mount advfs domain/fileset on different system

[Amanda Deer]

Is it possible to take a disk with an advfs domain/fileset, install it in a different system and mount the domain/fileset? We are using Tru64 V5.1A. Thanks

[Venkatesh BL]

I think this should be possible (eventhough I haven't tried it myself). You need to recreate the links in /etc/fdmns/ directory.

[Vladimir Fabecic]

Yes, it is possible.
For examlpe, you had file set fs1, and domain was created on "c" partition
Do the following:
Physicly install new hard disk.
Get device name using hwmgr (for example dsk7)
Do:
# cd /etc/fdmns
# mkdir (for example # mkdir dmn_7)
# cd dmn_7
# ln -s /dev/disk/dsk7c

Now you can mount file system:
# mount -t advfs dmn_3#fs1 /mnt

[Mark Poeschl_2]

Vladimir's procedure is absolutely correct, but a couple things to be aware of:

1) The disk device name on the new system is unlikely to be the same as it was on the old. This is not a problem and is the reason you manually create the soft links to the device special file

2) The new domain name need not match the old one. You can call it anything you like as long as the soft links you create in that directory point to the correct device.

3) The new fileset name MUST match the old one at least initially. If you want, once you've verified that you can mount the domain/fileset after creating the links, you could use renamefset to change the file set name.

[Han Pilmeyer]

Also be careful when doing this between different version of Tru64 UNIX. I know you said you use V5.1A, so it should be fine in this particular case. We have seen customers doing this between V5.1B and V5.1A and that mostly works until you start using things like vFast.

[Amanda Deer]

Is it possible to mount a disk that is read only - or does the OS need to write to it in order to mount it?

[Venkatesh BL]

OS has no requirement, only the user has. The OS will be fine as long as it can read from the disk.

[Han Pilmeyer]

Actually... I think that's wrong. You can mount the file system read only, but I believe that AdvFS needs to write to the device (e.g. for the log) and therefore the device must be read/write.

[Venkatesh BL]

Why would it write to the log when the user is not changing any of the file data?

As the disk is read-only, there will not be any meta-data changes as well. Right?

[Han Pilmeyer]

I believe it tries to access the log when you mount it. Also e.g. things like access times are recorded even when you don't change the files. Of course you could disable that. But if I remember correctly it will always write to the log.

I'll see if I can do a quick experiment this afternoon.