Make boot tape over network

[SUBRAMANYAM ANUPINDI_1]

Hi,

we have a HP 9000 L1000 Enterprise server which DOESN'T have a local tape drive attached. The O/S on this is "HP-UX B 11.00".

We have another server rp5470(L3000 class i believe).This has HP-UX B 11.11 ( 11i) with local tape drive.

The server WITH tape drive(rp5470) has B.4.4.12 ignite server.When i do swlist -l product Ignite-UX it cones up with

B.4.4.12 HP-UX system installation services.

The server WITHOUT tape has B.2.2.160 ignite server.When i do swlist -l product Ignite-UX it cones up with

B.2.2.160 HP-UX system installation services.

I want to create boot tape of HP 9000 L1000 server which DOESN'T have tape drive in case if there is a problem with server to boot etc.

question
--------
1) Do i have to uninstall B.2.2.160 on server without tape before i initiate Ignite-UX server from B.4.4.12 ignite-ux server.

2)In process of adding "client for recovery" from ignite-ux GUI.

Actions --> Add client for recovery

It comes with a message "client already exists".I could,'t see client icon.Earlier i cancelled this half way.

Is it OK if i just delete directory "/var/opt/ignite/clients/ directory OR i have to do something else ?

3) How to proceed from here

Thanks

S.Anupindi

[Mel Burslan]

First of all, if you are contemplating on using the tape drive on the remote machine, i.e. the rpXX with 11.11 OS on it, to create a bootable tape for this 11.0 system with no local tape drive, you need to scrap that idea. Recovery tapes can only be made on local tape drives, which is kind of what is expected as, when the system crashes and you need to boot from the tape, that tape drive needs to be local on the server.

to answer your second question about ignite server software removal, well, I do not see any reason for you to remove it from your 11.0 system but looking from a realistic point of view, unless you have hords of systems that you take the ignite images of, this does not make any sense. One server should be sufficient for few clients. So if you think there is a confusion about your ignite server location, you can remove the software from 11.0 system.

Then you need to use the 11.11 server as your ignite server and store your ignite image on this server's disk. To store the image on this server, you have few option to explore. read the man page for make_sys_image to find out which one is more feasible for you.

Hope this helps

[SUBRAMANYAM ANUPINDI_1]

Hi Mel,
You mentioned :

"Recovery tapes can only be made on local tape drives, which is kind of what is expected as, when the system crashes and you need to boot from the tape, that tape drive needs to be local on the server."

I might have forgotten to mention that if situation arises will attach a local tape drive to 11.00 server and then boot from there.

1)I assume,once archive is created on Ignite-UX server(11.11), if we have to boot 11.00 server, we can do this over network using tape archive on Ignite-UX server. Can you confirm ?

2) Once i uninstall Ignite-UX from 11.00 O/S server using swremove, i assume it removes all reference to this software including directories. Is there any cleanup i have to do afterwards ?

3)While reading document if same version of Ignite-UX is not available on client it will install it. Any idea how much space it takes and in which directories it goes ? I have space problem on client with O/S 11.00

Thanks

S.Anupindi

[Mel Burslan · Accepted solution]

Partial answer to your questions:

1) yes, if the image is stred on the ignite server, i.e., your 11.11 machine, and it is still running the ignite server software, you can stop the autoboot sequence right after the hardware tests completes (this is after the crash) then at the prompt, you should type

boot lan.A.B.C.D install
interact with IPL?> n {enter}

and it will boot over the network to the ignite server's interface. At this point, assuming this server is serving multiple images, you need to find which one to use and load this image to your machine.

2. Yes. At least in the concept, swremove should take care of all the unnecessary filesets after a product gets removed.

3. The client is not something that will take significant amount of space.

take points 2 and 3 with a grain of salt as these are not from my recent experience.

HTH

[SUBRAMANYAM ANUPINDI_1]

HI Mel,

Thanks for your reply. I want to hear opinion from experienced people on these :

1) Presently i am taking file system backup of my client (11.10 machine without tape drive) over network. This includes all O/S directories also.

Once i created boot image on Ignite server(11.11 machine),incase of disaster on client(11.10 machine without tape drive)i assume i can restore all VG00(O/S) mount points from
boot image over network. Still you suggest to backup these O/S file system(This is done every week)

2) There are no issues with two different O/S versions on Ignite-UX server(11.11) and client(11.00) ?

Thanks
S.Anupindi

[Sundar_7]

Hi Anupindi,

1) If you have included the entire vg00 in your recovery tape then you dont need a seperate OS file system backup.

2) That should not be a problem. Ignite-UX server running in 11i can install 11.0 release on clients.

Sundar

[Sundar_7]

One more thing to watch out for - Ignite-UX client and the server should be on the same subnet for the client to be able to boot from the server - or else you need a ignite-ux boot helper to act as a mediator between the iux client and server.