as a simple SCSI controller? For which management of your disks (building the array, carving luns, rebuilds and monitors... etc) would have to be done via iLo or the BIOS..

cciss I think is better.

Re: Linux hpsa scsi driver and hpacucli

Jimmy Vance — Wed, 08 Dec 2010 20:08:35 GMT

can you provide more detail. What distro and kernel version are you using? Do you have the complete PSP installed?

Re: Linux hpsa scsi driver and hpacucli

Alzhy — Wed, 08 Dec 2010 20:13:11 GMT

Again.. I do not think hpacucli WILL work with HP's specially contributed true scsi driver "hpsa" loaded. HPACUCLI will only work if the cciss module is active -- and hpsa and cciss cannot co-exist. It is one or the other...

You can aise a support ticket with HP for sure. I am not even sure it's "hpsa" is fully validated and recommmended even.= - which leads me to ask -- Why NOT just use the RHEL built in support for the Smart Controller P401 array in the cciss module?

Re: Linux hpsa scsi driver and hpacucli

ipv4 — Wed, 08 Dec 2010 20:13:12 GMT

I am running a RHEL 5 distro but with a self-compiled kernel from kernel.org

I do not have the PSP installed because I only need hpacucli.

hpacucli works fine on any kernel as long as I am using the cciss driver. It will not work with the alternative hpsa driver no matter what I do.

Re: Linux hpsa scsi driver and hpacucli

Jimmy Vance — Wed, 08 Dec 2010 22:37:57 GMT

ipv4, in working with the driver team, I've seen an internal email from you on this issue. If you haven't received a reply yet, you will shortly.

Alzhy, in response to your comments;

The array tools will work with hpsa
cciss and hpsa can be used at the same time on different controllers

There is an issue with hpaucli v8.60-8.0 functioning properly with hpsa. hpacucli v8.50-6.0 will work with hpsa. A future release of hpacucli will address the current issue.

Re: Linux hpsa scsi driver and hpacucli

Alzhy — Thu, 09 Dec 2010 15:11:12 GMT

The array tools will work with hpsa
cciss and hpsa can be used at the same time on different controllers

How? via a patch?
I have tested this in a DL380 G6 with a P420i and hpsa loaded and hpacucli does not work as ipv4 mentioned.

Is hpsa fully supported by HP?

Re: Linux hpsa scsi driver and hpacucli

Jimmy Vance — Thu, 09 Dec 2010 16:20:56 GMT

Alzhy said
>How? via a patch?
>I have tested this in a DL380 G6 with a
>P420i and hpsa loaded and hpacucli does not
>work as ipv4 mentioned.
>
>Is hpsa fully supported by HP?

This should probably all be moved to a new thread.

hpsa is a driver relesed by HP, so yes it is fully supported by HP.

Not sure what a P420i is

Ther eis a specific version of hpacucli that doesn't work with hpsa, it's listed in a previous post above

A patch is not needed for anything. cciss is still the driver for current/past generation Smart Array controllers. hpsa will be the driver moving forward. There is some overlap of the drivers as the transistion takes place.

If you have a system that has for example an E500 and a P410, the E500 will use cciss, the P410 will use hpsa

There is a paper slated to be released in the very near future that provides more detail about the migration path to hpsa

The paper will spell out what controllers work with which driver and what OS versions support hpsa

Re: Linux hpsa scsi driver and hpacucli

Alzhy — Thu, 09 Dec 2010 16:28:29 GMT

Good stuff.... now all our servers will have /dev/sda's all accross the board...

Oh wait... we're about to go to SAN Boot...

;^))

Re: Linux hpsa scsi driver and hpacucli

Remi Paulmier — Wed, 25 May 2011 14:21:52 GMT

modprobe sg

check dmesg output to confirm that your controller(s) are correctly detected.

After that you should be able to use hpacucli and other ACU tools as usual.