Creating /tcb on a separate filesystem

[Giorgio Tassi]

Hi all,

In order to solve the problem of being unable to remotely connect (SSH, FTP, etc...) to a HP/UX server whenever the / filesystem becomes full, I managed to create the /tcb direcotry on a separate filesystem.

This seems to have solved the issue, but do you think there are any drawbacks?

Thanks in advance!
Cheers,

Daniele

[James R. Ferguson]

Hi Daniele:

And what happens if you boot into single-user mode where only '/' and subordinate directories like '/sbin' and '/etc' are mounted?

You need to reconsider your action.

Regards!

...JRF...

[Pete Randall]

How are people going to log in at all if you have issues with this separate file system?


Pete

[Bill Hassell]

It will not work. /tcb is just like /etc/ and /sbin. They must all be available during bootup. You need to fix the reasons for / being full. The / directory is virtually static. If it grows in size (other than adding disks and volume groups), there is something seriously wrong. And being able to login is only the beginning of your problems when / is full.

Start by analyzing where the space has gone -- do NOT look for big files. Look for big directories like this:

du -kx / | sort -rn | head -30

Post the results and we can point out what does not belong in /. To find just files (not directories) in /, use this:

cd /
find * -prune -type f -exec ls -ld {} ;

The most common cause of junk in / is spelling errors and inappropriate directories for applications.

[Giorgio Tassi]

Hi all,

Thanks a lot for all your replies!

@James: single-user boot is not affected by this change; you don't get prompted for the root password and /etc/passwd is still available; so no problem from this point of view.

@Pete: /tcb resides on the same VG and physical disk(s) of the / filesystem; I think that a failure of /tcb wouldn't be more likely than a failure of /...

@Bill: Boot works perfectly, both in single user and multiuser. Of course, I know that the / filesystem should NOT get full, but you know, when you manage several hundreds of systems, sometimes this happens... and the biggest hassle is being unable to connect to the system to free space immediately...

Do you see any other drawbacks?

Thanks again!
Cheers,

Daniele