PTF 11 README

DFS(TM) for AIX(R) and Solaris
PTF 11 README

Version 3.1

Document Number 00000-00

00000


First Edition (July 2006)

This edition applies to:

        IBM DFS for Solaris 10, Version 3.1

and to all subsequent releases and modifications until otherwise indicated in new editions.

This softcopy version is based on the printed edition of this book. Some formatting amendments have been made to make this information more suitable for softcopy.

Order publications through your IBM representative or through the IBM branch office serving your locality.

© Copyright International Business Machines Corporation 2001-2006. All rights reserved.
Note to U.S. Government Users -- Documentation related to restricted rights -- Use, duplication or disclosure is subject to restrictions set forth in GSA ADP Schedule contract with IBM Corp.

Contents

Overview

Obtaining and Installing/Uninstalling the PTF

Contents of The PTF

  • Product notes
  • Support for Large Episode Aggregate
  • Migration tips
  • DCE 3.2 PTF 9 is required for Solaris 10
  • Online manual pages now available
  • Specifying a time interval between successive bak dump or bak dumpinfo commands
  • Quick Beginnings gives incorrect filename for HTML documentation
  • Creating the root.dfs fileset
  • System restart is inappropriate for stopping DFS
  • Solaris requires North American English locale (en_US)
  • Defects fixed in PTFs

  • Overview

    This README file describes the contents of the IBM DFS only for Solaris 10 Program Temporary Fix (PTF) 11 for version 3.1. This PTF is not packaged for AIX and Solaris versions other than Solaris 10. It also provides instructions for obtaining and installing the PTF on Solaris 10 platform.

    This PTF must be applied to DFS Version 3.1.


    Obtaining and installing the PTF

    The current software changes to DFS 3.1 are cumulative. That is, this PTF includes the changes that were issued in all previous PTFs. It is necessary to install DFS 3.1 GA before installing this PTF.


    Obtaining the PTF

    You can download the PTF from the IBM Web site http://www6.software.ibm.com/dl/dfs31/dfs31-p. Follow the instructions on the Web site to download the PTF, and then follow these installation instructions to install the PTF on your system.


    Installing the PTF

    This section describes the procedure for installing the DFS 3.1 PTF 11  on a Solaris 10 machine. The PTF for Solaris has the file name dfs-3.1-solaris-P11.tar.Z.

    Before installing the PTF, ensure that you have met all of the installation prerequisites described below:

    To install the PTF, do the following:

    1. Stop all DCE and DFS processes on the machine.
    2. Become the local superuser root. (Single-user mode is recommended.)
    3. Change to the directory where the PTF packages will be kept.
    4. Uncompress the PTF file and extract the files to install by using the following commands:
      uncompress [file_path]dfs-3.1-solaris-P11.tar.Z
      tar xvf [file_path]dfs-3.1-solaris-P11.tar

      Use of file_path is required if the PTF tar file is not in the current directory.

    5. Change to the directory named IDFS-P11.
    6. From the command prompt, type ./installptf to run the installation script.

      For information about various features of the installation script, see Installation script options.

    7. To start a DFS client or server using the new software binaries, first restart the machine.

    To verify which packages were installed, issue the command pkginfo | grep IDFS

    Installation script options

    You can modify the behavior of the PTF installation script, installptf, by using command-line options or by setting up a customized environment file.

    The complete format of the installptf script follows.

    installptf [-e env_file] [-nolock] [-noback] [-force] [-help]
    -e
    Installs the PTF using options specified in the alternative environment file, env_file.
    -nolock
    Installs the PTF without locking files and without checking for file locks.
    -noback
    Installs the PTF without generating a back-out PTF. A back-out PTF contains replaced software packages (stored as a tar file) and a script that reverses the installation of the update PTF.
    -force
    Installs the PTF without checking whether the PTF is already installed. Note that using the -force option neutralizes certain safety mechanisms in the installation process that are designed to prevent unexpected and unwanted results. This option is provided for use in extreme situations--for example, if the Solaris packages database becomes corrupted.
    -help
    Shows a message about the command's usage and options; does not install the PTF.

    Options specified on the command line always override default options and definitions found in an environment file.

    The PTF installation script reads several parameter values from its environment file, installptf.env. The environment file is located with the installation script in the IDFS-P10 directory. A customized environment file allows the administrator to change complex settings, such as file paths, that cannot be changed by using command-line options. For example, customizing the environment file to cause back-out PTFs to be uniquely named allows an administrator to store multiple uninstallation options; the installptf script's default behavior is to overwrite any existing back-out PTF with a new one.

    To use a customized environment file with the PTF installation script, follow these steps.

    1. Make a copy of the installptf.env file, using a different file name.
    2. Use a text editor to change parameters in your new environment file.
    3. When installing the PTF, use the command installptf -e file_name where file_name is the path and file name for your customized environment file.

    By default, the installptf script creates a log file and a back-out PTF. Both of these artifacts are overwritten by subsequent PTF installations. The log file is stored in /var/sadm/patch/IDFS/. The back-out PTF contains archived versions of overwritten packages, a README file, and a script named backoutptf that reverses the actions taken by the installptf script for that machine. The backoutptf script is stored in /var/sadm/patch/IDFS/backout/ and must be executed from that directory.

    Uninstalling the PTF

    During installation on a Solaris machine, a back-out PTF and log file are created by default. One exception to this statement is when PTF 11 is applied on Solaris 10 system. The back-out PTF includes a tar file containing replaced software packages and a script named backoutptf. To uninstall the update PTF using the back-out PTF, follow the steps below.
    1. Stop all DCE and DFS processes on the machine.
    2. Become the local superuser root.
    3. Change to the directory where your back-out file is stored. By default, the file is stored in /var/sadm/patch/IDFS/backout/
    4. Type ./backoutptf to run the back-out script.
    5. To start a DFS client or server using the restored binaries, first restart the machine.
    Note:
    Because the general availability release of DFS 3.1 and gold master release of DFS 3.1.0.1 does not provide support for the Solaris10 operating system, uninstalling the PTF 11 software on Solaris 10  systems is not supported.

    Contents of the PTF


    Product notes

    This section highlights general information and requirements that apply to this PTF release for IBM DFS 3.1 for Solaris 10.

    To find the latest information about this product, please refer to the following IBM Web site:

    http://www-306.ibm.com/software/stormgmt/dfs

    Note:
    This document does not duplicate the notes included in the README and Release Notes documents distributed with the general availability (GA) release of DFS 3.1 and all previous service pack releases, but those notes also apply to this PTF release unless otherwise specified. See those documents for additional information.

    Support for Large Episode Aggregate

    DFS 3.1 supports episode aggregate size only upto 1TB. If user tries to create episode aggregate on partition or logical volume with more than 1 TB size, then also DFS newaggr command creates aggregate of only upto 1TB size.

    Migration tips

    The following tips apply when upgrading DFS software to version 3.1 or installing a DFS 3.1 PTF.

    Migration tips for Solaris users

    Support for the Solaris 10 operating system has been introduced in DFS 3.1 PTF 11; it is not available in the gold master (GM) release of DFS 3.1.0.1. The following tips are important for customers who install DFS software on Solaris 10 systems using the DFS 3.1 GA release and PTF 11.
    DCE does not start automatically

    In some cases, after upgrading DCE and DFS software on Solaris machines, the DCE software does not start automatically when the machine is started. This is because a link to a DCE initialization file is missing after installation.

    To solve this problem, create a link named S15-20dce in the path /etc/rc3.d/. The link should reference the file /etc/init.d/dce.

    DCE 3.2 PTF 9 is required for Solaris 10

    Before installing DFS Version 3.1 PTF 11 on Solaris 10 machine, ensure that a supported DCE 3.2 PTF 9 is installed on the system. DFS 3.1 for Solaris 10 requires DCE 3.2 PTF 9 onward. A supported DCE product(DCE 3.2 PTF 9) must be installed on the machine prior to installation of DFS 3.1 PTF 11 on Solaris 10. Please refer DCE release/announcement for supported DCE version on Solaris 10.

    Installation procedures on Solaris platforms do not automatically enforce this requirement. The showrev -p command can be used to show patches that have been applied to your DCE software.

    Online manual pages now available

    A command line interface similar to the UNIX man command is now available with DFS 3.1 on Solaris and AIX. The new dfsman commands enable users to read preformatted command reference files in the list3270 format. For example, issue the dfsman cm command to access the manual page on the DFS Cache Manager. For a list of all available dfsman commands, issue the dfsman help command.

    Additionally, a new tool, asciiview.dfs, is now available to enable users to view the following documents:

    Specifying a time interval between successive bak dump or bak dumpinfo commands

    If bak dump commands or bak dumpinfo commands are executed too closely in succession, errors may result.

    These bak commands access the Backup Database for information on the dump schedule, the tape drive, and the DFS servers. To access the Backup Database, the bak process must obtain a lock. The lock is exclusive to the process and is not recursive. In other words, only one process can access the Backup Database at any given time. When a bak dump or bak dumpinfo command is issued, an instance ID is created. Simultaneous access to the Backup Database is prohibited, and the instance ID enforces this.

    Each distinct dump command requests different information and uses different functions; therefore, the period of time for which the lock exists differs for each dump request. And, the period of time for which other processes are prohibited from accessing the database differs for each dump request. For this reason, the time interval between successful bak dump or bak dumpinfo commands varies.

    DFS does not return an error the first time a locking conflict is encountered; instead, there is a sizable amount of time during which a locked out process retries to access the database. Therefore, if a lock is being held by another process when a bak dump or bak dumpinfo command is issued, DFS generally resolves the locking conflict. In the case that locking conflicts exist and cannot be resolved, DFS users receive an error specifying that a lock is held by another user. To resolve the problem when this error is received, stagger the execution times of the bak commands.

    Quick Beginnings gives incorrect filename for HTML documentation

    IBM DFS for AIX Quick Beginnings and IBM DFS for Solaris Quick Beginnings, included with DFS Version 3.1, give an incorrect file name in the file path for installed HTML documentation. The installed file has the extension .htm, but the file is incorrectly listed with the .html extension in the section titled "Viewing the HTML documentation."

    The correct paths follow.

    For AIX:

    /usr/lpp/dfsdoc/html/en_US/index.htm

    For Solaris:

    /opt/dce/dfsdoc/html/en_US/index.htm

    Creating the root.dfs fileset

    Instructions for creating the root.dfs fileset, which is the root of a DFS cell's filespace, were omitted from the DFS Version 3.1 Quick Beginnings guides. The instructions can be found in the DFS Administration Guide, in the "DFS configuration issues" section, under the heading "Setting up filesets."

    System restart is inappropriate for stopping DFS

    The Quick Beginnings guides included with DFS Version 3.1 inappropriately recommend restarting the system as a way of shutting down DFS processes before a software upgrade. This method is not effective in most cases because DFS automatically restarts when the system restarts.

    This error appears with the heading "Stopping Software Processes" in the "Installing DFS 3.1" section of the AIX and Solaris Quick Beginnings guides.

    Before upgrading DFS software, stop all DCE applications, then stop any remaining DCE and DFS processes. After upgrading DFS software, restart the system before using DFS.

    Solaris requires North American English locale (en_US)

    The need for the en_US locale on Solaris was not documented. Users should be aware that DFS 3.1 on Solaris 7, 8, 9 and 10 requires that the North American English locale (en_US) be installed on the host. This locale can be installed by the Solaris administrator at system installation. Alternatively, en_US locale support can be added to a pre-existing Solaris system. To find the Sun packages needed, go to the docs.sun.com Web site and search for "North America OS Support." Depending on the hardware architecture, the host might also need the package referred to as "North America 64 bit OS Support."


    Defects fixed in PTFs

    PTF 11 includes all updates that were in previous PTFs, plus bugs fixed for porting issues on Solaris 10. It doesn't include any new bug fixes other than Solaris 10 porting on top of DFS 3.1 PTF 10.  Reference APAR for DFS 3.1 PTF 11 on Solaris 10 is IY85394.



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