rp8420 vpars: how to use fibre-channel-attached boot-disk?

[John Wood_4]

I have an HP 9000 rp8420 that is hardware partitioned into 2 nPars.

Within the second nPar, I want to have multiple software partitions
(vPars).

The second nPar has the following I/O:
1/0/0 - core I/O, includes SCSI & LAN
1/0/8 - fibre-channel adapter
1/0/10 - fibre-channel adapter
1/0/12 - LAN interface
1/0/14 - LAN interface

I also have access to an EVA 5000 fibre-channel SAN.

My thinking is that I should be able to create 3 vPars:

vPar # boot disk network
-----------------------------------
0 1/0/0/... 1/0/0/...
1 1/0/8/... 1/0/12
2 1/0/10/... 1/0/14


On the EVA I created a virtual disk and presented it to the rp8420's
1/0/8 FC HBA. (I will need to present a second virtual disk to
1/0/10, which I haven't done yet).

Before I created my initial vPar, the HP-UX o/s instance in the
second nPar could see the EVA disk:

# ioscan -fnC disk
Class I H/W Path Driver S/W State H/W Type Description
==========================================================================
disk 0 1/0/0/2/0.6.0 sdisk CLAIMED DEVICE HP 73.4GMAS3735NC
/dev/dsk/c0t6d0 /dev/rdsk/c0t6d0
disk 1 1/0/0/2/1.2.0 sdisk CLAIMED DEVICE HP DVD-ROM 305
/dev/dsk/c1t2d0 /dev/rdsk/c1t2d0
disk 2 255/255/0/0.0 sdisk CLAIMED DEVICE HSV110 (C)COMPAQ
/dev/dsk/c20t0d0 /dev/rdsk/c20t0d0


I created my first vPar as follows:

# vparcreate -p vPar0 -a cpu::2 -a cpu:::1:16 -a mem::8192
-a io:1/0/0 -a io:1/0/0/2/0.6.0:BOOT

I've got the first vPar to boot OK.

My problem is now how to create the second vPar, to tell it to use the
EVA disk.

The following does not work:

# vparcreate -p vPar1 -a cpu::2 -a cpu:::1:16 -a mem::4096 -a io:1/0/8
-a io:1/0/12 -a io:255/255/0/0.0:BOOT

because I seem to have a conflict with device numbering e.g. 255/255 for
the EVA on the 1/0/8 fibre-channel host bust adapter.

I don't have HP-UX installed on the EVA disk yet, but I do have an Ignite
server. So I tried modifying vPar1 to boot from the network 1/0/12, but
I get a [MON] message that it "Failed to load (1/0/12;)/stand/vmunix)".

By the way, my HP-UX 11.11 operating system golden image has got
SecurePath installed.

I'd be grateful for any pointers on how to set up a second vPar using
the EVA fibre-channel storage.

Thanks,
John

[harry d brown jr]

You do have a device conflict because

disk 2 255/255/0/0.0 ....

isn't a valid device path and doesn't appear to match the 1/0/8 path. Something is messed up.

Can you shut down your machine and try to install the OS on 1/0/8.... ?

live free or die
harry d brown jr

[John Wood_4]

Thanks for the reply.

I'm fairly sure that without SecurePath installed, ioscan would show many (8?) paths to the same EVA disk, probably on unit 1/0/8.n.n.n... rather than 255/255...

I'm a bit stuck now. I have just my initial vPar #0 that just has the core I/O. How can I either: a) get rid of vPars so that I can then see the F/C adapters & the EVA disk; or b) add the F/C I/O adapter to vPar #0 (-I can't see how to do with with vPar0 up, and I've got no other vPars to do it from).

Thanks,
John

[Anthony Lennan]

Hi John,

I agree with Harry that the hardware path of 255/255 doesn't look right.

You should be able to get your vpars to boot from fibre attached SAN disk. I got it working with an RP8400 and fibre EMC disk when I played around with vpars last year. From memory I had the primary partition on the internal disks but got the other partitions to boot from fibre.

I made alot of notes at the time but unfortunately I haven't got them with me at the moment. When I get home I'll have a look and see if there's anything in them that might help with your issue.

That being said, I noted another case regarding booting vpars from EVA disks a couple of days ago and you may want to have a look at it as it may possibly raise some further issues for you :(

http://forums1.itrc.hp.com/service/forums/questionanswer.do?threadId=851149

In summary the person in this case was trying to use an ignite image to recover and boot a vpar on a EVA. In the end he spoke to HP and they told him that they didn't support using Ignite to recover vpars on EVA's. You might want to speak to HP and confirm this but if its true you may run into further problems when it comes time to prepare your Disaster Recovery procedures :(

I'm sorry to have added more problems than answers.

Rgds,
Anthony

[Anthony Lennan]

Hi John,

After thinking about it abit more I would probably try the following:

1) Create the second vpar without specifying a boot device and then boot from your Ignite server and see if you can select the disk.

# vparcreate -p vPar1 -a cpu::2 -a cpu:::1:16 -a mem::4096 -a io:1/0/8 -a io:1/0/12

Once you've created the second vpar, reboot your npar and then boot the primary vpar using the vpar monitor (you will see a warning about there being no boot disk but thats ok):

ISL> hpux /stand/vpmon
Boot
: disk(0/0/0/2/0.6.0.0.0.0.0;0)/stand/vpmon
638976 + 174376 + 16892824 start 0x23000
vPar1: WARNING: No boot device specified
Welcome to VPMON (type '?' for a list of commands)
MON>
MON> vparload -p vPar0

Once the primary vpar has come up you should now be able to boot the other vpars using your Ignite server as follows:

# vparboot -p vPar1 -I 172.17.3.13,/opt/ignite/boot/WINSTALL

Obviously you will need to ensure that your Ignite server is configured correctly and is on the same subnet as your network card on 1/0/12. You will also need to check your Ignite version - From memory vpars weren't supported in Ignite before version 4.3.4?? as prior to that WINSTALL wasn't relocatable... I could be wrong about the particular version but if you have any version of Ignite from 5.3.5 onwards you should be fine.

If all is well with your Ignite server it should boot and then after 5 to 10 minutes it should come up with the normal Ignite interface. You can then go into the advanced options and hopefully you should be able to see your fibre disk and be able to select that as the boot disk.

2) With all that being said though I still think you will have problems until you resolve the issue as to why your disk is showing as 255/255.

As you and Harry have stated, if everything is well I would expect the disk to be showing something like eg. 1/0/8/0/0.12.25.0.0.1.3

When you use the vparcreate command the boot disk you specify must be on one the i/o paths specified. (ie it must be down 1/0/8. 255/255 is not valid)

I'm unsure about what effect the securepath software may be having but it is definitely worth considering. I assume that it was installed on the orginal hpux os before you installed the vpar software and configured the first partition. If possible, I would consider removing the vpar software and then removing the securepath software and trying again.

Ok. That's all for now. Best of luck and let me know how you get on.

Rgds,
Anthony

[John Wood_4]

Thanks for the replies.

I think I've got something going now. I've been trying lots of things, and I'm not sure exactly which of them helped solve the problem, but I think what I should have done is:

1) do NOT have SecurePath in your HP-UX Ignite Golden Image

2) use Ignite to install HP-UX to use the disk & network set aside for vPar0

3) reboot, & use Ignite to install HP-UX to use the disk & network set aside for vPar1

Note: no vpar commands used yet

4) from one HP-UX instance, issue the vparcreate commands, etc.


I was right about SecurePath: with it installed, the EVA 5000 virtual disk shows as path 255/255/0/0.0, and without SecurePath I have 8 paths to the EVA virtual disk on 1/0/8/1/*. I'll have to read up on SecurePath: I thought it was a good thing to have when using an EVA, but it doesn't seem to play well with vPars.

Regards,
John

[Duncan Edmonstone]

John,

Probably a bit late to post this, but you should have looked in the Secure Path release notes here:

http://h200005.www2.hp.com/bc/docs/support/SupportManual/c00248530/c00248530.pdf

Page 19 States:

---------------------------------------
Ignite-UX software does not support Secure Path V3.0E for the following reasons:
1. When Secure Path V3.0E is installed on a system, the hardware addresses of
all EVA disk LUNs change. During the recovery process, importing LVM
volume groups existing on the EVA array may fail.
2. If the boot disk resides on an EVA array, the system will fail to boot due to an
LVM configuration failure panic.
3. Secure Path V3.0E is not included in the installation kernel and is not part of
the core HP-UX operating system.

---------------------------------------

HTH

Duncan

[John Wood_4]

Thanks for the replies. Good to see it's documented that you shouldn't use SecurePath with Ignite.

BTW, as suggested, I did manage to set up my 3rd vPar by using:

# vparboot -p vPar2 -I 10.0.15.0,/opt/ignite/boot/Rel_B.11.11/WINSTALL

to get it to boot & install from the Ignite server.

Thanks,
John

[Alzhy]

I have had vPars booting off EVA LUNS when SecurePath started supporting them. I believe support started at SecurePath 3.0D. There were a couple of changes to that bundle as do documentation and utilities that were put on and off.

In my case, I simply followed whatever was in the documentation.

We're now at SecurePath 3.0E and everything so far has been stable.