Issue Redhat 5.2 mounting EVA 5000 disks

[Simon J Xuereb]

Hardware
-2x Fibre Channel: A8002a - FC2142SR
-EVA 5000 - MSV110

Software
Redhat Enterprise 5.2
-HP_ElxApps-26-3.4a16-8.2.0.22_p1.bin.zip
-hp-lpfc-2008-05-30.tar.gz

Documentation Followed:
- http://h20000.www2.hp.com/bizsupport/TechSupport/Document.jsp?lang=en&cc=uk&taskId=115&pr
odSeriesId=1809835&prodTypeId=12169&objectID=c01526068

- http://bizsupport.austin.hp.com/bc/docs/support/SupportManual/c00710472/c00710472.pdf

- http://bizsupport.austin.hp.com/bc/docs/support/SupportManual/c01487192/c01487192.pdf


After following documentation, threads and forums unfortunately it is not clear whether multipath handling will be handled by
- hp fibre utils drivers(above) only
- linux native multipathing only
- or both.
- Or one choice excludes the other.

>more /proc/scsi/scsi

Host: scsi3 Channel: 00 Id: 00 Lun: 00
Vendor: COMPAQ Model: HSV110 (C)COMPAQ Rev: 3028
Type: RAID ANSI SCSI revision: 02
Host: scsi3 Channel: 00 Id: 01 Lun: 00
Vendor: COMPAQ Model: HSV110 (C)COMPAQ Rev: 3028
Type: RAID ANSI SCSI revision: 02
Host: scsi4 Channel: 00 Id: 00 Lun: 00
Vendor: COMPAQ Model: HSV110 (C)COMPAQ Rev: 3028
Type: RAID ANSI SCSI revision: 02
Host: scsi4 Channel: 00 Id: 01 Lun: 00
Vendor: COMPAQ Model: HSV110 (C)COMPAQ Rev: 3028
Type: RAID ANSI SCSI revision: 02

- Path /dev/mapper/mpath1 ( is not being created )
- /var/log/messages ( sample extract )

Nov 14 11:37:05 radclust01 multipathd: path checkers start up
Nov 14 11:37:08 radclust01 multipathd: path checkers start up
Nov 14 11:37:08 radclust01 kernel: device-mapper: multipath round-robin: version 1.0.0 loaded
Nov 14 11:37:08 radclust01 kernel: device-mapper: table: 253:0: multipath: error getting device
Nov 14 11:37:08 radclust01 kernel: device-mapper: ioctl: error adding target to table


./lssg
sg0 0,2,0,0 LSI MegaRAID SAS RMB 1.03
sg1 3,0,0,0 COMPAQ HSV110 (C)COMPAQ 3028
sg2 3,0,1,0 COMPAQ HSV110 (C)COMPAQ 3028
sg3 4,0,0,0 COMPAQ HSV110 (C)COMPAQ 3028
sg4 4,0,1,0 COMPAQ HSV110 (C)COMPAQ 3028


Our issue is regulating visibility to a single disk instance (multipath) and mounting the
disk. this part is missing in the documentation 10x.

[Uwe Zessin]

sg1 to sg4 are the EVA controller devices which are mapped at LUN address 0. Usually, they are ignored by the (disk) multipath filter.

[J Peak]

I'm not sure on the drivers, but in your multipath.conf file make sure you have the blacklist commented out.

Lines like this:
blacklist {
devnode "*"
}


should look like this:
#blacklist {
# devnode "*"
#}

Be sure to stop and restart multipath after you make the changes to the multipath.conf file.

running "multipath -ll" should show you all current multipath devices.

We use the following to rescan our fibre for devices.
For each interface on the system ( some systems have more than one... check /sys/class/fc_host for directories )

* echo "1" > /sys/class/fc_host/host1/issue_lip
* echo "- - -" > /sys/class/scsi_host/host1/scan

Hope this helps

[Rob Leadbeater]

Hi,

Be sure to read again some of the docs that you quoted earlier...

In this one:

http://bizsupport.austin.hp.com/bc/docs/support/SupportManual/c00710472/c00710472.pdf

you'll find this on page 7: "MultiPulse does not support older firmware on HP storage arrays. These storage arrays are known as active-passive storage arrays since not all paths are active on the fabric at the same time."

You're running VCS 3028 (which is out of support by the way) so using Emulex Multipulse is probably out of the question.

I've not checked, but I suspect that the same might be true of the device-mapper solution.

Personally I'd use QLogic cards and use their built in failover capabilities...

Cheers,

Rob

[Simon J Xuereb]

During installation( with cards installed) on command line
entered > linux mpath

This created file /etc/multipath in which i commented the blacklist.

defaults {
user_friendly_names yes
}

#blacklist {
# devnode "^(ram|raw|loop|fd|md|dm-|sr|scd|st)[0-9]*"
# devnode "^(hd|xvd)[a-z]*"
# wwid "*"
#}

>/etc/init.d/multipathd stop

>/etc/init.d/multipathd start

>multipath â l (returns no output)

>multipath â v2 (return no output)

>multipath â v2 -d

create: mpath0 (36003005ffffffff00f278535b018c880) LSI,MegaRAID SAS RMB
[size=136G][features=0][hwhandler=0]
\_ round-robin 0 [prio=1][undef]
\_ 0:2:0:0 sda 8:0 [undef][ready]

(only local disk is returned)

[Simon J Xuereb]

some correction to wrong characters in my post..

>multipath -l (returns no output)
>multipath -v2 (return no output)
>multipath -v2 -d

create: mpath0 (36003005ffffffff00f278535b018c880) LSI,MegaRAID SAS RMB
[size=136G][features=0][hwhandler=0]
\_ round-robin 0 [prio=1][undef]
\_ 0:2:0:0 sda 8:0 [undef][ready]
(only local disk is returned)

[Simon J Xuereb]

using HP drivers / Emulex console please see below..

./probe-luns -a

Adding legacy tape devices to /proc/scsi/device_info
Scanning /sys/class/scsi_host/host3
Scanning /sys/class/scsi_host/host4
scsi3 00 00 00 COMPAQ HSV110 3028 RAID
scsi3 00 01 00 COMPAQ HSV110 3028 RAID
scsi4 00 00 00 COMPAQ HSV110 3028 RAID
scsi4 00 01 00 COMPAQ HSV110 3028 RAID


I also installed Emulex Console on Gnome
- fibre links are up
- 1 Disk instance are visible x4

I also have noted the VCS 3028 firmware issue point..

Thanks to all for your help so far.

[Rob Leadbeater]

Hi again,

I take it you've been through the RedHat docs:

http://www.redhat.com/docs/en-US/Red_Hat_Enterprise_Linux/5.2/pdf/DM_Multipath/DM_Multipath.pdf

Cheers,

Rob

[Simon J Xuereb]

yes Rob 10x. I have read that too..

I suspect it's something to do with LVM / partitioning or the sort.

Somewhere I had picked up on a possible bug loading mpio partitions during bootup related to particular partitioning/lvm configurations.

[Ed Barnum]

Your problem is that the EVA5000 running VCS 3.028 is an active/passive array; device mapper only supports active/active arrays. Since you have Emulex HBA's, the only solution for this version VCS is to access the EVA in single path, ie only one port zoned to only one HBA.

My recommendation though would be to upgrade the EVA5000 firmware to VCS 4.100 to make it an active/active array, which should work with either device mapper or Emulex Multipulse.

[Simon J Xuereb]

10x a lot. I will try to work in single path and upgrade to the recommended VCS 4.100 firmware.

[Uwe Zessin]

Watch out if there are other servers connected to this EVA! A migration from active/passive to active/active must be planned as this can mean additional work on those servers, too.

[Rob Leadbeater]

Which is why I favour QLogic cards...!

Cheers,
Rob

[Uwe Zessin]

I think that does not help if you have a server that runs Windows and the basic MPIO ;-)
Or HP-UX and Secure Path.
Or Novell NetWare (yes, it is still in use!) and Secure Path.
...

[Simon J Xuereb]

Hi all, thanks for your help. we do not intend to upgrade the firmware yet. We fully understand it's impact.. ;)

I will be trying to work in single path Emulex.