TCPIP Pause At Startup

[Jack Trachtman]

We sometimes isolate our VMS systems for
testing by physically disconnecting the
ethernet cable before booting.

I've noticed that TCPIP pauses near the
end of its startup and waits about 5
minutes before continuing. I've tried
inserting a turn-around ethernet plug
but there is still a pause.

1) What thing (or things) is TCPIP
startup trying to do at that point?

2) What timer(s) affect the above?

3) What's the simplest way to reduce
this pause?

Thanks all

[Karl Rohwedder]

The last thing TCPIP$STARTUP does, is calling your sitespecific startupprocedure (TCPIP$YSTARTUP) if available, before that it tries to register the network with SET NETWORK.

Are all service started wit 'normal' performance before that? May be something is waiting to connect to an outside server?

regards Kalle

[Ian Miller.]

do you have a dns server defined?
Parhaps there is a DNS lookup being performed.

[Jim_McKinney]

> What thing (or things) is TCPIP
> startup trying to do at that point?

Perhaps - attempting to establish a connection to your default router and update the routing table?

[Volker Halle]

Jack,

what you could try to isolate this, is:

Edit SYSTARTUP_VMS.COM:

$ SET PREFIX "(!5%T) "
$ SET VERIFY
$ @SYS$STARTUP:TCPIP$STARTUP.COM/OUT=TCPIP_STARTUP.LOG
$ SET NOVERIFY

and every DCL command line will be shown prefixed with the time in the .LOG file.

Volker.

[Wim Van den Wyngaert]

I just rebooted a VMS 7.3 station with TCP 5.3 ECO 2 and this with the network disconnected. Startup of TCP took 30 seconds (12 services enabled, no DNS).

It must be something specific for your site (NFS ? Setting in sysconfigtab.dat ?).

Wim

[David B Sneddon]

Jack,

Are you using SMTP? I have noticed a similar
issue on some of my systems (my wait is about
8 minutes) and I tracked it down to starting
the SMTP queues... don't know exactly what it
was doing but that is where my systems were
waiting.

Dave

[Wim Van den Wyngaert]

Just tested it with SMTP enabled. Still about 30 seconds.

Wim

[Robert Atkinson · Accepted solution]

This is almost definitely a DNS problem, possibly SMTP trying to start or could be the LPD startup trying to translate the queue names.

We made this mod to our DR test plan, because effectively 'the cable is unplugged' and a reboot can take 10 minutes (as you said) :-


"13.10. Name Servers
In a test situation, or live invocation only one Domain Controller would be available, probably CODC-3.

The IP stack on the Alphaâ s is configured to look at all Domain Controllers, which means the time to return information is extended because of the timeouts required.

To ensure the lookups are as fast as possible, any DNS servers that are not operational should be removed from the list.

The list can be displayed by typing â $ TCPIP SHOW NAMEâ , and looking at the â serversâ field.

To change this, type â $ TCPIP SET NAME /NOSERVER=server_to_removeâ and â $ TCPIP SET CONFIG NAME /NOSERVER=server_to_removeâ , to make the change permanent."

Rob.

[Robert Gezelter]

Jack,

I would not recommend speculating as to what is happening. The science to determine the correct answer is not particularly complex. In addition, the same external behavior can be caused by many different actual problems (a problem that physicians are all too aware of).

The way to identify what communication is being attempted is to use a network monitor on the otherwise unconnected line to determine what IS happening, not what might be happening.

This used to be a question of non-trivial budgets, but tools like Ethereal ( http://www.ethereal.com ) are zero cost.

Capture the traffic emnating from the subject node with a sniffer and you will know precisely what the node is attempting.

- Bob Gezelter, http://www.rlgsc.com