problem regarding lvmtab file

[mohit rathore]

When i was creating a new physical volume he give me a error that entry is already in /etc/lvmtab.
what i suppose to do to avoid this problem

[Peter Godron]

Hi,
and welcome to the forums !

What commands are you using ?
Are you trying to re-use an existing name ?
If you are not sure, have you tried using SAM ?

Other thread with similar problems:
http://forums1.itrc.hp.com/service/forums/questionanswer.do?threadId=29843
http://forums1.itrc.hp.com/service/forums/questionanswer.do?threadId=41806
http://forums1.itrc.hp.com/service/forums/questionanswer.do?threadId=243117


Please also read:
http://forums1.itrc.hp.com/service/forums/helptips.do?#33 on how to reward any useful answers given to your questions.

[Sandman!]

Since the PV is in the lvmtab file it could be part of an active VG and you might end up clobbering exisiting data. Better option would be to ask the SAN team for a free unused LUN.

~cheers

[Sunny Jaisinghani]

Hi Mohit,

The PV must be a part of some VG. If the data in it is not of any importance use pvcreate with -f option.
however this is usually not recommended if u r geeting the error you mentioned.

sunny

[Berd]

Mohit,

Do a stings /etc/lvmtab to help identify which volume group the disk belongs too.

Only if you are 100% sure that it is not an active disk would I reccommend the use of pvcreate -f.

Regards,
Berd

[Court Campbell]

Do a strings on /etc/lvmtab as suggested. Find out the associated volume group. Do a bdf and see if any filesystems are mounted from that volume group. If not you could probably safely remove the volume group info using vgexport. But you may want to do an ll on the /dev/vgXX and see what files exist. If you see any special files like lvol1 or something other than the group file you more than likely have some logical volumes on that disk. You could mount the filesystems (if they are not swap) and see what's there. This is only a rough explanation of what to look for.