mirror for hpux, itanium .. continued

[GB Tek]

Torsten had replied to do the following: Pete, what I dislike on this link is - this is for 11.22 (with only 2 partitions).
But what I like is to run

# lvlnboot -r /dev/vg00/lvol3
# lvlnboot -b /dev/vg00/lvol1
# lvlnboot -s /dev/vg00/lvol2
# lvlnboot -d /dev/vg00/lvol2

instead of
lvlnboot -R.


I've found some documents advising to run lvlnboot -R
lvlnboot -R /dev/vg00
and some documents saying that it isn't necessary. I've followed the commands:
# lvlnboot -r /dev/vg00/lvol3
# lvlnboot -b /dev/vg00/lvol1
# lvlnboot -s /dev/vg00/lvol2
# lvlnboot -d /dev/vg00/lvol2

is there a reason to run /not to run lvlnboot -R?

[Steven E. Protter]

Shalom,

No reason not to run lvlnboot -R

SEP

[Torsten. · Accepted solution]

Here is the reason:

"Whenever mkboot(1M) is used to restore the LIF area of a damaged root physical volume, the -b boot_lv option of lvlnboot must be performed afterwards to record the boot volume information inside the new LIF (see lif(4)). Subsequent lvlnboot commands such as lvlnboot -R are dependent on the boot_lv information inside the LIF."

( http://docs.hp.com/en/B2355-60130/lvlnboot.1M.html and http://docs.hp.com/en/B2355-60105/lvlnboot.1M.html )

This sounds to me that "lvlnboot -R" is not working, if the information set by "lvlnboot -b" is not there.

So especially while mirroring a disk, I prefer to run all the 4 commands, because I experienced some situations where a system booted from a mirrored disk (lvlnboot -R was used) can not properly boot into various modes (single user) or having problems with the boot loader showing /stand directory etc.

[Pete Randall]

Read the man page for lvlnboot:

"This command should be run in recovery mode (-R) whenever the configuration of the root volume group is affected by one of the following commands: lvextend, lvmerge, lvreduce, lvsplit, pvmove, lvremove, vgextend,
or vgreduce (see lvextend(1M), lvmerge(1M), lvreduce(1M), lvsplit(1M), pvmove(1M), lvremove(1M), vgextend(1M), and
vgreduce(1M)). Starting with HP-UX Release 10.0, this is done automatically."


Pete

[GB Tek]

Thanks Torsten. That makes sense.

[Torsten.]

Based on the quotation I made, it is (at least for me) clear, you *must* perform the 4 steps instead of the "lvlnboot -R" only after mirroring the boot drive.

But many documents only list this single command (... -R) or all 5!

# lvlnboot -r /dev/vg00/lvol3
# lvlnboot -b /dev/vg00/lvol1
# lvlnboot -s /dev/vg00/lvol2
# lvlnboot -d /dev/vg00/lvol2
# lvlnboot -R

Some documents lists the mentioned 4 steps.

I sent a feedback using the feedback system on http://docs.hp.com/en/feedback.html some weeks ago regarding this, but without any response until now.


I noticed also, the systems in question are booting fine if you don't interrupt the boot process, but if you boot from the just created mirror (only "lvlnboot -R" performed), you probably get problems to boot into single user or other modes from the boot loader prompt.

[Geoff Wild]

I just reloaded my IA64 workstation (RX2600)

I followed steps here:

http://docs.hp.com/en/5991-6481/ch03s04.html#babegeeh

I only ran lvlnboot -R

# lvlnboot -v
Boot Definitions for Volume Group /dev/vg00:
Physical Volumes belonging in Root Volume Group:
/dev/disk/disk7_p2 -- Boot Disk
/dev/disk/disk5_p2 -- Boot Disk
Boot: lvol1 on: /dev/disk/disk7_p2
/dev/disk/disk5_p2
Root: lvol3 on: /dev/disk/disk7_p2
/dev/disk/disk5_p2
Swap: lvol2 on: /dev/disk/disk7_p2
/dev/disk/disk5_p2
Dump: lvol2 on: /dev/disk/disk7_p2, 0


Then did the setboot command:
setboot -a 0/1/1/0.0x1.0x0


Rebooted to the alternate - and it worked!



Rgds...Geoff

[Torsten.]

Geoff,
now try to boot the alternate disk, interrupt and list the content of /stand from the OS loader, then boot to single user mode.
I saw problems in doing this.

Booting without interrupt the process worked.

[Geoff Wild]

I selected:

HP-UX Alternate Boot: 0/1/1/0.0x1.0x0

I pressed the Any Key to interrupt Autoboot



HPUX> ls /stand
.kc.lock backup boot.sys bootconf bootfs
current ext_ioconfig ioconfig krs last_install
lost+found nextboot rootconf system vmunix



HPUX> boot vmunix -is
> System Memory = 6132 MB
loading section 0
................................................................................
...... (complete)
loading section 1
............... (complete)
loading symbol table
loading System Directory (boot.sys) to MFS
.....
loading MFSFILES directory (bootfs) to MFS
...............
Launching /stand/vmunix
SIZE: Text:43521K + Data:7446K + BSS:20777K = Total:71745K


Then I was in single user mode:

INIT: Running /sbin/sh
#


Rgds...Geoff

[Geoff Wild]

BTW - just had a thought - I'm running Feb 2007 HP-UX 11.31


Rgds...Geoff

[Torsten.]

Looks good, but you know intermittent problems :-)

May be related to patch levels etc.

From my logs:

...
HP-UX Boot Loader for IPF -- Revision 2.028

Press Any Key to interrupt Autoboot
\EFI\HPUX\AUTO ==> boot vmunix
Seconds left till autoboot - 9
Type 'help' for help

HPUX> ls
no such file or directory

...
HPUX> hpux
Could not open file vmunix to check for a directory
Could not open vmunix

loading failed

fs1:\EFI\HPUX> hpux
Using EFI boot partition (no HPUX partition on boot media)

(C) Copyright 1999-2006 Hewlett-Packard Development Company, L.P.
All rights reserved

HP-UX Boot Loader for IPF -- Revision 2.028

Press Any Key to interrupt Autoboot
\EFI\HPUX\AUTO ==> boot vmunix
Seconds left till autoboot - 9
Type 'help' for help
...

but without interrupt, it works ...

fs0:\EFI\HPUX> hpux

(C) Copyright 1999-2006 Hewlett-Packard Development Company, L.P.
All rights reserved

HP-UX Boot Loader for IPF -- Revision 2.028

Press Any Key to interrupt Autoboot
\EFI\HPUX\AUTO ==> boot vmunix -lq
Seconds left till autoboot - 0
AUTOBOOTING...> System Memory = 12258 MB
loading section 0
...
the server boots up to init 3



Doing the same after running all the lvlnboot commands no errors came up.

[GB Tek]

I tried the -R command last. Thanks for the clarification.