problem with basicdsd process

[Lana Cameli]

I work with HP-UX v.10.20. Currently, I am experiencing a problem with one application where it would fill up my /var/adm/syslog/syslog.log file and eventually, lead to a necessity to clear my log file and/or reboot the system.

I have scheduled for someone to come back and look at it, however, I can’t stop the application use and to avoid filling up my syslog.log file, I’ve disabled the syslog daemon. (# /sbin/init.d/syslogd stop)

But, somewhere along the line, something else came up. A couple of users called saying that they noticed a degradation in performance, that the system was lagging. After running ps –eaf command, I found that there is a process basicdsd that is hogging cpu.

I have been trying to find information on how (of if) I could disable that which lead me to learn that it’s all part of HPDPS, and that I could restart it. The link lead me to a manual on HPDPS but I am short on time.

I can’t say what’s in syslog.log file because logging has been disabled.
I can say, however, that in the file /var/opt/pc/pdclientd/startup.log file there is a message:
Cannot start basicdsd: DCE error 382312513

Would this have anything to do with my disabling of logging and the problem app causing “disress”? Is there a way to hush it until I get the fix for the app without affecting system performance?

Thanks in advance,
Lana.

[Bill Hassell]

HPDPS is a printing system based on a complex protocol called DCE. If you are not using it for printing, then stop the subsystem. basicdsd is part of HPDPS and it should terminate when HPDPS is shutdown. The performance issue is hard to diagnose with so little information but disabling syslogd will not impact your system performance. Stopping HPDPS (the script is located in /sbin/init.d) should eliminate the problems for now.

[Lana Cameli]

Thanks for such a quick reply.

I could stop the process but will that disable printing capabilities? If so, is there a way to disable the problem without affecting the printing?

[Patrick Wallek]

If you are using HPDPS for printing (not may people I know have ever used it) then it would effect you.

However, if you are using the normal lp spooler (do you have an lpsched process running? what does lpstat show?) then printing will not be effected.

[Bill Hassell]

HPDPS is a complex subsystem and requires a fairly good knowledge of DCE and the subsystem to keep it running. You could try killing basicdsd but that may affect your current printing tasks. The safest approach is to restart HPDPS using the /sbin/init.d script. That way, it will be shutdown in a normal manner (there are a lot of components). Then start it back running again. However, something is wrong and there is always a possibility that the subsystem may not restart until the problem is fixed.

Since it sounds like a sysadmin that knows HPDPS is not available, you may have to live with the problem until you can get some experienced help.