HPUX 11.0: EMC New Disks Allocation

[LG Porter]

I have several HP N-Class servers, running HPUX 11.0, which are attached to a EMC Symmetrix 8730 array. Periodically new disks are added to each server while they are up and running. Once new disks are presented to the server, is there a sequence of commands that should be executed prior to the disks being seen by the OS? That is, should the "insf -e", "ioscan" and EMC "inq" tools be executed in that order? (If so, what are the correct options?) Also, is there other commands that should be used when allocating new EMC disks to a server? I discovered that was two versions of the "inq" previously installed (3/2000 & 12/2001). Could there be a conflict between older versions of this tool exsisting on a server together? How often should the EMC "inq" tool be updated? Is there better tool(tools)available for managing EMC disks?

[Sridhar Bhaskarla · Accepted solution]

Hi,

This is my order to see the new disks. It is not required to use insf -e.

#ioscan -f > ioscan.out
#insf

Here you should see the new device files being added if you have added disks.

#ll -t /dev/dsk |more

Idenfity the new disks based on the time stamp.

I can't think of a better tool than 'inq' which is native to EMC disks. It's only a command so you do not need to worry about multiple versions. Ofcourse, upgrading it to a new version is better as there might be some enhancements.

-Sri

[John Poff]

Hi,

When we make more EMC disks visible to a system, I like to do 'ioscan', 'insf -e', and 'ioscan' again in that order. The 'inq' utility will help you see which disks and controllers are connected to which ports on the EMC. Try the 'inq -et' command to see the port connections to the EMC.

The two different versions of 'inq' shouldn't conflict with each other, but I would remove the older version just to keep things simple. You should get newer versions of 'inq' and the other EMC tools when you update their software. Your EMC engineer should be able to help you with this.

JP

[Marco Santerre]

Hi,

Yes you should follow a certain order of commands. ioscan should come first, then insf -e, and then you'd be able to see your devices and use them for your LVM.

Personnally, I like to use the "symcfg discover" to discover the new disks seen by my server, and "sympd list" to display them. For that you'll need the SYMCLI tools from EMC.

If you want to manage the EMC disks themselves, I recommend you get EMC ControlCenter Suite. The basic package will allow you to get a good feel for the SYmm 8730 itself and how it is configured, and will also allow you to get a better reading on the EMC disk performance and the SYmm performance as well. If you include SDR (I think they've renamed the product though), which means Symm Disk Reallocation, this will allow you to change the config of your Symm and move LUNs from one FA to another without ever needing EMC to create "bins" for you anymore.

Hope this can help.

[Stefan Farrelly]

We use EMC a lot also. The procedure for adding new disks should be;

1. ioscan -fnCdisk (to confirm new disks visible to host)
2. insf (to create device files)
3. [optional] inq (or inq.HP or syminq)

The inq is very similar to ioscan except it adds the serial number of the disk (lun) which you can verify using Symmetrix manager or ESN manager to confirm the disk you assigned (or more importantly - you may have moved dynamically from another server) is the correct one - before you do a pvcreate on it!

There are different versions of inq, but theyre all pretty much the same in my opinion - no real need to upgade.

[Sridhar Bhaskarla]

Hi,

Just to clarify a little bit on "it is not required to run insf -e".

You need to run 'insf' without any options after running ioscan -f. But running it with -e option is going to recreate device files for all the devices which is not necessary. With just 'insf' it will confirm that there are new disks added by printing out the new paths and instances. You can reinforce it using the outputs of ioscan and inq.

-Sri

[LG Porter]

Sridhar: In refer to your comment referring to the visually displaying the device files in the /dev/dsk location with the "ll -t | more" command, i just added new EMC disks to a N-Class server and I do not see the device files in the /dev/dsk directory. At what time did they become visually available or created in that location? I can each drive using the "ioscan -fnC disks" as well as with the "inq -sortsymm". Do these disks have to be added to a VG before the character or block device files are visually shown in the /dev/dsk locaiton? Do you or anyone else replying to this quesition know where I can get documentation outlining the various options associated with the "inq" command, "symcfg" and "sympd" commands?

[Marco Santerre]

If you want to have the man pages for the different EMC commands. You can include the path /usr/symcli/man in your MANPATH

#export MANPATH=$MANPATH:/usr/symcli/man

and you can see the different man pages for those commands. There's always references to the EMC books.

As for your device file names, they will appear in your ioscan and inq only once you will have done the insf -e.

[Sridhar Bhaskarla]

Hi,

If the command 'insf' does not give any output, then it's that you already have those device files on the system. "ll -t" will show you the most recently created device files, one way of quickly identifying the new device files if they got created by the 'insf' command.

Find out the device files correspond to these paths using 'ioscan -fnC disk' and then look at the time stamps of those device files.

-Sri

[Rita C Workman]

You might also check and see if you have a little program called symmcu. I think someone at EMC called Mark Halstead wrote it and it will run you a quick report that lists your info which includes some info like what vg & lvol already assigned to disks. It sorts and prints out a nice little report....and you can run it and have it compile all your hosts into 1 report.

Or you can do what some folks do...write your own script that utilizes your inq output and then does some vgdisplay and lvdispland extracts the info to produce a report that maps out everything used down to your filesystems and everything that has not been assigned. It would be alot of work, but handy once it's done.
At least until you get the Control Center Suite of products....

Just a thought from another EMC user,
Rita

[John Poff]

Hi,

You can get help on the 'symcfg' and 'sympd' commands
by just adding the man page directory to your MANPATH
variable. On my box I'm running V4.3.1 of the SYMCLI
programs, so I just did this:

export MANPATH=$MANPATH:/opt/emc/SYMCLI/V4.3.4/man

assuming you have your programs installed in the same
directory.

As for the 'inq' command, I found a man directory for it
but it didn't explain much. I get much better help by
just doing 'inq -?'. I've included an attachment that
lists what I get from my inq command that way. My
favorite is the 'inq -et' as it will show which EMC port
that each controller is connected to. A nice tool for
lazy sysadmins like me who are too busy eating doughnuts
when the EMC engineer is plugging in the fibre cables, and
then I need to update my documentation! :)

JP