Add EML103e to CentOS 5.5

[ArtemTroitsky]

Hi!

I've just installed CentOS 5.5 on HP Proliant DL380G5 with two FC HBA and now I'm struggling with adding HP EML103e connected through two Brocade SAN switches. Tape library has two tape drives, each in different fabric. Robotics connected to both fabrics. Zoning is ok - OS sees drives' and robotics' ports, as well as EML sees host ports, but dmesg shows no tape devices defined. /sys/class/fc_remote_port/rport*/port_name shows correct EML WWNs and */port_state shows Online, but OS cannot recognize it as tape drives. I also tried to investigate the problem using QLogic SANsurfer and it shows Offline in front of drive ports. Command View TL shows all drives as Active and Available, FC ports are up

What did I miss? Could anyone please suggest something to find out what went wrong?..

Thanks in advance

[Matti_Kurkela]

Is the "st" (SCSI Tape) kernel module loaded? Run "modprobe st" if it isn't.

What does the "lsscsi" command say? (Run "yum install lsscsi" if you don't have the command installed yet.)

[ArtemTroitsky]

I wonder if 'cat /proc/scsi/scsi' would be enough:

[root@tsm ~]# cat /proc/scsi/scsi
Attached devices:
Host: scsi0 Channel: 00 Id: 00 Lun: 00
  Vendor: TEAC     Model: DV-28S-V         Rev: C.0F
  Type:   CD-ROM                           ANSI SCSI revision: 05

Also I tried to add and remove st module several times as well as qla2xxx with no results. I'm feeling desperate to connect this OS to tape library and I think I should install something different there afternoon

[Matti_Kurkela · Accepted solution]

Hmm... I haven't had a chance to actually work as a serious SAN administrator, but as far as I know, there are two separate access control layers in FibreChannel fabrics:

• zoning: telling the FC switches which host ports may access which ports of the storage system (kind of like VLANs on a LAN)
• masking: telling the storage devices that a particular host WWNs are allowed to access the storage (on the LAN side, the equivalent would be something like an iptables firewall, but filtering mainly by MAC addresses). This often includes a way to specify the type of OS for each host WWN, so the storage system can tailor its interface to match the OS-specific requirements.

Your description is a bit short on technical details, but it seems to me that you've confirmed there is connectivity at the FC level, but the EML103e refuses to acknowledge anything beyond the existence of the FC connectivity - which would suggest a possible masking problem.

I once had to set up a separate HP FC storage box for a system that could not be connected to the company SAN: I seem to recall that its default masking settings were of the "deny everything" variety. Perhaps the EML103e is similar?

[ArtemTroitsky]

Dear Matti_Kurkela, Thank you very much for you help and attention at my topic. I checked EML cabling this morning and found that it was connected incorrectly. So, not Linux was the problem, but cabling scheme. Now everything works fine. Thanks a lot for your help BR, Artem