Minor number of /dev/vgXX/group is not unique.

[Christine S Feeley]

While trying to create two new volume groups (vg10 and vg11) on an rx5670 Integrity Server, it receive the following error messages during both create attempts:

vgcreate: Minor number of /dev/vg10/group is not unique. /dev/vg11/group has the same minor number.

However, neither vg10 nor vg11 exist. This is the first time to create volume groups with these names.

/dev contains a vg10 and vg11 device directory with a group file, but neither volume group appears on my list in SAM.

Is it safe to delete these two directories in /dev and start over? Or is there a better way to clear these unlisted volume groups?

[Robert-Jan Goossens]

Hi,

Check if there is an old group file

# ll /dev/*/group


Regards,
Robert-Jan

[Pete Randall]

Christine,

It should be safe to remove the /dev/vg10 and /dev/vg11 directories and start over.


Pete

[Pete Randall]

On second thought, how about first trying a vgexport on vg10 and on vg11 just to make sure.


Pete

[Sanjay_6]

Hi,

check for duplicate minor number for the group files in /dev

ll /dev/*/group

you must have unique minor number for each group file / for each vg.

Hope this helps.

Regds

[A. Clay Stephenson]

Do a strings /etc/lvbtab. Only the entries for one of two VG's you mention should be there. If both are listed, you need to vgexport both and start over.

There is nothing that forces your to associate vg02, for example, with 0x020000 and vg09 with a group node minor device number of 0x090000. This is simply convention but it does make life easier.

The most common error, in trying to follow this convention, is not remembering that the values are hexadecimal so that vg10 should be 0x0a0000, vg11 should be 0x0b0000, ... .

[Christine S Feeley]

Alrighty....I removed both device directories and started over. Now, I am getting the following error when I try to recreate vg10:

vgcreate: cannot open the control file /dev/vg10/group. No such device.

However, when I go to this directory the group file exists with a unique number, and it is world readable. It is owned by root/adm with read-only priveleges for everyone, including root. All other vg devices have the same privileges and work just fine.

[A. Clay Stephenson]

Do these commands and post the results:

ls -l /dev/vg*/group

strings /etc/lvmtab

vgdisplay

That should enable us to identify the problem.

[Rita C Workman · Accepted solution]

Christine,

Go back and read Clay's comment again...I belive (although not seen) that you probably have a vg called 0x0a0000 and 0x0b0000. Note what Clay reminded you of....the minor numbers are NOT decimal, but rather hexidecimal.
So if you have a vg with 0x0a0000 you can NOT create 0x100000, because a=10.

Just my 2 cents thrown into Clay's little pond..

Remember (depending on what your maxvg setting is) you could use a higher number, as long as you don't exceed that value.

Rgrds,
Rita

[Christine S Feeley]

Sometimes it's the simple stuff that escapes me....

Y'all helped me solve my initial problem that was generated by another problem.

Deleting those device directories worked fine and allowed me to start over.

However, the root of the problem was my maxvgs setting which Rita reminded me of.

It is set at 10....so vg10, vg11, vg12....would have all failed until I changed the setting.

Thanks for everyone's help....points have been assigned :)