topic Re: Need Help Changing Device Names in Operating System - OpenVMS

Need Help Changing Device Names

JeradMason — Mon, 03 Jun 2019 04:11:27 GMT

Background: I created two logical volumes prior to installing open VMS on the first, smaller volume (a raid1). After installing, it shows the device names as DKA0, DKA1, and DKB0. I installed onto DKA0; I assume the dvd drive that I installed off of is DKB0.

Question: I need the two logical volumes to device names to be DKB0 and DKB1, not DKA0 and DKA1, in order to match the existing infrustructure. Is there any way to game the boot order, or make a sys file change, to make this happen?

Super new to this. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Re: Need Help Changing Device Names

Steven Schweda — Mon, 03 Jun 2019 04:44:59 GMT

> [...] I created two logical volumes [...]

How? On what? Are we talking about some kind of computer here?
Running some version of OpenVMS? With some kind of storage devices?

> [...] it shows the device names as DKA0, DKA1, and DKB0. [...]

Actual output from a command like "SHOW DEVICE /FULL D" might be
interesting.

> [...] I need the two logical volumes to device names to be DKB0 and
> DKB1, not DKA0 and DKA1, in order to match the existing infrustructure.
> [...]

If so, then that's not well-designed infrastructure. Generally, you
can define logical names to work around unfortunate physical device
names, but I'd want more actual information about what's happening here
before making any specific suggestions.

Re: Need Help Changing Device Names

JeradMason — Mon, 03 Jun 2019 14:12:58 GMT

I created the logical volumes through UEFI shell 2.2. on an HPE Integrity RX2800. The two volumes were created with SSDs.

SHOW DEVICE /FULL D

Disk HOST12$DKA0:, device type HP LOGICAL VOLUME, is online, mounted, file-
oriented device, shareable, available to cluster, error logging is enabled.

Error count 0 Operations completed 28038
Owner process "" Owner UIC [SYSTEM]
Owner process ID 00000000 Dev Prot S:RWPL,O:RWPL,G:R,W
Reference count 116 Default buffer size 512
Current preferred CPU Id 9 Fastpath 1
Total blocks 585871964 Sectors per track 96
Total cylinders 63572 Tracks per cylinder 96
Logical Volume Size 585871964 Expansion Size Limit 4261348350

Volume label "DKA0" Relative volume number 0
Cluster size 16 Transaction count 204
Free blocks 547939440 Maximum files allowed 16711679
Extend quantity 5 Mount count 1
Mount status System Cache name "_HOST12$DKA0:XQPCACHE"
Extent cache size 64 Max blocks in extent cache 54793944
File ID cache size 64 Blocks in extent cache 0
Quota cache size 0 Maximum buffers in FCP cache 10990
Volume owner UIC [1,1] Vol Prot S:RWCD,O:RWCD,G:RWCD,W:RWCD

Volume Status: ODS-5, subject to mount verification, protected subsystems
enabled, file high-water marking, write-through XFC caching enabled,
write-through XQP caching enabled, hard links enabled, special files
enabled.

Disk HOST12$DKA1:, device type HP LOGICAL VOLUME, is online, file-oriented
device, shareable, available to cluster, error logging is enabled.

Error count 0 Operations completed 64
Owner process "" Owner UIC [SYSTEM]
Owner process ID 00000000 Dev Prot S:RWPL,O:RWPL,G:R,W
Reference count 0 Default buffer size 512
Current preferred CPU Id 9 Fastpath 1

Disk HOST12$DKB0:, device type TEAC DV-28S-W, is online, file-oriented device,
shareable, available to cluster, error logging is enabled.

Error count 0 Operations completed 64
Owner process "" Owner UIC [SYSTEM]
Owner process ID 00000000 Dev Prot S:RWPL,O:RWPL,G:R,W
Reference count 0 Default buffer size 512

Re: Need Help Changing Device Names

JeradMason — Mon, 03 Jun 2019 16:52:44 GMT

Is it possible to change the adapter name from PKA0 to PKB0? Would that change how the devices are named?

Re: Need Help Changing Device Names

Steven Schweda — Mon, 03 Jun 2019 18:18:41 GMT

> I created the logical volumes through UEFI shell 2.2. [...]

Not an entirely unambiguous description of the actual program used,
but probably good enough.

> [...] on an HPE Integrity RX2800. [...]

Ok. Newer than any of my junk, so I know nothing. I have played
with an rx2660 and an LSI Logic SAS1068 adapter (which uses a "cfggen"
utility, and creates a "device type LSILOGIC Logical Volume"). Knowing
what I do, I'd guess that "device type HP LOGICAL VOLUME" means that you
have some kind of HP Smart Array adapter.

> Is it possible to change the adapter name from PKA0 to PKB0? [...]

Other than adding another adapter (as PKA0), and using only the
second one (as PKB0), I'm unaware of a way to do that.

> [...] Would that change how the devices are named?

I'd expect it to, but I don't see that as a practical solution.

From my brief reading on the rx2800, it looks to me as if your PKA
and PKB adapters are "integrated on system board", so you couldn't even
try to swap the adapter card in their slots. (No separate boards, no
physical slots.)

What are the other systems, where the hard disks appear as DKBx?

How do the "existing infrustructure" systems know which device names
to use?

What, exactly, is expecting to see "DKB0" and "DKB1", and why can't
you change it?

Again, you can fool most software by defining logical names, but it
takes especially lame software (with physical device names hard-coded
into it) to make that necessary in a case like this. Even the software
which I write is not that lame, so I'd guess that there's a way to tell
it which device names to use (without needing to fiddle with stuff
behind its back).

> Super new to this. [...]

"There comes a tide in the affairs of men, my dear Blubber, when
we must take the bull by the tail, and face the situation."

You've seen more of your environment than I have, but I'd speculate
that you're grasping the wrong end of the bull. I'd be trying to
massage the software to accommodate the hardware configuration (which
seems to be pretty hard), rather than trying to mold the non-malleable
hardware to accommodate the software.

Re: Need Help Changing Device Names

JeradMason — Mon, 03 Jun 2019 19:09:34 GMT

You are correct. I was running under the impression that the existing software/scripts had these devices hardcoded into them. This turns out to not be the case. I will need to create some defines, though.

Thanks so much for your time!