ftp problem? "Connection Closed Gracefully"

[joeljoel]

we are using a windows backup utility that FTPs our unix files to a windows formatted 300gig external FireWire800 drive

we've gotten past most problems but now we are seeing this error repeated about 200 times in the backup software's log:

"Connection Closed Gracefully"

this whole firewire800 thing has proven to be very unreliable at least in the windows environment - in other words, it could be somehow related/causing this problem

we believe it's something FTP related but not sure... the backup does successfully backup ALL of the unix file systems EXCEPT for the mirrored copies

the general process we have is this:
=1= we split mirrors on unix using windows "rsh" to a unix script
=2= once mirrors are split and mounted to /mirror, windows FTP backup kicks off to grab /mirror/*
=3= after completing, a 2nd "rsh" command runs to merge the mirrors

(not that it matters, but all of these are mount points in /)
/ext2/* is successfully backed up
/home/* is successfully backed up
/mirror/* are not backed up; all the dirs are created but no files are FTPed down)

some addtl info:
- the /mirror/* files are all 15gig+ each
- FTP grabs about 800meg of the 1st file in /mirror/ before crapping out
- this is a new process we are working on and has never completely worked
- FTP is running in active mode


any suggestions would be greatly appreciated

thanks
joel

[Steven E. Protter]

Shalom joel,

The default inactivity time fo rmost ftp servers is 15 minutes.

If this device is unreliable in the windows world, its likely a problem for Linux/Unix as well. As a result, the process is hanging up and then timing out.

You can transfer the file without chopping it up if the target fileystem has largefiles enabled. This is enabled when the fs is created with the newfs command or with fsadm after the fact.

SEP

[joeljoel]

Steven,

It may have something to do with the FTP timeout but I don't see how. The 800meg of the 1st 15gig file only runs for about 4 minutes before we start getting the "conn. closed gracefully" msg... far below 15min.

do you know how to see and/or change the timeout?

we've been able to successfully FTP 20gig in test without having this problem - the difference in our testing and live run is that our test is against a mirrored (not split) filesystem and the live run is against a mirrored copy --- we're thinking some I/O issue related to mirroring

joel

[rick jones]

First suggestion - get Omniback or whatever we call it these days - OpenView DataProtector? :)

Second, is there any indication if the "Connection Closed Gracefully" is for a _data_ connection or a control connection?

Might increase the logging on the UX side - see the ftpd manpage for specifics.

Just for grins check for core files on the UX side - if an FTP server process were to die for some reason, that would still be a graceful close of the connection.