Oracle RAC, RHEL4 and NIC bonding

John Donovan — Wed, 16 Apr 2008 14:24:25 GMT

Description of problem: I have 2 RHEL4 systems running oracle RAC with 4 NICs each. The NICs are configured into 2 bonds on each system. bond0 is made up of (eth0 & eth2).
bond1 is made up of (eth1 & eth3). bond0 is a public ip address. bond1 is a
private ip address that serves as an interconnect for an Oracle RAC cluster.
If I ping -I eth1 "interconnect address", I get "Destination Host Unreachable"
messages. If I then ping -I eth3 "interconnect address", I get "Destination
Host Unreachable" messages, followed by the public network connections
dropping. I was able to ssh from the 2nd system back into the "down" system
across the private interconnect. However response is extremely slow or non-
responsive to many commands. I had to perform a power down to restart the
system.

Additional info:
# cat /etc/modprobe.conf
alias eth0 tg3
alias eth1 tg3
alias eth3 e1000
alias eth2 e1000
alias bond0 bonding
options bond0 miimon=100 mode=5 max_bonds=2
alias bond1 bonding
options bond1 miimon=100 mode=5

[root@rac1]# cat /etc/sysconfig/network-scripts/ifcfg-bond0
DEVICE=bond0
BOOTPROTO=none
IPADDR=xxx.xxx.xxx.10
NETMASK=255.255.255.224
ONBOOT=yes

[root@rac1]# cat /etc/sysconfig/network-scripts/ifcfg-bond1
DEVICE=bond1
BOOTPROTO=none
IPADDR=192.168.234.10
NETMASK=255.255.255.224
ONBOOT=yes

[root@rac1]# cat /etc/sysconfig/network-scripts/ifcfg-eth0
# Broadcom Corporation|NetXtreme BCM5703 Gigabit Ethernet
DEVICE=eth0
BOOTPROTO=none
HWADDR=00:02:A5:4E:04:7E
MASTER=bond0
ONBOOT=yes
SLAVE=yes
TYPE=Ethernet

[root@rac1]# cat /etc/sysconfig/network-scripts/ifcfg-eth1
# Broadcom Corporation|NetXtreme BCM5703 Gigabit Ethernet
DEVICE=eth1
BOOTPROTO=none
HWADDR=00:02:A5:4E:04:7F
MASTER=bond1
ONBOOT=yes
SLAVE=yes
TYPE=Ethernet

[root@rac1]# cat /etc/sysconfig/network-scripts/ifcfg-eth2
# Intel Corporation 82546EB Gigabit Ethernet Controller (Copper)
DEVICE=eth2
BOOTPROTO=none
HWADDR=00:0E:7F:F1:3E:0D
MASTER=bond0
ONBOOT=yes
SLAVE=yes
TYPE=Ethernet

[root@rac1]# cat /etc/sysconfig/network-scripts/ifcfg-eth3
# Intel Corporation 82546EB Gigabit Ethernet Controller (Copper)
DEVICE=eth3
BOOTPROTO=none
HWADDR=00:0E:7F:F1:3E:0C
MASTER=bond1
ONBOOT=yes
SLAVE=yes
TYPE=Ethernet

We changed the modprobe.conf on each server from "mode=5" to "mode=6".

Repeated the above test. The interconnect is still unreachable, but the connectivity issue seems resolved.

Now for the long awaited question... What is the difference in mode 5 and mode 6 that would account for this? I've read several posts and the RH docs on bonding, but I don't understand why that would resolve the "crash problem".

The Interconnect is still not reachable, but it seems to us that it should be. Which is the second question.

Appreciate any help...
Thanks,

Re: Oracle RAC, RHEL4 and NIC bonding

Steven E. Protter — Wed, 16 Apr 2008 16:05:01 GMT

Shalom,

Probably the gateway is incorrect on the malfunctioning interface.

Thats controlled on the ifcfg-bond# file and you need to make sure there is no gateway programming in /etc/sysconfig/network for example.

SEP

Re: Oracle RAC, RHEL4 and NIC bonding

John Donovan — Wed, 16 Apr 2008 17:01:02 GMT

Hi, Steven...

/etc/sysconfig/network:
NETWORKING=yes
HOSTNAME=rac1
GATEWAY=123.456.789.010

So, I should delete the "GATEWAY" entry on each server?

Thanks,
:-)

Re: Oracle RAC, RHEL4 and NIC bonding

Johannes Krackowizer — Wed, 16 Apr 2008 20:16:52 GMT

what output provides route -n
and what output provides a ping 192.168.234.10
?

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Oracle RAC, RHEL4 and NIC bonding

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