vgcreate is hanging while creating volume group.

[Janusz Wojnarowicz]

Hi Folks,
my problem is as follows. I'm trying to create a new volume group on a new disc. It makes no difference whether I'm using sam or if I do it from a command line with pvcreate,vgcreate and so on.
I am just observing a strange effect that vgcreate process is hanging. I can see:
- /dev/vg01 is created and within it a node to vg: 64 0x010000 Apr 29 18:30 group
- I can see my disc in /etc/lvmtab.
- I can see the vgcreate process which is hanging
And when I take this disc into the existing vg e.g. vg00 he's finished in few seconds.
So I do not really understand why I'm getting these problems when I'm trying to create vg01 with this disc?

Can anyone give any tip?

Regards,
Janusz

[Jeff Schussele]

Hi Janusz,

Make sure you don't have any minor # conflicts

ll /dev/vg* | | grep 0x010000

and see if you get more than one hit.

Rgds,
Jeff

[Jeff Schussele]

Oops - just one pipe required - typo'd that

Jeff

[Lorenzo Facello]

???
Hi J.
I don't understand your problem...
but I give you the right procedure
pvcreate -f /dev/rdsk/cxtxdx
mkdir /dev/vg01
cd /dev/vg01
mknod group c 64 0x010000
vgcreate /dev/vg01 /dev/dsk/cxtxdx
lvcreate -L xx(MB) -n (name-optional) /dev/vg01
newfs -F vxfs /dev/vg01/rlovolx
mkdir /xxx
mount /dev/vg01/rlovolx /xxx

Hope this helps
L.

[Janusz Wojnarowicz]

Hi Jeff,

I have only vg00 at the moment and I'm for 111% sure I don't have any minor conflict.

[Marvin Strong]

He is asking if the minor number you are using is being used by another volume group.

ll /dev/vg*/group
crw-r----- 1 root sys 64 0x000000 Feb 16 2000 /dev/vg00/group
crw-r--r-- 1 root sys 64 0x110000 Aug 17 2002 /dev/vg01/group
crw-r--r-- 1 root sys 64 0x120000 Aug 17 2002 /dev/vg03/group
crw-r--r-- 1 root sys 64 0x130000 Aug 17 2002 /dev/vg04/group
crw-r--r-- 1 root sys 64 0x140000 Aug 17 2002 /dev/vg07/group
crw-r--r-- 1 root sys 64 0x0a0000 Dec 18 15:56 /dev/vg10/group
crw-r--r-- 1 root sys 64


notice they are all unique.

[Marvin Strong]

oh if you only have vg00 its probably 0x00000 however I would still verify that.

[Janusz Wojnarowicz]

I know what you mean - I don't have any conflict:
ll /dev/vg*/group
crw-r----- 1 root sys 64 0x000000 Jul 9 2003 /dev/vg00/group
cr--r--r-- 1 root sys 64 0x010000 Apr 29 18:30 /dev/vg01/group

[Lorenzo Facello]

take a look at the permission!!!!
L.

[Marvin Strong]

hmm interesting permissions you have on /dev/vg02/group there. I think it needs to be writeable by owner.

[Janusz Wojnarowicz]

Hi Lorenzo,

I tried to do it in 2 ways. One way was exactly this one as you described. And it was hanging at vgcreate. I couldn't kill the process the only way to get rid of him was to reboot the machine.

[Jeff Schussele]

Hi Janusz,

Notice the perms on vg01 group - make them

chmod 644 /dev/vg01/group

Rgds,
Jeff

[Lorenzo Facello]

agree with marvin
perms must be:
crw-r----- or
crw-rw-rw

L.

[A. Clay Stephenson]

My best guess, now that minor device numbers appear to be out of the picture, is that you have some corrupt kernel LVM data structures.
I would look for and install the latest LVM and LVM Commands cumulative patch set. Since you didn't bother to identify your OS, it's not possible to identify the needed patches.

[Janusz Wojnarowicz]

Ok it maybe a permission. So you mean if I change them while the process is running it could take an effect "on the fly" ?

[Sanjay_6]

Hi,

Suggest you check for patches on your system. Maybe you are missing one of the critical patches.

Hope this helps.

Regds

[Janusz Wojnarowicz]

Hi Sanyaj,
how can I check it ?

[Lorenzo Facello]

try to erase vg
vgexport vg03...
... patch the system..
and retry.
you install the quality pkg??
what version do you run?
L.

[Janusz Wojnarowicz]

How can I check which patch I need ?

[Lorenzo Facello]

look for patches database in itrc
search by version and by keyword LVM
compare with yours patches on the system...
swlist -l product | grep -i LVM

[Janusz Wojnarowicz]

It looks like this:

/usr/sbin/swlist -l product | grep -i LVM

LVM B.11.23 LVM

[Lorenzo Facello]

so
go to site map,
patches databsae,
find individual patches -->HPUX,
specify your vers HPUX and specify keyword LVM.
...then download and istall all!!!

Regds

L.

[Janusz Wojnarowicz]

Well, I took a look at HP-UX patches databases and LVM patches. There are only 2 critical but none of them is regarding to my problem.
I'm just wondering because when I got this machine with these 2 discs I just configured them and it worked! I got this problem after installing W2003 on the third disc because I configured my box as dual boot. And after reboot vg01 was inactive. So I wanted to activate her and I got an error: he couldn't find a cross-link to the physical device e.g. to my disc. Then I cleaned it up and I wanted to create vg01 from the beginning. And since then I'm not able to to it.
But adding this disc to the existing vg00 works !

[Sanjay_6]

Hi Janusz,

You can run a patch assessment for your box and find out what patches are necesary on your box.

The assessment list the patches that are on your box, the latest patch in that category and the hp recommended patch in that category.

Try this link from itrc on patch assessment.

http://www1.itrc.hp.com/service/patch/assessSystemsPage.do

Hope this helps.

Regds

[Yue Du]

Has the problem been fixed? I encountered
similar problem --- I have a brand
new 140G disk from HP. When creating
volume group (using SAM), it hanged.
Any advice would be highly appreciated.

Yue