Re: Backing up Centera?
Greetings, No disrespect intended, but you are missing the fundamental rationale behind the Centera. It is an archiving platform, not a primary storage platform. It is intended to be the last platform the data ever resides on. It has replication capabilities, so you can keep another copy off-site on another Centera for redundancy purposes, but since the data on it should be archive data, you should not be backing it up, and you should not need to. You don't need to back up an archive, since it is static data that is no longer being used for production processing. That also means that you should not be sending data to it that you intend to use for primary production applications. It is a good platform for email archive, or application data that is no longer being used on a daily basis, but might be needed at a later date for legal discovery or other reasons. EMC has had the Centera platform around for many years, and they always try to steer people away from trying to use the Centera for purposes outside of it's intended design. Best Regards, John D. Schneider The Computer Coaching Community, LLC Office: (314) 635-5424 / Toll Free: (866) 796-9226 Cell: (314) 750-8721 Original Message Subject: Re: [ADSM-L] Backing up Centera? From: john d mrmelr...@comcast.net Date: Fri, December 02, 2011 10:42 am To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU NDMP might be an option. Hopefully, you are running TSM 6.2 -Original Message- From: ADSM: Dist Stor Manager [mailto:ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU] On Behalf Of Huebner,Andy,FORT WORTH,IT Sent: Friday, December 02, 2011 11:17 AM To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU Subject: Re: [ADSM-L] Backing up Centera? Seven10 software, the Altus product. Andy Huebner -Original Message- From: ADSM: Dist Stor Manager [mailto:ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU] On Behalf Of Sachin Chaudhari Sent: Thursday, December 01, 2011 10:25 PM To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU Subject: [ADSM-L] Backing up Centera? Hello, How to take EMC centera backup? One way of doing it through additional EMC Module CBRM with TSM. But CBRM was end of life product, Pl suggest any alternate way of doing Centera backup on TSM-TAPE without CBRM.? Regards, Sachin C. This e-mail (including any attachments) is confidential and may be legally privileged. If you are not an intended recipient or an authorized representative of an intended recipient, you are prohibited from using, copying or distributing the information in this e-mail or its attachments. If you have received this e-mail in error, please notify the sender immediately by return e-mail and delete all copies of this message and any attachments. Thank you.
Re: TS3500 Library with TS1120 drives configuration
Mario, You don't mention whether you are using the IBMTape device drivers or not. Since this is an IBM library and IBM drives, you should be using the IBMTape device drivers. That is why the devices say GENERICTAPE instead of 3592. Go to www.ibm.com/storage and find the web site for the IBM TS3500 library, and pull down the drivers it provides. Before you install the drivers, take a look at your zoning. From the description you gave, the library and the two tape drives are only going to be visible from one FC path? If so, then there should be one zone for each tape drive, and no more. The 3592 tape drives have two FC ports each, but there is not much point in zoning separate paths through each side of the tape drive if they all go to one FC adapter. The library can define a library control path for each tape drive if you want. In other words, in the TS3500 library itself, you can configure Tape0 as a library control path, and also Tape1. When you configure the library devices, you will see two library devices appear. This is normal. When you define it to TSM, just pick the first one to be the device for the library manager. If that device is ever unavailable, the driver will automatically try to talk to the library using the alternate path. That is built into the driver. Once you have verified it is zoned correctly, delete the library and all the drives from the server, then follow the instructions that come with the IBMTape driver to install it. It will configure the library device and all the drives. It looks like you have used the correct device names to configure the library path and drives. Once you get the driver issue straightened out, it should work. Best Regards, John D. Schneider The Computer Coaching Community, LLC Office: (314) 635-5424 / Toll Free: (866) 796-9226 Cell: (314) 750-8721 Original Message Subject: [ADSM-L] TS3500 Library with TS1120 drives configuration From: Mario Behring mariobehr...@yahoo.com Date: Mon, March 21, 2011 11:12 pm To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU Hi all, I have a TS3500 tape Library with 2 drives TS1120...how should I define it to TSM? TSM Server is 6.2.2 running on Windows 2008. Here is what Windows and TSM Management Console actually seeand the tsm: * 4 Changer0 devices * 2 \.\\Tape0 devices * 2 \.\\Tape1 devices Tivoli Storage Manager -- Device List Utility Licensed Materials - Property of IBM 5697-TSM (C) Copyright IBM Corporation 2000, 2005. All rights reserved. U.S. Government Users Restricted Rights - Use, duplication or disclosure restricted by GSA ADP Schedule Contract with IBM Corporation. Computer Name: HOSTNAME OS Version: 6.1 OS Build #: 7601 TSM Device Driver: TSMScsi - Not Running One HBA was detected. Manufacturer Model Driver Version Firmware Description -- -- Emulex Corporation 42C2069 elxstor 7.2.30.018 2.82A3 IBM 42C2069 4Gb 1-Port PCIe FC HBA for System x TSM Name ID LUN Bus Port SSN WWN TSM Type Driver Device Identifier - mt0.0.0.4 0 0 0 4 07841159 500507630F559506 GENERICTAPE NATIVE IBM 03592E05 1EC7 lb0.1.0.4 0 1 0 4 000A18580402 500507630F559506 LIBRARY IBM IBM 03584L22 7363 mt1.0.0.4 1 0 0 4 07841088 500507630F559507 GENERICTAPE NATIVE IBM 03592E05 1EC7 lb1.1.0.4 1 1 0 4 000A18580402 500507630F559507 LIBRARY IBM IBM 03584L22 7363 mt2.0.0.4 2 0 0 4 07841088 500507630F959507 GENERICTAPE NATIVE IBM 03592E05 1EC7 lb2.1.0.4 2 1 0 4 000A18580402 500507630F959507 LIBRARY IBM IBM 03584L22 7363 mt3.0.0.4 3 0 0 4 07841159 500507630F959506 GENERICTAPE NATIVE IBM 03592E05 1EC7 lb3.1.0.4 3 1 0 4 000A18580402 500507630F959506 LIBRARY IBM IBM 03584L22 7363 Completed in: 0 days, 0 hours, 0 minutes, 0 seconds. Why the tsmldst utility identify 4 libraries and 4 drives? Actually the WWN and the Device Identifier show that there is only 1 Library, but how do I configure it in TSM? Here is what I've defined at TSM: * Device: Type = 3592 and Format = 3592-2C * Library: Type = SCSI, Device=\.\\Changer0 * Drives: Device= \.\\Tape0 and Device=\.\\Tape1 All created PATHs are onlinebut I can't manage to checkin any tape Any help is appreciated. Mario
Re: Fw: Estimating amount of data involved in a restore
Since you said you are going to restore an entire filespace, you can issue the query filespace command to find out how large the filesystem is, and the percent full, which will tell you the amount of data to be restored. Best Regards, John D. Schneider The Computer Coaching Community, LLC Office: (314) 635-5424 / Toll Free: (866) 796-9226 Cell: (314) 750-8721 Original Message Subject: [ADSM-L] Fw: Estimating amount of data involved in a restore From: Pete Tanenhaus tanen...@us.ibm.com Date: Fri, January 28, 2011 6:25 pm To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU The following command should give you the information you are looking for: dsmc query backup d:\*.* -subdir=yes -querydetail The summary output displayed after the list of backed up files contains information pertaining to the aggregate amount data, the total number of files and directories, etc. Hope this helps Pete Tanenhaus Tivoli Storage Manager Client Development email: tanen...@us.ibm.com tieline: 320.8778, external: 607.754.4213 Those who refuse to challenge authority are condemned to conform to it -- Forwarded by Pete Tanenhaus/San Jose/IBM on 01/28/2011 07:18 PM --- Please respond to ADSM: Dist Stor Manager ADSM-L@vm.marist.edu Sent by: ADSM: Dist Stor Manager ADSM-L@vm.marist.edu To: ADSM-L@vm.marist.edu cc: Subject: Estimating amount of data involved in a restore Does anyone know how to get info out of TSM prior to an performing a restore, for instance a restore of an entire filespace on a node e.g the d: drive on a Windows Server, that would tell you how much data there is to be restored? I've tried the Export Node command with Preview=Yes and it appears to do this fairly well but can run for a long time, so I'm trying to find a better or quicker way. Thanks for any help.
Re: Anyone using ILMT?
Zoltan, You don't get specific about what you problem is, but if you can't find it in the manual, you can call support and get help for it. Or you can ask again and include the details of your configuration, and what you want to know. Since ILMT is being used frequently by TSM customers, I don't think asking about it in this forum is completely off the subject. Best Regards, John D. Schneider The Computer Coaching Community, LLC Office: (314) 635-5424 / Toll Free: (866) 796-9226 Cell: (314) 750-8721 Original Message Subject: [ADSM-L] Anyone using ILMT? From: Zoltan Forray/AC/VCU zfor...@vcu.edu Date: Thu, January 27, 2011 12:08 pm To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU This may be the wrong place to ask this (if so...please tell me where to go, if you know, of course ;) Anyone have any experience using the IBM License Metric Tool? I just got in up on a test server and am playing with it and have come across a strange situation I am looking for help with? Googling ILMT brings up all kind of PPT files and users guides, but not what I am looking for. Zoltan Forray TSM Software Hardware Administrator Virginia Commonwealth University UCC/Office of Technology Services zfor...@vcu.edu - 804-828-4807 Don't be a phishing victim - VCU and other reputable organizations will never use email to request that you reply with your password, social security number or confidential personal information. For more details visit http://infosecurity.vcu.edu/phishing.html
Re: Configuring IBM 3584 library
I think Mark misread the original post. Since this is an EDL emulating an IBM3584 library, then you don't have to update firmware on the drives, obviously. But you will want to make sure your CE has the latest software installed on the EDL. Since you are emulating an IBM library, be sure to install the IBM drivers, either the IBMTape drivers for Windows, or Atape drivers for Unix, before you attach the tape drives and discover them. And if I can offer a bit of advice, use the advanced tape creation method on the EDL, and create your virtual tapes to be smaller than real 3592 tape drives. Real 3529 drives are 300GB, but on an VTL, you can get better tape utilization by making them smaller, 50-100GB in size. That way, you can reclaim them sooner and reuse the space sooner. And if you ever get into a situation where you need to recover a lot of filesystems or serves, you can get more restores going in parallel if they are on smaller tapes. Best Regards, John D. Schneider The Computer Coaching Community, LLC Office: (314) 635-5424 / Toll Free: (866) 796-9226 Cell: (314) 750-8721 Original Message Subject: Re: [ADSM-L] Configuring IBM 3584 library From: Loy, Mark W m...@state.pa.us Date: Fri, December 10, 2010 12:32 pm To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU Just a piece of advice, make sure that all of the firmware (both library and drives) are up to date. We've had a fair amount of issues with our 3584 with 3592-E05 drives that firmware fixed and we were only one or two versions behind the most recent. The same holds true, of course, with the drivers as well. --Mark -Original Message- From: ADSM: Dist Stor Manager [mailto:ads...@vm.marist.edu] On Behalf Of Martha McConaghy Sent: Friday, December 10, 2010 1:18 PM To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU Subject: [ADSM-L] Configuring IBM 3584 library I need a little quick help. I'm trying to connect our TSM 5.5 server to an EMC VTL. The EMC box is emulating an IBM 3584 library with IBM 3592 tape drives. I can't figure out how to define the library. Should it be SCSI? Anyone have any clue what options I should use? We've never used either before and I haven't had much luck searching the manuals for info on it. Martha McConaghy Marist IT
Re: rotating private tapes into/out of 3584 manually
Keith, You can just use checkout libvolume library_name volume_name remove=bulk checklabel=no and insert your library_name and volume_name as appropriate. Then you want to update volume volume_name access=unavail so TSM won't try to access them. TSM will not loose track of the data on a tape just because it is checked out of the library. It will still be in a storage pool, and TSM still knows everything on it. If you have any separate storage pools for archive data, you could check out those first, because you are probably less likely to need them. Also, you can query the tapes and see which ones have not been written to in a long time as good candidates to check out. You can issue select volume_name,status,pct_utilized,last_write_date from volumes order by last_write_date to get a list of tape candidates. Ideally you want to check out tapes with a status of Full, and a high pct_utilized, because they won't come up for reclamation for awhile. I hope you can get an additional frame soon, because TSM is much easier to manage if you have enough room in the library. Best Regards, John D. Schneider The Computer Coaching Community, LLC Office: (314) 635-5424 / Toll Free: (866) 796-9226 Cell: (314) 750-8721 Original Message Subject: [ADSM-L] rotating private tapes into/out of 3584 manually From: Keith Arbogast warbo...@indiana.edu Date: Tue, October 19, 2010 11:18 am To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU We are running TSM 5.5.4.3 on RHEL 5.5. Our tape library is a 3584 with ALMS and twelve 3592-E05 drives. Expiration and reclamation are not producing enough scratch tapes to stay ahead of their usage, so our scratch tape supply is dwindling (#18). More tapes are on the way, but only 15 empty slots remain in the 3584. Another frame for the 3584 is being negotiated, but Rome was not built in a day, administratively speaking. Given the current pace of expiration and reclamation, we could hit 0 scratch tapes. If that happens, I am thinking our only recourse will be to eject Private tapes and load new tapes manually until new capacity is in place. How is that done, properly? Is it like ejecting tapes for offsite vaulting? I don't have experience checking-out or checking-in Private volumes, so I am concerned that no data be lost due to incorrect parameters on checkouts and checkins. Is running dsmadmc in mountmode going to be the best way to do this? Or, console mode? With many thanks and best wishes, Keith
Re: TSM + VTL and physical tape library
Capo, I implement and support both large and small environments with VTLs, and have had a lot of practice. I will weigh in on your questions, but there are more issues involved to really get the best design for your sitation. Contact me offline if you want to discuss further. 1. TSM catalog is growing too much. Would VTL help them to reduce its size ? When data are copied offline (I suppose via a copy pool), does the catalog still keeps track of them? No, the TSM database contains all backup objects, no matter what storage pool they are in. If a copy storage pool is made, the database keeps track of those objects, too. 2. Physical tape generation from Virtual media is really important in this project: customer would like to keep fresh backups on VTL and old ones on tape. With other BU applications this would be quite easy but, since TSM has got a peculiar way to manage files (versions), I am a confused: do you think that defining the tape library as a copy pool is a good idea? What level of granularity can I reach with the storage policies and copy pools? Can I simulate the lifecycle policy of other backup applications ? Can I tell migrate XX backup to tape after 1 month and remove it from the VTL and stuff like that ? You have a few choices here, depending on how much VTL disk you can afford, and your requirements: - If your virtual library is sized large enough, you can keep all your Primary data on the VTL. A physical library is used for copy storage pools for offsite storage, and backups of the TSM database. - The VTL can be used for multiple storage pools, so some storage pools can hold client data that never migrates to tape (the VERY important clients) and other clients can migrate to tape so the VTL doesn't get full. - If your VTL can't hold all your primary data, you can set up automatic migration. You can set up the storage pool to only migrate data after it is a certain number of days old. - You can also set up a storage pool so the data keeps the most recent version of each file on the VTL, and only migrates to tape the older version. 3. Any real life experience to share ? The candidates for this project are Centricstor and DXi 7500 (or the new DXi 8500). I can't claim personal knowledge of either of those products; I am most familiar with the EMC Disk Library. Neither of those products is one of the major VTLs, but that doesn't mean they won't work. But when evaluating any of these VTLs, consider the possibility of an outage in your design. In other words, if you have problems with your VTL and it is down for awhile, what is your contingency plan? If you have a VTL from a major vendor with good support in your town, you may never experience an outage of more than a few hours. If you buy a low-end product with no local support, you could be down for days when that happens. You may be able to live with that risk, but you should discuss it in advance. Do you need a couple TBs of disk on standby somewhere, so you can use it for disk storage pool so you don't loose backups if the VTL is down? Can your customers live through a long period of time when nothing can be restored because the VTL is down? These are the things that cause customers to buy the high-end products with good hardware support capabilities. Consider the costs/benefits of what each vendor offers, not just in price and performance, but in support. Because one day your are going to need it. Best Regards, John D. Schneider The Computer Coaching Community, LLC; a TSM Consulting Company Office: (314) 635-5424 / Toll Free: (866) 796-9226 Cell: (314) 750-8721 Original Message Subject: [ADSM-L] TSM + VTL and physical tape library From: Capo tsm-fo...@backupcentral.com Date: Fri, October 15, 2010 3:35 am To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU Hi all, I'm involved in a TSM + VTL project but, unfortunately, I'm quite new in TSM world: please apology me if I make trivial questions: My customer has currently got 4 TSM instances copying to a small disk pool and then to an IBM Tape library. They would like to introduce a VTL in the existing environment to improve overall performances and give TSM servers a little break. My questions: 1. TSM catalog is growing too much. Would VTL help them to reduce its size ? When data are copied offline (I suppose via a copy pool), does the catalog still keeps track of them? 2. Physical tape generation from Virtual media is really important in this project: customer would like to keep fresh backups on VTL and old ones on tape. With other BU applications this would be quite easy but, since TSM has got a peculiar way to manage files (versions), I am a confused: do you think that defining the tape library as a copy pool is a good idea? What level of granularity can I reach with the storage policies and copy pools? Can I simulate the lifecycle policy of other backup applications ? Can I tell migrate XX backup
Re: Frustrated by slowness in TSM 6.2
Andrew, The crowd may be right, and the XIV may be your bottleneck for the DB, but I wouldn't focus on that. In your test environment, with only a small number of backups running at once, there probably isn't all that much database traffic generated, is there? And not many database reads, if much of your database should fit in memory. Database writes should be going to cache in the XIV, if it is as lightly loaded as you say, so I don't see that as much of a bottleneck when only a few clients are getting backed up. What kind of client backups are you testing? Are they large file database backups? Those can generate very good I/O throughput, because the client is sending the data as fast as possible. Or incremental filesystem backups on Windows servers? Those can generate very pool I/O throughput, if they have to examine thousands of files for each file that needs to be sent to the server. Can you say with assurance that the clients themselves are able to send more than 20-30MB/sec? Do you know what performance those same clients get when they backup to your production environment? Try backing them up to their production environment, at some time of night when the TSM server is not maxed out. Use that as a known starting point. If you just want to test throughput, and don't care about anything else: 1) Turn off client compression, if it is on. 2) Do selective backups of the whole filesystem, so the clients send everything without having to make any time-consuming decisions about what gets sent. 3) Pick a time for the test with the client is very lightly loaded. 4) Try to pick a client with a small number of very large (multi-GB) files, not zillions of small files. Andrew, I know you already know these things, but I include them for the benefit of the rest of the list. The point I am making is to allow the TSM client shove data across as fast as it can, and if it performs really well, then the device that is absorbing all that incoming data (The DataDomain, or other disk storage pool) is performing well. If another client is sending zillions of files, but performing very slowly, maybe that client is creating a lot more traffic to the database, and that is where your bottle neck. In other words, different clients can be used to show what part of the TSM server is the slowest performer. Best Regards, John D. Schneider The Computer Coaching Community, LLC Office: (314) 635-5424 / Toll Free: (866) 796-9226 Cell: (314) 750-8721 Original Message Subject: Re: [ADSM-L] Frustrated by slowness in TSM 6.2 From: Paul Zarnowski p...@cornell.edu Date: Fri, October 08, 2010 11:37 pm To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU Rick, I think their response would be something along these lines... The XIV can perform better than other traditional arrays because the [cache miss] I/Os are spread across so many more spindles. I get that. But it seems to be that that can break down when the overall I/O load gets sufficiently high, across all of the spindles. In an I/O intensive environment such as TSM, I think this could be more likely to happen - particularly if you are using XIV for storage pools as well as for database volumes. I'm still skeptical about how far it can go. I can buy that it has good performance --- for a SATA-based product. But not compared to a pure 15K spindle-based product. Oh, and the SATA drives are larger than the SAS or FC drives, which doesn't help. ..Paul At 01:57 PM 10/8/2010, Richard Rhodes wrote: I would be suspicious of having the db on XIV. Do you have any FC or SAS Disk you could try putting the DB on? I know XIV has lots of CPU cache, but underneath it all is still SATA. I've heard Marketing types rave about how fast XIV is, even with SATA, because I/O can be spread across many spindles, but I'm not entirely convinced it's as good as 15k FC or SAS. This is _exactly_ what IBM has not, and seems unwilling, to explain. Soon after IBM finalized the purchase of XIV, they had a series of seminars around the country (usa) about the box. This wasn't some little out of the way seminar . . . Moshe (inventor of the box) was there and gave much of the presentation. I attended one - Lets just say it was strange!!! They hammered on high performance, over and over. They threw up one graph where they claimed 25k iops at 3ms response time for a cache miss workload. Lets see, cache miss means having to go to the spindle to do the I/O. SATA drives come no where close to this response time. The workload was either not cache miss, or, they effectively short-stroked the drive such that the heads never moved. When I questioned this claim I got nowhere - just run-around. Rick - The information contained in this message is intended only for the personal and confidential use of the recipient(s) named above. If the reader of this message is not the intended recipient or an agent responsible for delivering it to the intended recipient
Re: Urgent - Library Master mount queue breaking down, tapes going into RESERVED status and never getting mounted
My thanks to all who replied to my requests for help last Friday. I thought I would reply and let everybody know how this played out. In our situation, we had 128 virtual tape drives, and for two nights in a row, the TSM Library Master instance was getting into a state where there would be 80 or more virtual tapes in RESERVED status, and at the same time hundreds of clients in MediaWait waiting for virtual tape mounts. The basic underlying problem was a Windows LAN-free server that was using about 40 of our 128 virtual tape mounts, and not giving them back. The Storage Agent wasn't down, but it wasn't responding right, either. For example, when it is normally working, you can issue a q mount command to it from the Library Master and get a response back instantly. But last week it was causing the Library Master to hang for 10 seconds, then give us an error that the Storage Agent had replied with errors. So not only did the Library Master not know how to get back the 40 virtual tapes, but under heavy load the Library Master's queue would grow rapidly while it was issuing requests to the Storage Agent over and over, and waiting 10 seconds between each reply. The problem would seem to go away for awhile if we restarted the Library Master, and during the day the problem would seem to go away because we don't need all 128 virtual drives, and the tape mounts are fewer and farther between. But as soon as backup load picked up at night, the Library Master would get into trouble. Once we understood the underlying problem, we restarted the Windows LAN-free server, and the 40 virtual tapes freed up, and we were in business. We also realized that under normal circumstances we were using over 110 virtual tapes at night, and so we allocated an additional 64 virtual tape drives to the environment, just to relieve that potential bottleneck. For now we have turned of the LAN-free storage agent, and have come to the conclusion that running that particular client LAN-free does nothing to improve it's performance. It's backup runs just as fast across the LAN is it did directly to tape, so we will probably just leave it that way. Best Regards, John D. Schneider The Computer Coaching Community, LLC Office: (314) 635-5424 / Toll Free: (866) 796-9226 Cell: (314) 750-8721 Original Message Subject: Re: [ADSM-L] Urgent - Library Master mount queue breaking down, tapes going into RESERVED status and never getting mounted From: Prather, Wanda wprat...@icfi.com Date: Fri, September 10, 2010 4:03 pm To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU And you've probably done this already, but you should be able to log into the CDL and look at it's CPU busy, make sure IT isn't overwhelmed... -Original Message- From: ADSM: Dist Stor Manager [mailto:ads...@vm.marist.edu] On Behalf Of Richard Rhodes Sent: Friday, September 10, 2010 5:01 PM To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU Subject: Re: [ADSM-L] Urgent - Library Master mount queue breaking down, tapes going into RESERVED status and never getting mounted One time when we had problems like this it was caused by rmt devices being out of sync with TSM paths. We never did figure out how it occured, but we ended up blowing away all our paths and drives, and recreating it. Rick John D. Schneider john.schnei...@c To OMPUTERCOACHINGCO ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU MMUNITY.COM cc Sent by: ADSM: Dist Stor Subject Manager Re: Urgent - Library Master mount ads...@vm.marist queue breaking down, tapes going .EDU into RESERVED status and never getting mounted 09/10/2010 04:39 PM Please respond to ADSM: Dist Stor Manager ads...@vm.marist .EDU Richard, All good suggestions. No AIX errors with the VTL or VTL drives. We are using the Atape driver, because the VTL is emulating a 3584 with LTO1 drives. But there are a number of Atape files, in particular Atape.smc0.traceX. I look in them and see regular errors in them; but I wonder if this is a red herring. Because I look on the Library Master for a physical 3584 library, and I see similar trace files, and the same sort of errors on the smc1 device for a real 3584 library. So are these libraries always getting these errors? I looked at our SAN switches a couple days ago, and zeroed out the error counters for the AIX host, the EDL, and the ISLs between the switches. Two days later, and all those ports are totally error free. So I don't see how it could be in the switches. All good ideas, and I don't mean to disparage them. I just don't see a smoking gun, yet. Best Regards, John D. Schneider The Computer Coaching Community, LLC Office: (314) 635-5424 / Toll Free: (866) 796-9226 Cell: (314) 750-8721 Original Message Subject: Re: [ADSM-L] Urgent - Library Master mount queue breaking down, tapes going into RESERVED status and never getting mounted From: Richard Rhodes rrho...@firstenergycorp.com Date: Fri, September 10, 2010 12:44 pm To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU Sounds like maybe the library
Urgent - Library Master mount queue breaking down, tapes going into RESERVED status and never getting mounted
Greetings, Our environement is 8 TSM instances on AIX, running AIX 5.3ML11, and TSM 5.4.3.0. I know we are rather far behind, but this has been an extremely stable version for us, until just recently. There are 4 instances on one AIX host, and 4 on the other. The hosts are pSeries 570s. There is also a Windows Lan-free client in the mix. Total client count about 1500, in schedules more or less spread across the night. Performance of backups is OK; the AIX hosts are generally 20-30 CPU loaded across 8 CPUs. One of the TSM instances servers as a TSM Library Master for the others, and has no other workload. It mounts tapes for a EMC Disk library (virtual library), configured with 128 virtual LTO1 tape drives, shared between all the instances. The device class for the library has a 15 minute mount retention period. The clients mostly can only mount a single virtual tape. A few larger database servers are allowed to mount more. All have keep mount point set to yes. This basic configuration has been in place about three years. At first we had problems, and had to put LIBSHRTIMEOUT 60 and COMMTIMEOUT 3600 in the dsmserv.opt of the Library Master. But it has been many months since we had to make any configuration changes to the environment. I like STABLE. But things are growing, and we are adding new clients all the time, and have added about forty in the last few weeks. A couple weeks ago, the Library Master instance got into a state where there were lots of tapes in RESERVED status when we did a 'q mount'. There were still occasional mounts happening, but lots of clients were in Media wait. We restarted the Library Master and the problem went away, but then it came back like a week later. Now it is happening every day. Last night we stayed up all night watching it, and at first could see just a couple of RESERVED tape drives, and lots of normal mounts coming and going. Then slowly the number of RESERVED ones would creap up over the course of an hour or two until there were 80 or more in RESERVED status, and dozens of clients in Media wait. Ordinarily virtual tape mounts take 2-4 seconds. Last night during the problem they were taking 15-20 seconds. At about 1am we restarted the Library Master, and the RESERVED drives went away, but were back again within the hour. One thing I noticed then was that the Library Master had over 300 sessions, all admin. Usually it has very few. Our MAXSESSIONS was set to 500, so I wondered if perhaps were were overrunning it. We bumped it up to 1000 on all instances. We restarted all TSM instances this time, including the lan-free one. (The lan-free Windows server was hung, although we don't know if this is coincidence, or has something to do with anything). After we restarted, we appeared to be stable for about 4 hours, so we started rerunning a bunch of the TSM clients that failed last night during the problem. In no time at all the RESERVED list grew huge, clients were in Media wait again, and we had to restart the Library Master again. So it seems like to me the problem has to do with the Library Master's queuing mechanism. Somehow it is becoming overwhelmed with tape mount requests, and can't satisfy them all, so they go into RESERVED status. This is somewhat normal behavior, and we see drives go into RESERVED status lots of times when a burst of mounts happens at once, but then the queue clears after a few minutes. But even after an hour or two it never catches up, and things go from bad to worse. One other tidbit, but might not even be related. Back on 8/23 our EMC Disk library had a drive fail, but within 24 hours had rebuilt onto a spare. We just found out about it, and haven't replaced the drive. I don't think it is related, but I didn't want to leave out any important fact. If anybody has any advice on how to tune the Library Master to allow it to support a greater number of requests at once, please let me know. Best Regards, John D. Schneider The Computer Coaching Community, LLC Office: (314) 635-5424 / Toll Free: (866) 796-9226 Cell: (314) 750-8721
Re: Urgent - Library Master mount queue breaking down, tapes going into RESERVED status and never getting mounted
Richard, All good suggestions. No AIX errors with the VTL or VTL drives. We are using the Atape driver, because the VTL is emulating a 3584 with LTO1 drives. But there are a number of Atape files, in particular Atape.smc0.traceX. I look in them and see regular errors in them; but I wonder if this is a red herring. Because I look on the Library Master for a physical 3584 library, and I see similar trace files, and the same sort of errors on the smc1 device for a real 3584 library. So are these libraries always getting these errors? I looked at our SAN switches a couple days ago, and zeroed out the error counters for the AIX host, the EDL, and the ISLs between the switches. Two days later, and all those ports are totally error free. So I don't see how it could be in the switches. All good ideas, and I don't mean to disparage them. I just don't see a smoking gun, yet. Best Regards, John D. Schneider The Computer Coaching Community, LLC Office: (314) 635-5424 / Toll Free: (866) 796-9226 Cell: (314) 750-8721 Original Message Subject: Re: [ADSM-L] Urgent - Library Master mount queue breaking down, tapes going into RESERVED status and never getting mounted From: Richard Rhodes rrho...@firstenergycorp.com Date: Fri, September 10, 2010 12:44 pm To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU Sounds like maybe the library manager is not communicating with the VTL. Some things to check: - any errors in the AIX error log? - any errors in the VTL? - any san errors? If you are running atape . . . - check the logs in /var/adm/ras - are you running multi-pathing? If yes, what is the status of the paths? Atape with multi-paths is very good at hiding hardware problems. Rick John D. Schneider john.schnei...@c To OMPUTERCOACHINGCO ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU MMUNITY.COM cc Sent by: ADSM: Dist Stor Subject Manager Urgent - Library Master mount queue ads...@vm.marist breaking down, tapes going into .EDU RESERVED status and never getting mounted 09/10/2010 01:05 PM Please respond to ADSM: Dist Stor Manager ads...@vm.marist .EDU Greetings, Our environement is 8 TSM instances on AIX, running AIX 5.3ML11, and TSM 5.4.3.0. I know we are rather far behind, but this has been an extremely stable version for us, until just recently. There are 4 instances on one AIX host, and 4 on the other. The hosts are pSeries 570s. There is also a Windows Lan-free client in the mix. Total client count about 1500, in schedules more or less spread across the night. Performance of backups is OK; the AIX hosts are generally 20-30 CPU loaded across 8 CPUs. One of the TSM instances servers as a TSM Library Master for the others, and has no other workload. It mounts tapes for a EMC Disk library (virtual library), configured with 128 virtual LTO1 tape drives, shared between all the instances. The device class for the library has a 15 minute mount retention period. The clients mostly can only mount a single virtual tape. A few larger database servers are allowed to mount more. All have keep mount point set to yes. This basic configuration has been in place about three years. At first we had problems, and had to put LIBSHRTIMEOUT 60 and COMMTIMEOUT 3600 in the dsmserv.opt of the Library Master. But it has been many months since we had to make any configuration changes to the environment. I like STABLE. But things are growing, and we are adding new clients all the time, and have added about forty in the last few weeks. A couple weeks ago, the Library Master instance got into a state where there were lots of tapes in RESERVED status when we did a 'q mount'. There were still occasional mounts happening, but lots of clients were in Media wait. We restarted the Library Master and the problem went away, but then it came back like a week later. Now it is happening every day. Last night we stayed up all night watching it, and at first could see just a couple of RESERVED tape drives, and lots of normal mounts coming and going. Then slowly the number of RESERVED ones would creap up over the course of an hour or two until there were 80 or more in RESERVED status, and dozens of clients in Media wait. Ordinarily virtual tape mounts take 2-4 seconds. Last night during the problem they were taking 15-20 seconds. At about 1am we restarted the Library Master, and the RESERVED drives went away, but were back again within the hour. One thing I noticed then was that the Library Master had over 300 sessions, all admin. Usually it has very few. Our MAXSESSIONS was set to 500, so I wondered if perhaps were were overrunning it. We bumped it up to 1000 on all instances. We restarted all TSM instances this time, including the lan-free one. (The lan-free Windows server was hung, although we don't know if this is coincidence, or has something to do with anything). After we restarted, we appeared to be stable for about 4 hours, so we started rerunning a bunch of the TSM clients that failed last night during the problem. In no time
Re: Urgent - Library Master mount queue breaking down, tapes going into RESERVED status and never getting mounted
Richard, We have looked at the EDL console, and the EDL is not full, or getting any other errors. But we have seen situations before where a memory leak in the EDL caused it to just run out of swap space on the engine, and cause various errors and hangs. It is conceivable that we are just seeing something like that. This afternoon we are going to restart the EDL engine. The other line of inquiry we have pursued is looking at the library clients, such as the Windows lan-free. It is a funny coincidence that when we were fighting this last night, we discovered that the lan-free server was hung. We couldn't log in to it, but it wasn't down. Just had a blank screen. So we rebooted it. But four hours later we were back in the same position, with 80+ Reserved tape drives, and the lan-free was not doing anything that we could tell. Best Regards, John D. Schneider The Computer Coaching Community, LLC Office: (314) 635-5424 / Toll Free: (866) 796-9226 Cell: (314) 750-8721 Original Message Subject: Re: [ADSM-L] Urgent - Library Master mount queue breaking down, tapes going into RESERVED status and never getting mounted From: Richard Rhodes rrho...@firstenergycorp.com Date: Fri, September 10, 2010 2:27 pm To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU Or . .. maybe the vtl is simply full. Or, if it's a background dedup box, maybe it can't keep up with the rate of data coming in. Dwight Cook coo...@cox.net Sent by: ADSM: To Dist Stor ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU Manager cc ads...@vm.marist .EDU Subject Re: Urgent - Library Master mount queue breaking down, tapes going 09/10/2010 02:51 into RESERVED status and never PM getting mounted Please respond to ADSM: Dist Stor Manager ads...@vm.marist .EDU Also have to wonder if maybe the VTL hasn't lost multiple drives in a raid array and is (possibly) working off of parity or at minimum, rebuilding on a spare drive though that would generally happen and be done with (not be seen over and over again) but... if you have a raid array that has lost excessive drives and is operating off parity, that would greatly slow down processing when things get busy. -Original Message- From: ADSM: Dist Stor Manager [mailto:ads...@vm.marist.edu] On Behalf Of Richard Rhodes Sent: Friday, September 10, 2010 12:44 PM To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU Subject: Re: [ADSM-L] Urgent - Library Master mount queue breaking down, tapes going into RESERVED status and never getting mounted Sounds like maybe the library manager is not communicating with the VTL. Some things to check: - any errors in the AIX error log? - any errors in the VTL? - any san errors? If you are running atape . . . - check the logs in /var/adm/ras - are you running multi-pathing? If yes, what is the status of the paths? Atape with multi-paths is very good at hiding hardware problems. Rick John D. Schneider john.schnei...@c To OMPUTERCOACHINGCO ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU MMUNITY.COM cc Sent by: ADSM: Dist Stor Subject Manager Urgent - Library Master mount queue ads...@vm.marist breaking down, tapes going into .EDU RESERVED status and never getting mounted 09/10/2010 01:05 PM Please respond to ADSM: Dist Stor Manager ads...@vm.marist .EDU Greetings, Our environement is 8 TSM instances on AIX, running AIX 5.3ML11, and TSM 5.4.3.0. I know we are rather far behind, but this has been an extremely stable version for us, until just recently. There are 4 instances on one AIX host, and 4 on the other. The hosts are pSeries 570s. There is also a Windows Lan-free client in the mix. Total client count about 1500, in schedules more or less spread across the night. Performance of backups is OK; the AIX hosts are generally 20-30 CPU loaded across 8 CPUs. One of the TSM instances servers as a TSM Library Master for the others, and has no other workload. It mounts tapes for a EMC Disk library (virtual library), configured with 128 virtual LTO1 tape drives, shared between all the instances. The device class for the library has a 15 minute mount retention period. The clients mostly can only mount a single virtual tape. A few larger database servers are allowed to mount more. All have keep mount point set to yes. This basic configuration has been in place about three years. At first we had problems, and had to put LIBSHRTIMEOUT 60 and COMMTIMEOUT 3600 in the dsmserv.opt of the Library Master. But it has been many months since we had to make any configuration changes to the environment. I like STABLE. But things are growing, and we are adding new clients all the time, and have added about forty in the last few weeks. A couple weeks ago, the Library Master instance got into a state where there were lots of tapes in RESERVED status when we did a 'q mount'. There were still occasional mounts happening, but lots of clients were in Media wait. We restarted the Library Master and the problem went away, but then it came back like a week later. Now it is happening every day
Re: Urgent - Library Master mount queue breaking down, tapes going into RESERVED status and never getting mounted
Wanda, We just now took down all our virtual tape drives, and rebooted the EDL engine. So we will see tonight if that is the problem. We also looked at our schedules, to see if it is possible that we have too many schedules in too narrow a timeframe asking for tape mounts, pushing the library master to queue them and not be able to fulfil them. We have moved some clients to other schedules hours later, and reduced resourceutilization on some clients that may be using more simultaneous tape drives than they need. Tonight we will monitor it carefully and see. Best Regards, John D. Schneider The Computer Coaching Community, LLC Office: (314) 635-5424 / Toll Free: (866) 796-9226 Cell: (314) 750-8721 Original Message Subject: Re: [ADSM-L] Urgent - Library Master mount queue breaking down, tapes going into RESERVED status and never getting mounted From: Prather, Wanda wprat...@icfi.com Date: Fri, September 10, 2010 4:03 pm To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU And you've probably done this already, but you should be able to log into the CDL and look at it's CPU busy, make sure IT isn't overwhelmed... -Original Message- From: ADSM: Dist Stor Manager [mailto:ads...@vm.marist.edu] On Behalf Of Richard Rhodes Sent: Friday, September 10, 2010 5:01 PM To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU Subject: Re: [ADSM-L] Urgent - Library Master mount queue breaking down, tapes going into RESERVED status and never getting mounted One time when we had problems like this it was caused by rmt devices being out of sync with TSM paths. We never did figure out how it occured, but we ended up blowing away all our paths and drives, and recreating it. Rick John D. Schneider john.schnei...@c To OMPUTERCOACHINGCO ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU MMUNITY.COM cc Sent by: ADSM: Dist Stor Subject Manager Re: Urgent - Library Master mount ads...@vm.marist queue breaking down, tapes going .EDU into RESERVED status and never getting mounted 09/10/2010 04:39 PM Please respond to ADSM: Dist Stor Manager ads...@vm.marist .EDU Richard, All good suggestions. No AIX errors with the VTL or VTL drives. We are using the Atape driver, because the VTL is emulating a 3584 with LTO1 drives. But there are a number of Atape files, in particular Atape.smc0.traceX. I look in them and see regular errors in them; but I wonder if this is a red herring. Because I look on the Library Master for a physical 3584 library, and I see similar trace files, and the same sort of errors on the smc1 device for a real 3584 library. So are these libraries always getting these errors? I looked at our SAN switches a couple days ago, and zeroed out the error counters for the AIX host, the EDL, and the ISLs between the switches. Two days later, and all those ports are totally error free. So I don't see how it could be in the switches. All good ideas, and I don't mean to disparage them. I just don't see a smoking gun, yet. Best Regards, John D. Schneider The Computer Coaching Community, LLC Office: (314) 635-5424 / Toll Free: (866) 796-9226 Cell: (314) 750-8721 Original Message Subject: Re: [ADSM-L] Urgent - Library Master mount queue breaking down, tapes going into RESERVED status and never getting mounted From: Richard Rhodes rrho...@firstenergycorp.com Date: Fri, September 10, 2010 12:44 pm To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU Sounds like maybe the library manager is not communicating with the VTL. Some things to check: - any errors in the AIX error log? - any errors in the VTL? - any san errors? If you are running atape . . . - check the logs in /var/adm/ras - are you running multi-pathing? If yes, what is the status of the paths? Atape with multi-paths is very good at hiding hardware problems. Rick John D. Schneider john.schnei...@c To OMPUTERCOACHINGCO ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU MMUNITY.COM cc Sent by: ADSM: Dist Stor Subject Manager Urgent - Library Master mount queue ads...@vm.marist breaking down, tapes going into .EDU RESERVED status and never getting mounted 09/10/2010 01:05 PM Please respond to ADSM: Dist Stor Manager ads...@vm.marist .EDU Greetings, Our environement is 8 TSM instances on AIX, running AIX 5.3ML11, and TSM 5.4.3.0. I know we are rather far behind, but this has been an extremely stable version for us, until just recently. There are 4 instances on one AIX host, and 4 on the other. The hosts are pSeries 570s. There is also a Windows Lan-free client in the mix. Total client count about 1500, in schedules more or less spread across the night. Performance of backups is OK; the AIX hosts are generally 20-30 CPU loaded across 8 CPUs. One of the TSM instances servers as a TSM Library Master for the others, and has no other workload. It mounts tapes for a EMC Disk library (virtual library), configured with 128 virtual LTO1 tape drives, shared between all the instances. The device class for the library has a 15 minute mount retention period. The clients mostly can only
Re: Urgent - Library Master mount queue breaking down, tapes going into RESERVED status and never getting mounted
Dwight, As I said in my original email, we did have a drive fail on 8/23, and the EDL rebuilt onto a spare. The event log shows it took about a day to rebuild. So it doesn't look like it is running in degraded mode at this point. I will call in the problem and get the drive replaced, but I don't think it should be the culprit for our problem with tape drives going into Reserved status. Best Regards, John D. Schneider The Computer Coaching Community, LLC Office: (314) 635-5424 / Toll Free: (866) 796-9226 Cell: (314) 750-8721 Original Message Subject: Re: [ADSM-L] Urgent - Library Master mount queue breaking down, tapes going into RESERVED status and never getting mounted From: Dwight Cook coo...@cox.net Date: Fri, September 10, 2010 1:51 pm To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU Also have to wonder if maybe the VTL hasn't lost multiple drives in a raid array and is (possibly) working off of parity or at minimum, rebuilding on a spare drive though that would generally happen and be done with (not be seen over and over again) but... if you have a raid array that has lost excessive drives and is operating off parity, that would greatly slow down processing when things get busy. -Original Message- From: ADSM: Dist Stor Manager [mailto:ads...@vm.marist.edu] On Behalf Of Richard Rhodes Sent: Friday, September 10, 2010 12:44 PM To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU Subject: Re: [ADSM-L] Urgent - Library Master mount queue breaking down, tapes going into RESERVED status and never getting mounted Sounds like maybe the library manager is not communicating with the VTL. Some things to check: - any errors in the AIX error log? - any errors in the VTL? - any san errors? If you are running atape . . . - check the logs in /var/adm/ras - are you running multi-pathing? If yes, what is the status of the paths? Atape with multi-paths is very good at hiding hardware problems. Rick John D. Schneider john.schnei...@c To OMPUTERCOACHINGCO ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU MMUNITY.COM cc Sent by: ADSM: Dist Stor Subject Manager Urgent - Library Master mount queue ads...@vm.marist breaking down, tapes going into .EDU RESERVED status and never getting mounted 09/10/2010 01:05 PM Please respond to ADSM: Dist Stor Manager ads...@vm.marist .EDU Greetings, Our environement is 8 TSM instances on AIX, running AIX 5.3ML11, and TSM 5.4.3.0. I know we are rather far behind, but this has been an extremely stable version for us, until just recently. There are 4 instances on one AIX host, and 4 on the other. The hosts are pSeries 570s. There is also a Windows Lan-free client in the mix. Total client count about 1500, in schedules more or less spread across the night. Performance of backups is OK; the AIX hosts are generally 20-30 CPU loaded across 8 CPUs. One of the TSM instances servers as a TSM Library Master for the others, and has no other workload. It mounts tapes for a EMC Disk library (virtual library), configured with 128 virtual LTO1 tape drives, shared between all the instances. The device class for the library has a 15 minute mount retention period. The clients mostly can only mount a single virtual tape. A few larger database servers are allowed to mount more. All have keep mount point set to yes. This basic configuration has been in place about three years. At first we had problems, and had to put LIBSHRTIMEOUT 60 and COMMTIMEOUT 3600 in the dsmserv.opt of the Library Master. But it has been many months since we had to make any configuration changes to the environment. I like STABLE. But things are growing, and we are adding new clients all the time, and have added about forty in the last few weeks. A couple weeks ago, the Library Master instance got into a state where there were lots of tapes in RESERVED status when we did a 'q mount'. There were still occasional mounts happening, but lots of clients were in Media wait. We restarted the Library Master and the problem went away, but then it came back like a week later. Now it is happening every day. Last night we stayed up all night watching it, and at first could see just a couple of RESERVED tape drives, and lots of normal mounts coming and going. Then slowly the number of RESERVED ones would creap up over the course of an hour or two until there were 80 or more in RESERVED status, and dozens of clients in Media wait. Ordinarily virtual tape mounts take 2-4 seconds. Last night during the problem they were taking 15-20 seconds. At about 1am we restarted the Library Master, and the RESERVED drives went away, but were back again within the hour. One thing I noticed then was that the Library Master had over 300 sessions, all admin. Usually it has very few. Our MAXSESSIONS was set to 500, so I wondered if perhaps were were overrunning it. We bumped it up to 1000 on all instances. We restarted all TSM instances this time, including the lan-free one. (The lan-free Windows server was hung, although we don't know if this is coincidence
Re: New server - 6.1.4.1 or 6.2.1.1?
Remco, If TSM 6.1 is dead, and everybody should just go to 6.2, then please respond to the user's posted problem. He was running 6.1 and tried to upgrade to 6.2.1.1, and had such a miserable failure that he ended up wiping out all his efforts and starting over. How does he get to 6.2 if the upgrade won't work? Can anybody else tell us about the 6.1 to 6.2 upgrade path? Is this user's experience isolated to Linux? Or is it a complete aberation for this user, but nobody else is getting this sort of problem during an upgrade? I have a customer who upgraded from 5.5.x to 6.1.0.0 (yes, I know, I have no idea why they installed that version) and of course they are unhappy about it. So they asked me today to upgrade it to a stable version, and I was going to suggest 6.1.4, since I have other customers stable on that release. But if it makes more sense to go straight to 6.2.1.1, I am happy to do that, but I would like to have some confidence in the upgrade path before I make my recommendation. Best Regards, John D. Schneider The Computer Coaching Community, LLC Office: (314) 635-5424 / Toll Free: (866) 796-9226 Cell: (314) 750-8721 Original Message Subject: Re: [ADSM-L] New server - 6.1.4.1 or 6.2.1.1? From: Remco Post r.p...@plcs.nl Date: Tue, September 07, 2010 2:22 pm To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU Repeat after me: TSM 6.1 is dead! :) Really, 6.1 is never a good choice, always go straight to 6.2. -- Gr., Remco On 7 sep. 2010, at 20:39, Zoltan Forray/AC/VCU zfor...@vcu.edu wrote: I am putting up 2-new Linux based 6.x servers that will eventually replace older 5.5.x boxes. My issue/question is should I go with 6.1.4.1 or 6.2.1.1? Part of the reason for asking this is due to my bad experience with trying to upgrade a test server from 6.1.3.4 to 6.2.1 - total failure - upgrade would not run to completion - kept telling me the database had issues (eventhough it was a virgin, empty 6.1.3.4 instance just installed) and it got so badly torqued when I tried to remove the half-install, I had to have the OS guy just wipe it and start all over. Then I installed 6.2.1.1 virgin and it has been sitting there (waiting to have it shipped offsite). To date, I have not had any problems upgrading/patching my one production 6.1.x server - just getting ready to upgrade from 6.1.3.4 to 6.1.4.1 (anyone else do this on a Linux platform ? Any problems?) Your thoughts? Zoltan Forray TSM Software Hardware Administrator Virginia Commonwealth University UCC/Office of Technology Services zfor...@vcu.edu - 804-828-4807 Don't be a phishing victim - VCU and other reputable organizations will never use email to request that you reply with your password, social security number or confidential personal information. For more details visit http://infosecurity.vcu.edu/phishing.html
Re: TS3500 PROBLEM
You don't say of ALL tape drives are refusing to mount, or if only certain ones are experiencing the problem. The Reservation conflict is the interesting part. Rick talked about deleting all the devices, and recreating everything, but it may just turn around and happen again if you don't get to the root of the Reservation conflict problem. In my main support environment, we have many 14 TSM instances and Lan-free servers all sharing the same libraries. Sometimes we have had a similar problem because we have shut down TSM instances while they had tapes mounted. In an ideal world, you should stop all tape processes and dismount all tape drives that are mounted by the Library Clients before shutting any of them down. But there are times when some sort of problem arises and you just have to restart a TSM instance or Lan-free agent, and can't afford the proper procedure. When this happens, I have found that the TSM Library Clients or Lan-free agent sometimes looses track of what tape mounts it had before it was shut down, so when it comes back up, it does not go through the normal dismount process. The normal dismount process will clear the SCSI Reserve that the Library Client put on the tape drive to prevent other servers from using it. So although the TSM Library Master and Client agree to that the Client is done with the drive, when the Library Master goes to perform a mount on it the next time, it can't open it because the SCSI Reserve is still set on the drive. There are two ways to clear it: 1) Power-cycle the tape drive, which will clear the SCSI reserve. (This might cause the drive to disappear from the SAN long enough to cause TSM instances to loose track of it, so you might have to rediscover it (or run cfgmgr).) 2) Log on to the Library Client or Lan-free agent that failed to dismount it properly, and clear the SCSI Reserve. You will have to go through the TSM activity logs, but the log of the TSM Library Master will usually tell you what Library Client it was talking to when trying to complete the dismount of the drive. Once you know the Library Client that failed to dismount it properly, you can use the tapeutil utility (in AIX) or ntutil utility (in Windows) to clear the SCSI Reserve. In tapeutil, you first select the option to Open the device, and enter the device name. If it opens correctly, you select the Option to clear the Reserve. Then you close the device. On Windows, you just Open the device, then Close it; there is no option to clear the Reserve. Apparently the Close takes care of it. If you try to Open the device on a Library Client and the Open fails, it probably means you have selected the wrong Library Client, and it is being stopped by the SCSI Reserve set by a different Client. This has solved Reserve conflict problems for us in the past, and it is far easier than deleting and recreating all the tape drives everywhere. Best Regards, John D. Schneider The Computer Coaching Community, LLC Office: (314) 635-5424 / Toll Free: (866) 796-9226 Cell: (314) 750-8721 Original Message Subject: Re: [ADSM-L] TS3500 PROBLEM From: Richard Rhodes rrho...@firstenergycorp.com Date: Fri, June 04, 2010 7:23 am To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU We've had some similar type problems, althought not that bad! At times it's as through someone (aix, san, lib/drives) looses track of things and starts fighting itself. It showed up as mount failures, reserve conficts, and lib manager hanging. We never did figure out what happened or why, but I believe it was AIX/TSM getting confused. The solution that seemed to work was to completely dismantle the tape subsystem and recreate it. By dismantle I mean completely blow it away: tsm drives/paths, aix rmt/smc devices, fscsi/fcs adapters. And, not just drop them to a defined state - delete them (clean out the ODM). Then, cfgmgr it all back in, set your atape multi-pathing, define new drives/paths toTSM. After doing this the problem finally went away. We've done this enought that I put together some scripts to generate the TSM commands for drive/path deletion and creation. Rick I would agree with this, but even further. We've had several instances where problem where the fix that seemed to workwas to complete delete the Nick Laflamme dplafla...@gmail .COM To Sent by: ADSM: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU Dist Stor cc Manager ads...@vm.marist Subject .EDU Re: TS3500 PROBLEM 06/04/2010 12:15 AM Please respond to ADSM: Dist Stor Manager ads...@vm.marist .EDU Have you tried to verify that the devices your paths point to are still the same? Or, better yet, deleted all your paths from all the library clients and regenerated them from scratch? We haven't run with a real 3584 in a while, but whenever I get weird errors with library managers and shared libraries, that's where I go first. You probably have, but you haven't said so, only that you've worked with the SANDISCOVERY settings. Just a thought
Re: Virtual Tape Library
Jorge, I think you will find that most of the major vendors put out a reliable offering, so you will get responses from people across the community who use and like all of them. But here is one TSM admin's opinion. The main environment I support has 23 TSM instances, with 7 EMC Disk Libraries. They have been in place over three years. Almost all backup data from these TSM instances goes directly into the EDLs, without going through disk storage pool first. At the largest site, they have 10 TSM instances all sharing one EDL model 4100. Every day about 15TB of new backup flows into it. Then it has to make two copies, one to copy storage pool tape, and another to migrate the data that is a couple days old to primary storage. They can hold at most a few day's data on disk. So that means that this one EDL is handling over 45TB of I/O every day. It has been a real workhorse. Having said that, every three to six months or so, this EDL will run out of memory and crash, and have to be restarted. I think that there must be some small memory leak in the code somewhere, and with the huge volume of I/O, eventually virtual memory gets exhausted. We have put on various service packs as they were recommended to us, but the problem has never gone away. If we are going to have some sort of outage to the environment, to work on some other component, we sometimes perform a preemptive reboot of the EDL, just to start fresh so we won't have to worry about a problem for a few months. The other 6 EDLs in the environment are not nearly as loaded as this one is, and they have never exhibited this problem with virtual memory, so I feel like it is directly tied to how much I/O it does, and not to any real flaw in the product. The other 6 never crash at all. The best way I have found to configure the EDL library to work with TSM is to configure it to emulate an IBM3584 tape library, with LTO1 tape drives. On the TSM server you use the IBM tape drivers (Atape for AIX, or IBMtape for Windows). This has been very easy to configure, and very reliable. (On Windows, make sure you turn on persistent binding on the FC adapter.) One other thing we do is configure the LTO1 tape cartridges to be 50GB tapes. This will give you a little better overall utilization, because you can reclaim tapes sooner as the data ages. But you can make your own decision about that, based on your workload. If you are doing this in an AIX environment, I have some ksh scripts I have written to rename the AIX logical devices to make it easier to manage in a TSM library sharing environment. I can share those offline. Best Regards, John D. Schneider The Computer Coaching Community, LLC Office: (314) 635-5424 / Toll Free: (866) 796-9226 Cell: (314) 750-8721 Original Message Subject: [ADSM-L] Virtual Tape Library From: Jorge Amil jorgea...@hotmail.com Date: Tue, June 01, 2010 9:57 am To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU Hi everybody. What VTL solution do you recommend?Our main backup tool is TSM and we also have Networker for documentum backup. I mainly look for IBM,EMC,HP,Netapp. Thanks in advance Jorge _ Consejos para seducir ¿Puedes conocer gente nueva a través de Internet? ¡Regístrate ya! http://contactos.es.msn.com/?mtcmk=015352
Re: SV: RedHat 5.2 to 5.4 upgrade causes problems for TSMscsi tape drivers
As a followup for this question, can anybody tell me where I would get the drivers for this? It is a HP E-series 712e tape library with LTO4 drives. We are upgrading from RedHat 5.2 to 5.4. I went out to HP's web site, and the only thing they offered is called LTT, Library and Tape Tools. But it doesn't look like it includes a driver, just diagnostic tools, which won't solve my problems, since people have been telling me I need the driver. If HP doesn't supply one for their own product, where am I supposed to get one? Best Regards, John D. Schneider The Computer Coaching Community, LLC Office: (314) 635-5424 / Toll Free: (866) 796-9226 Cell: (314) 750-8721 Original Message Subject: [ADSM-L] SV: RedHat 5.2 to 5.4 upgrade causes problems for TSMscsi tape drivers From: Christian Svensson christian.svens...@cristie.se Date: Thu, May 13, 2010 3:44 am To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU Hi John, When you upgrading RHEL from 5.2 to 5.4. Then does RHEL upgrade the kernel also. That mean you need to download the HP Tape Source Code Drivers again and re-compile them. The TSM Drivers you may have installed, they are only creating links to the correct SG devices that HP drivers are creating. Best Regards Christian Svensson Cell: +46-70-325 1577 E-mail: christian.svens...@cristie.se Skype: cristie.christian.svensson Supported Platform for CPU2TSM:: http://www.cristie.se/cpu2tsm-supported-platforms Från: John D. Schneider [john.schnei...@computercoachingcommunity.com] Skickat: den 13 maj 2010 06:42 Till: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU Ämne: Re: RedHat 5.2 to 5.4 upgrade causes problems for TSMscsi tape drivers Len, The IBMTape drivers are intended only for the IBM tape drives. For all others (such as the HP in my case), the TSM drivers are what TSM wants us to use. So I believe that we are using the right sort of driver, and it has been working for some months; the problem only arose when we upgraded RedHat from 5.2 to 5.4. Best Regards, John D. Schneider The Computer Coaching Community, LLC Office: (314) 635-5424 / Toll Free: (866) 796-9226 Cell: (314) 750-8721 Original Message Subject: Re: [ADSM-L] RedHat 5.2 to 5.4 upgrade causes problems for TSMscsi tape drivers From: Len Boyle len.bo...@sas.com Date: Wed, May 12, 2010 11:29 pm To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU Hello John, I have not used tsm on Linux, but I have used ibm tape drives on linux. I used the ibm lintape driver. These tape drives were fc based. I am not sure if your tape drives are fc based. I am also not sure if the lintape driver supports scsi tape drives. I do have a tsm server running on windows and they recommended that we use the ibm tape drivers and not the tsm drivers for the newer tape drives. So I am doing a bit of guessing here. Since the tape driver is the piece between the os and the hardware I would expect that be the first part that needs looking at. It might be a change in the o/s api used by the tape driver. With the lintape driver you can test out the tape drive without tsm running. Do you have another box that you can test out the different tape drivers and tape drives? I just looked at the lintape readme and it appears that it only is supported with IBM devices. Does HP supply drivers for use with their tape drives and Linux? You might want to call IBM service for tsm and see what they might suggest. - I remember seeing this note on a past adsm-l mailing list entry. Re: Library unavailable Michael Green Mon, 06 Jul 2009 23:23:45 -0700 I don't know about 3583, but with 3584 one shouldn't use the TSM supplied drivers. IBM provides a so called 'lintape' (ex IBMtape) driver on their FTP. -- len -Original Message- From: ADSM: Dist Stor Manager [mailto:ads...@vm.marist.edu] On Behalf Of John D. Schneider Sent: Wednesday, May 12, 2010 11:07 PM To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU Subject: Re: [ADSM-L] RedHat 5.2 to 5.4 upgrade causes problems for TSMscsi tape drivers Len, Thanks for your reply. No, we did not upgrade any of the TSM software, including the tape drivers. We were running the TIVsm-tsmscsi-6.1.3-1.x86_64 version both before and after the RedHat 5.2 to 5.4 upgrade. I have since found out that there is a 6.1.3-3 version of the driver. Since they are running the 6.1.3.3 version of TSM, they probably should be running that version of the driver, too. I don't know why or why not, since that is before they became my customer. The previous TSM admins that set all this up are no longer working for this company. But I hesitate to recommend upgrading the drivers as a course of action unless I can point to a concrete reason why. I went through the Release Notes and Readmes and could not find any hint of a driver problem being addressed. None
TSM 6.1 automatic database backups
Greetings, Sorry if this is a newbie TSM 6.1 question. I just inherited a few TSM 6.1 instances, and I am trying to catch up. They are running TSM 6.1.3.3 on Linux RedHat 5.2. I looked through the archives, but did not find it. 1) On one instance, each day a full TSM DB backup gets done, but within about 16-18 hours, the archive filesystem is filling up. The archive filesystem is 50GB, which is of course much bigger than it was under 5.5. We have only migrated a fraction of the TSM clients over to this instance, so I shudder to think how much archive space is going to be require when all the TSM clients are in place. Can anybody give me any tips on reducing the amount of log data that gets created so it doesn't fill up so fast? 2) I used set drrecovery dbb_full to point this to a FILE type devclass where we want the DB backups to go. According to the manual, this should cause the database to get automatically get backed up. But the manual is totally obscure about how full it is going to get before it kicks off the backup. It describes the vague criteria, but doesn't seem to give the admin any controls. We have seen it 98% full, and gave up and performed the 'backup db' manually. Can anybody give me more details than the manuals have about how this works and how to control it? Best Regards, John D. Schneider The Computer Coaching Community, LLC Office: (314) 635-5424 / Toll Free: (866) 796-9226 Cell: (314) 750-8721
Re: TSM 6.1 automatic database backups
Wanda, I don't have access to the dsmserv.opt, but I will discuss this with the admins tomorrow. I don't think ALLOWREORGTABLE NO is turned on, because I have been seeing messages like: 05/12/2010 06:41:31 ANR0293I Reorganization for table Backup.Objects started. 05/12/2010 06:41:36 ANRI Table reorganization for Backup.Objects paused. 05/12/2010 07:10:31 ANRI Resuming table reorg after pause for Backup.Objects. 05/12/2010 07:19:48 ANRI Table reorganization for Backup.Objects paused. 05/12/2010 07:21:44 ANRI Resuming table reorg after pause for Backup.Objects. 05/12/2010 08:25:08 ANRI Table reorganization for Backup.Objects paused.(SESSION: 10542, PROCESS: 1) 05/12/2010 08:45:13 ANRI Resuming table reorg after pause for Backup.Objects. 05/12/2010 12:05:28 ANRI Table reorganization for Backup.Objects paused. 05/12/2010 12:08:03 ANRI Resuming table reorg after pause for Backup.Objects. 05/12/2010 12:09:28 ANRI Table reorganization for Backup.Objects paused. 05/12/2010 12:18:04 ANRI Resuming table reorg after pause for Backup.Objects. 05/12/2010 13:46:04 ANRI Table reorganization for Backup.Objects paused. 05/12/2010 13:46:44 ANRI Resuming table reorg after pause for Backup.Objects. 05/12/2010 13:51:45 ANRI Table reorganization for Backup.Objects paused. 05/12/2010 14:01:25 ANRI Resuming table reorg after pause for Backup.Objects. 05/12/2010 14:08:39 ANRI Table reorganization for Backup.Objects paused. 05/12/2010 15:02:09 ANRI Resuming table reorg after pause for Backup.Objects. 05/12/2010 15:16:38 ANRI Table reorganization for Backup.Objects paused. 05/12/2010 15:24:28 ANRI Resuming table reorg after pause for Backup.Objects. 05/12/2010 15:33:21 ANRI Table reorganization for Backup.Objects paused. 05/12/2010 15:36:31 ANRI Resuming table reorg after pause for Backup.Objects. 05/12/2010 15:36:43 ANRI Table reorganization for Backup.Objects paused.(SESSION: 13263, PROCESS: 16) 05/12/2010 15:56:33 ANRI Resuming table reorg after pause for Backup.Objects. 05/12/2010 18:16:22 ANR0294I Reorganization for table Backup.Objects ended. So, the reorg of that table ran off and on for 12 hours. There were pauses in it, but I can see how this would generate a lot of logs. Best Regards, John Original Message Subject: Re: [ADSM-L] TSM 6.1 automatic database backups From: Prather, Wanda wprat...@icfi.com Date: Thu, May 13, 2010 7:42 pm To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU John, Make sure you have in the dsmserv.opt file: ALLOWREORGTABLE NO There is a bug in 6.1 that lets the automatic DB table reorgs go nuts with the log. 1) On one instance, each day a full TSM DB backup gets done, but within about 16-18 hours, the archive filesystem is filling up. The archive filesystem is 50GB, which is of course much bigger than it was under 5.5. We have only migrated a fraction of the TSM clients over to this instance, so I shudder to think how much archive space is going to be require when all the TSM clients are in place. Can anybody give me any tips on reducing the amount of log data that gets created so it doesn't fill up so fast? 2) I used set drrecovery dbb_full to point this to a FILE type devclass where we want the DB backups to go. According to the manual, this should cause the database to get automatically get backed up. But the manual is totally obscure about how full it is going to get before it kicks off the backup. It describes the vague criteria, but doesn't seem to give the admin any controls. We have seen it 98% full, and gave up and performed the 'backup db' manually. Can anybody give me more details than the manuals have about how this works and how to control it? Best Regards, John D. Schneider The Computer Coaching Community, LLC Office: (314) 635-5424 / Toll Free: (866) 796-9226 Cell: (314) 750-8721
Re: TSM 6.1 automatic database backups
Wanda, I will check out ALLOWREORGTABLE NO. Thanks, that could be very important. As for the second issue, can anybody tell me why the automatic database log isn't running, even when the filesystem for the archives is filling up? What triggers it, and how do I control it? I guess I can just write a script to monitor it and perform the backup db when the filesystem gets close to full, but since this is supposed to be an automatic feature, it seem like something is wrong here. Best Regards, John D. Schneider The Computer Coaching Community, LLC Office: (314) 635-5424 / Toll Free: (866) 796-9226 Cell: (314) 750-8721 Original Message Subject: Re: [ADSM-L] TSM 6.1 automatic database backups From: Prather, Wanda wprat...@icfi.com Date: Thu, May 13, 2010 7:42 pm To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU John, Make sure you have in the dsmserv.opt file: ALLOWREORGTABLE NO There is a bug in 6.1 that lets the automatic DB table reorgs go nuts with the log. 1) On one instance, each day a full TSM DB backup gets done, but within about 16-18 hours, the archive filesystem is filling up. The archive filesystem is 50GB, which is of course much bigger than it was under 5.5. We have only migrated a fraction of the TSM clients over to this instance, so I shudder to think how much archive space is going to be require when all the TSM clients are in place. Can anybody give me any tips on reducing the amount of log data that gets created so it doesn't fill up so fast? 2) I used set drrecovery dbb_full to point this to a FILE type devclass where we want the DB backups to go. According to the manual, this should cause the database to get automatically get backed up. But the manual is totally obscure about how full it is going to get before it kicks off the backup. It describes the vague criteria, but doesn't seem to give the admin any controls. We have seen it 98% full, and gave up and performed the 'backup db' manually. Can anybody give me more details than the manuals have about how this works and how to control it? Best Regards, John D. Schneider The Computer Coaching Community, LLC Office: (314) 635-5424 / Toll Free: (866) 796-9226 Cell: (314) 750-8721
RedHat 5.2 to 5.4 upgrade causes problems for TSMscsi tape drivers
058 006 000 000 003 001 HP025qFkNO0b Ultrium 3-SCSI R210 022 059 006 000 000 004 001 HP025qFkNO0c Ultrium 3-SCSI R210 023 060 006 000 000 005 001 HP025qFkNO0d Ultrium 3-SCSI R210 024 061 006 000 000 006 001 HP025qFkNO0e Ultrium 3-SCSI R210 025 062 006 000 000 007 001 HP025qFkNO0f Ultrium 3-SCSI R210 026 063 007 000 000 000 001 HPHU19044R76 Ultrium 4-SCSI H36W 027 064 007 000 001 000 001 HPHU18383947 Ultrium 4-SCSI H36W 028 065 007 000 002 000 001 HPMXP09210N8 Ultrium 4-SCSI H36W 029 066 007 000 003 000 001 HPHU181720AU Ultrium 4-SCSI H36W Tivoli Medium Changer Devices: == Index Minor Host CHN ID LUN Type Vendor_ID Device_Serial_Number Product_ID Rev. 000 039 003 000 000 000 008 HP2U10630005 ESL E-Series 6.23 001 043 004 000 000 000 008 HP025qFkNO00 ESL E-Series 2.00 Yesterday they tried to upgrade from RedHat 5.2 to 5.4. We didn't change anything on the TSM software. The upgrade went fine, and after the reboot onto the new kernel, they went through the same routine of running autoconf -a. This time when the TSM Library Master came up, it got I/O errors on each of the drives, and was not able to mount anything. It said it initialized the Library OK, but I have no way to know if that was really true. We were not able to figure out the why RedHat 5.4 caused TSM to have a problem. so eventually had to reboot on the old RedHat 5.2 kernel. They we ran autoconf -a, brought up the TSM Library master, and everything worked fine. So the problem is definitely between RedHat 5.2 and 5.4. Has anyone seen a problem like this, and can give us some insight? Best Regards, John D. Schneider The Computer Coaching Community, LLC Office: (314) 635-5424 / Toll Free: (866) 796-9226 Cell: (314) 750-8721
Re: RedHat 5.2 to 5.4 upgrade causes problems for TSMscsi tape drivers
Len, Thanks for your reply. No, we did not upgrade any of the TSM software, including the tape drivers. We were running the TIVsm-tsmscsi-6.1.3-1.x86_64 version both before and after the RedHat 5.2 to 5.4 upgrade. I have since found out that there is a 6.1.3-3 version of the driver. Since they are running the 6.1.3.3 version of TSM, they probably should be running that version of the driver, too. I don't know why or why not, since that is before they became my customer. The previous TSM admins that set all this up are no longer working for this company. But I hesitate to recommend upgrading the drivers as a course of action unless I can point to a concrete reason why. I went through the Release Notes and Readmes and could not find any hint of a driver problem being addressed. None of the tape driver APARs described since 6.1.3 in this Technote sound like they have anything to do with our problem: http://www-01.ibm.com/support/docview.wss?uid=swg21320763 Any insight would be appreciated. Best Regards, John D. Schneider The Computer Coaching Community, LLC Office: (314) 635-5424 / Toll Free: (866) 796-9226 Cell: (314) 750-8721 Original Message Subject: Re: [ADSM-L] RedHat 5.2 to 5.4 upgrade causes problems for TSMscsi tape drivers From: Len Boyle len.bo...@sas.com Date: Wed, May 12, 2010 8:53 pm To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU Did you upgrade the tape drivers? -Original Message- From: ADSM: Dist Stor Manager [mailto:ads...@vm.marist.edu] On Behalf Of John D. Schneider Sent: Wednesday, May 12, 2010 5:33 PM To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU Subject: [ADSM-L] RedHat 5.2 to 5.4 upgrade causes problems for TSMscsi tape drivers Greetings, I have a customer running TSM 6.1.3.3 under RedHat Linux 5.2. The Library Master instance on this server has a HP ESL722 tape library with LTO4 tape drives, and a HP VTL emulating a ESL tape library with LTO3 drives. They are running the TSMscsi drivers to talk to the drives, version TIVsm-tsmscsi-6.1.3-1.x86_64. Any time they reboot the server, they execute: cd /opt/tivoli/tsm/devices/bin ./autoconf -a which loads the tsmscsi driver and configures the drives. This has been working fine for months now. The output is: ** * IBM TIVOLI STORAGE MANAGER * * Autoconf Utility Program for Linux * ** Licensed Materials - Property of IBM (C) Copyright IBM Corporation 2009. All rights reserved. U.S. Government Users Restricted Rights - Use, duplication or disclosure restricted by GSA ADP Schedule Contract with IBM Corporation. Added the read and write permissions for all users to /dev/sg35. Added the read and write permissions for all users to /dev/sg36. Added the read and write permissions for all users to /dev/sg37. Added the read and write permissions for all users to /dev/sg38. Added the read and write permissions for all users to /dev/sg39. Added the read and write permissions for all users to /dev/sg40. Added the read and write permissions for all users to /dev/sg41. Added the read and write permissions for all users to /dev/sg42. Added the read and write permissions for all users to /dev/sg43. Added the read and write permissions for all users to /dev/sg44. Added the read and write permissions for all users to /dev/sg45. Added the read and write permissions for all users to /dev/sg46. Added the read and write permissions for all users to /dev/sg47. Added the read and write permissions for all users to /dev/sg48. Added the read and write permissions for all users to /dev/sg49. Added the read and write permissions for all users to /dev/sg50. Added the read and write permissions for all users to /dev/sg51. Added the read and write permissions for all users to /dev/sg52. Added the read and write permissions for all users to /dev/sg53. Added the read and write permissions for all users to /dev/sg54. Added the read and write permissions for all users to /dev/sg55. Added the read and write permissions for all users to /dev/sg56. Added the read and write permissions for all users to /dev/sg57. Added the read and write permissions for all users to /dev/sg58. Added the read and write permissions for all users to /dev/sg59. Added the read and write permissions for all users to /dev/sg60. Added the read and write permissions for all users to /dev/sg61. Added the read and write permissions for all users to /dev/sg62. Added the read and write permissions for all users to /dev/sg63. Added the read and write permissions for all users to /dev/sg64. Added the read and write permissions for all users to /dev/sg65. Added the read and write permissions for all users to /dev/sg66. Tivoli Tape Drives: === Index Minor Host CHN ID LUN Type Vendor_ID Device_Serial_Number Product_ID Rev. 000 035 001 000 000 000 001 HP MXP09210N5 Ultrium 4-SCSI H36W 001 036 001 000 001 000 001 HP HU18282JH5 Ultrium 4-SCSI H36W 002 037 001 000 002 000 001 HP HU17340A0J Ultrium 4-SCSI
Re: RedHat 5.2 to 5.4 upgrade causes problems for TSMscsi tape drivers
Len, The IBMTape drivers are intended only for the IBM tape drives. For all others (such as the HP in my case), the TSM drivers are what TSM wants us to use. So I believe that we are using the right sort of driver, and it has been working for some months; the problem only arose when we upgraded RedHat from 5.2 to 5.4. Best Regards, John D. Schneider The Computer Coaching Community, LLC Office: (314) 635-5424 / Toll Free: (866) 796-9226 Cell: (314) 750-8721 Original Message Subject: Re: [ADSM-L] RedHat 5.2 to 5.4 upgrade causes problems for TSMscsi tape drivers From: Len Boyle len.bo...@sas.com Date: Wed, May 12, 2010 11:29 pm To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU Hello John, I have not used tsm on Linux, but I have used ibm tape drives on linux. I used the ibm lintape driver. These tape drives were fc based. I am not sure if your tape drives are fc based. I am also not sure if the lintape driver supports scsi tape drives. I do have a tsm server running on windows and they recommended that we use the ibm tape drivers and not the tsm drivers for the newer tape drives. So I am doing a bit of guessing here. Since the tape driver is the piece between the os and the hardware I would expect that be the first part that needs looking at. It might be a change in the o/s api used by the tape driver. With the lintape driver you can test out the tape drive without tsm running. Do you have another box that you can test out the different tape drivers and tape drives? I just looked at the lintape readme and it appears that it only is supported with IBM devices. Does HP supply drivers for use with their tape drives and Linux? You might want to call IBM service for tsm and see what they might suggest. - I remember seeing this note on a past adsm-l mailing list entry. Re: Library unavailable Michael Green Mon, 06 Jul 2009 23:23:45 -0700 I don't know about 3583, but with 3584 one shouldn't use the TSM supplied drivers. IBM provides a so called 'lintape' (ex IBMtape) driver on their FTP. -- len -Original Message- From: ADSM: Dist Stor Manager [mailto:ads...@vm.marist.edu] On Behalf Of John D. Schneider Sent: Wednesday, May 12, 2010 11:07 PM To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU Subject: Re: [ADSM-L] RedHat 5.2 to 5.4 upgrade causes problems for TSMscsi tape drivers Len, Thanks for your reply. No, we did not upgrade any of the TSM software, including the tape drivers. We were running the TIVsm-tsmscsi-6.1.3-1.x86_64 version both before and after the RedHat 5.2 to 5.4 upgrade. I have since found out that there is a 6.1.3-3 version of the driver. Since they are running the 6.1.3.3 version of TSM, they probably should be running that version of the driver, too. I don't know why or why not, since that is before they became my customer. The previous TSM admins that set all this up are no longer working for this company. But I hesitate to recommend upgrading the drivers as a course of action unless I can point to a concrete reason why. I went through the Release Notes and Readmes and could not find any hint of a driver problem being addressed. None of the tape driver APARs described since 6.1.3 in this Technote sound like they have anything to do with our problem: http://www-01.ibm.com/support/docview.wss?uid=swg21320763 Any insight would be appreciated. Best Regards, John D. Schneider The Computer Coaching Community, LLC Office: (314) 635-5424 / Toll Free: (866) 796-9226 Cell: (314) 750-8721 Original Message Subject: Re: [ADSM-L] RedHat 5.2 to 5.4 upgrade causes problems for TSMscsi tape drivers From: Len Boyle len.bo...@sas.com Date: Wed, May 12, 2010 8:53 pm To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU Did you upgrade the tape drivers? -Original Message- From: ADSM: Dist Stor Manager [mailto:ads...@vm.marist.edu] On Behalf Of John D. Schneider Sent: Wednesday, May 12, 2010 5:33 PM To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU Subject: [ADSM-L] RedHat 5.2 to 5.4 upgrade causes problems for TSMscsi tape drivers Greetings, I have a customer running TSM 6.1.3.3 under RedHat Linux 5.2. The Library Master instance on this server has a HP ESL722 tape library with LTO4 tape drives, and a HP VTL emulating a ESL tape library with LTO3 drives. They are running the TSMscsi drivers to talk to the drives, version TIVsm-tsmscsi-6.1.3-1.x86_64. Any time they reboot the server, they execute: cd /opt/tivoli/tsm/devices/bin ./autoconf -a which loads the tsmscsi driver and configures the drives. This has been working fine for months now. The output is: ** * IBM TIVOLI STORAGE MANAGER * * Autoconf Utility Program for Linux * ** Licensed Materials - Property of IBM (C) Copyright IBM Corporation 2009. All rights reserved. U.S
TSM 6 database space performance question
Greetings, I have a customer running TSM 6.1.3 on a Linux RedHat 5.4 server. They are using high-performance SAN attached disk for the TSM database and logs. They have created the TSM database all in one directory under one filesystem. Recently then needed to add more space, and they carved out a lun from another RAID group, and then added that lun to the existing filesystem. TSM shows that it now has the additional space, but it is still all under one directory. In reading the Performance Guide and Admin Guide, they both recommend spreading the data out over multiple directories, putting each directory behind separate disks/luns. This certainly makes sense to spread the I/O out over multiple luns, and I get that. But is there anything wrong with the way my customer has done it? They are using multiple luns from different RAID groups, but they are all put together behind one directory. Is this going to become a problem as they add more and more load to this instance? If TSM has lots of separate directories and they are across multiple luns, does TSM do it's database I/O differently? Best Regards, John D. Schneider The Computer Coaching Community, LLC Cell: (314) 750-8721
Re: Anyone using DPA?
Fred, I would agree with Shawn. I have worked with DPA, and other EMC products, and also with IBM products for many years. EMC often makes good products, but assumes that you don't need good documentation. They will have all the manual titles you could ask for; Quick Start Guide, Administrators Guide, Programmers Reference, etc. but the manuals will have nothing but superficial overviews in them. Nothing like what you would find in the equivalent manuals for an IBM product. The IBM Manuals may take a long time to find your way through, but at least your odds are much better of finding what you are looking for. On the other hand, EMC support will give you extra help when you ask for it. IBM Support is usually mainly about defect support. They aren't there to help you configure the product; if it is working as designed then you are on your own. EMC support, however, has often answered how-to questions about configuration issues. So perhaps they are trying to make up for the lack of good manuals. Best Regards, John D. Schneider The Computer Coaching Community, LLC Office: (314) 635-5424 / Toll Free: (866) 796-9226 Cell: (314) 750-8721 Original Message Subject: Re: [ADSM-L] Anyone using DPA? From: Shawn Drew shawn.d...@americas.bnpparibas.com Date: Mon, May 10, 2010 3:49 pm To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU We are using EBA/DPA We had a custom report running on EBA that didn't work on DPA, so we are trying to get that worked out before we upgrade. (DPA is being run in a test environment) We've tested Aptare and Servergraph as well, and EMC's product fits our particular environment better than the others. The main thing we do that the others have trouble with is that we have multiple nodes per server and the others didn't handle this in the way that I wanted it. They just handle them differently, not better or worse. You should evaluate this for yourself. My main problem with DPA is that there doesn't seem to be any advanced documentation or training if you wanted to do anything above basic reporting customization. The Professional Services is the only way to do any advanced customization. You could muddle around and figure out quite a bit by yourself, but I wish there was some good documentation. If you do purchase this, make sure and include a few days of PS and have a list of the custom reports you want. Regards, Shawn Shawn Drew Internet f...@uchicago.edu Sent by: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU 05/10/2010 04:15 PM Please respond to ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU To ADSM-L cc Subject [ADSM-L] Anyone using DPA? I know this has been asked before (and not answered), but is there anyone out there using DPA from EMC? Has anyone given it a close look? Fred Johanson TSM Administrator University of Chicago 773-702-8464 This message and any attachments (the message) is intended solely for the addressees and is confidential. If you receive this message in error, please delete it and immediately notify the sender. Any use not in accord with its purpose, any dissemination or disclosure, either whole or partial, is prohibited except formal approval. The internet can not guarantee the integrity of this message. BNP PARIBAS (and its subsidiaries) shall (will) not therefore be liable for the message if modified. Please note that certain functions and services for BNP Paribas may be performed by BNP Paribas RCC, Inc.
Re: mediawait during backup to disk
Keith, You could mitigate this somewhat by creating more disk storage pool volumes, and spreading them across more physical disks. I don't entirely agree with Allen that your disk pool is going to be slower than your incoming networks. It is certainly possible to build a disk storage pool environment that can respond that fast. However, you have to decide whether it is worth spending any money to do so. How close are you to running outside your backup window? If you are getting all your backups done in a timely manner, then the actual speed doesn't matter. But if you are pressing your window, you might have justification for some engineering improvements. Best Regards, John D. Schneider The Computer Coaching Community, LLC Office: (314) 635-5424 / Toll Free: (866) 796-9226 Cell: (314) 750-8721 Original Message Subject: Re: [ADSM-L] mediawait during backup to disk From: Allen S. Rout a...@ufl.edu Date: Fri, April 30, 2010 10:14 am To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU On Fri, 30 Apr 2010 11:07:35 -0400, Keith Arbogast warbo...@indiana.edu said: What does it mean when a node incurs mediawait during a backup to disk? It means that the process was blocking on disk writes. Your disk (usually) can't write as fast as your various networks can pass you data. So there's some fraction of media wait, on a fine granularity. - Allen S. Rout
Re: Retry Dismount Failure that won't clear
Robert, Thanks for your email. For TSM, the IBMtape driver should be installed in Exclusive mode. And I double checked with the guy who recently installed the drivers, and assured me they were installed in Exclusive mode. But your email did help me solve the problem. From the Windows server running the Lan-free client, I ran ntutil, (similar to tapeutil in AIX, but not quite). From the ntutil prompt, I: 1) Chose option 1, and entered the tape device that had been previously reserved i.e. tape6. (Check in Device Manager or the TSM Management Console) to be sure you have the right device name. Even though Device Manager may call it \\.\Tape6, put in tape6 at the prompt for the device name. 2) Chose option 20, to open the device. This worked correctly. 3) Chose option 21, to close the device. This worked correctly. I repeated this for all five devices that were in Retry Dismount Failed state. After just a few minutes, the Retry Dismount Failed state cleared up on the Library Master. Everything's been fine since. Thanks a bunch! Best Regards, John D. Schneider The Computer Coaching Community, LLC Office: (314) 635-5424 / Toll Free: (866) 796-9226 Cell: (314) 750-8721 Original Message Subject: Re: [ADSM-L] Retry Dismount Failure that won't clear From: Robert Clark robert.cla...@usbank.com Date: Tue, April 27, 2010 6:10 pm To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU Hi John, I seem to recall that tapeutil has a clear SCSI reserve command. I also seem to recall that the Windows version fo Atape can be installed in exclusive or non-exclusive mode. If set to exclusive mode by mistake, it may cause the symptom you're seeing? (When I say Atape, I mean lintape, IBMTape, or whatever the package is called on a given OS.) Thanks, [RC] From: John D. Schneider john.schnei...@computercoachingcommunity.com To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU Date: 04/27/2010 02:42 PM Subject: Re: [ADSM-L] Retry Dismount Failure that won't clear Sent by: ADSM: Dist Stor Manager ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU Robert, That's a good thing to bring up, but Removable Storage Manager is Disabled. We are emulating an IBM3584 library, with 64 virtual LTO1 tape drives. We use the IBMTape drivers on Windows, and Atape on AIX. We just upgraded the drivers a few weeks ago. I guess it is conceivable that we are hitting something caused by the new drivers. Incidentally, the Retry Dismount Failure has disappeared for now, although it will probably come back, since it has happened a few times, although it is always weeks or months in between, so it is tough to nail down the exact circumstance that caused it. Using the advice from an old ADSM-L post, I: 1) deleted the paths to the Lan-free clients, 2) deleted the path to the library master 3) deleted the drive. Then, when I did a q mount, it would still show Retry Dismount Failure, but it wouldn't show what drive! Instead of: ANR8380I LTO volume V50317 is mounted R/O in drive EPC-LTO1-006 (/dev/epc-lto1-006), status: RETRY DISMOUNT FAILURE. it would say: ANR8380I LTO volume V50317 is mounted R/O, status: RETRY DISMOUNT FAILURE. Strange. Then stranger still, about 15 minutes later, the library master instance crashed. We brought it back up, and all the Retry Dismount Failures were gone! I should be happy, but I'm not, for two reasons. First, this is bound to come up again. And second, the virtual tape device is still screwed up. It must have a SCSI reserve still set. When I try to configure a path for it now, it gives me: ANR8420E DEFINE PATH: An I/O error occurred while accessing drive EPC-LTO1-006. How do you clear the SCSI reserve in a virtual tape drive? I may have to reboot the whole EDL to do it. Best Regards, John D. Schneider The Computer Coaching Community, LLC Office: (314) 635-5424 / Toll Free: (866) 796-9226 Cell: (314) 750-8721 Original Message Subject: Re: [ADSM-L] Retry Dismount Failure that won't clear From: Robert Clark robert.cla...@usbank.com Date: Tue, April 27, 2010 12:25 pm To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU I would make sure RSM on the Windows host is not grabbing the tape drives. What type of library is being emulated? [RC] From: John D. Schneider john.schnei...@computercoachingcommunity.com To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU Date: 04/27/2010 08:25 AM Subject: [ADSM-L] Retry Dismount Failure that won't clear Sent by: ADSM: Dist Stor Manager ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU Greetings, I have been through the archives for help with this one, but I still don't have an answer. I support a TSM 5.4.3.0 server running on AIX 5.3ML9. EMC Disk Library for virtual tape, configured as 64 LTO1 tape drives. This server is the library master for both AIX and Windows Lan-free clients running the 5.4.2.0 Lan-free storage agent. We came in yesterday and found 5 virtual tapes mounted, but in Retry Dismount Failure state: ANR8380I LTO volume V50135 is mounted R/O in drive EPC-LTO1-025 (/dev/epc-lto1-025), status: RETRY DISMOUNT FAILURE. ANR8380I LTO volume V50128
Retry Dismount Failure that won't clear
. (SESSION: 11596) 04/27/10 08:16:51 ANR8965W The server is unable to automatically determine the serial number for the device. (SESSION: 11596) 04/27/10 08:16:51 ANR8779E Unable to open drive /dev/epc-lto1-006, error number=16. (SESSION: 11596) 04/27/10 08:16:51 ANR1794W TSM SAN discovery is disabled by options. (SESSION: 11599) 04/27/10 08:16:51 ANR8965W The server is unable to automatically determine the serial number for the device. (SESSION: 11599) 04/27/10 08:16:51 ANR8779E Unable to open drive /dev/epc-lto1-047, error number=16. (SESSION: 11599) 04/27/10 08:16:51 ANR1794W TSM SAN discovery is disabled by options. (SESSION: 11597) 04/27/10 08:16:51 ANR8965W The server is unable to automatically determine the serial number for the device. (SESSION: 11597) 04/27/10 08:16:51 ANR8779E Unable to open drive /dev/epc-lto1-025, error number=16. (SESSION: 11597) We have seen this before, but rarely, and in the past we were always able to clear it by restarting the Lan-free agent and the TSM server software. But this time that isn't working. FYI, every once in a while, the 'Retry Dismount Failure' will change to 'Dismounting' for a few seconds, then goes back to 'Retry Dismount Failure' again. So TSM is obviously trying to do something to clear it. Can anyone suggest a procedure for clearing this condition? Best Regards, John D. Schneider The Computer Coaching Community, LLC Office: (314) 635-5424 / Toll Free: (866) 796-9226 Cell: (314) 750-8721
Re: Retry Dismount Failure that won't clear
Robert, That's a good thing to bring up, but Removable Storage Manager is Disabled. We are emulating an IBM3584 library, with 64 virtual LTO1 tape drives. We use the IBMTape drivers on Windows, and Atape on AIX. We just upgraded the drivers a few weeks ago. I guess it is conceivable that we are hitting something caused by the new drivers. Incidentally, the Retry Dismount Failure has disappeared for now, although it will probably come back, since it has happened a few times, although it is always weeks or months in between, so it is tough to nail down the exact circumstance that caused it. Using the advice from an old ADSM-L post, I: 1) deleted the paths to the Lan-free clients, 2) deleted the path to the library master 3) deleted the drive. Then, when I did a q mount, it would still show Retry Dismount Failure, but it wouldn't show what drive! Instead of: ANR8380I LTO volume V50317 is mounted R/O in drive EPC-LTO1-006 (/dev/epc-lto1-006), status: RETRY DISMOUNT FAILURE. it would say: ANR8380I LTO volume V50317 is mounted R/O, status: RETRY DISMOUNT FAILURE. Strange. Then stranger still, about 15 minutes later, the library master instance crashed. We brought it back up, and all the Retry Dismount Failures were gone! I should be happy, but I'm not, for two reasons. First, this is bound to come up again. And second, the virtual tape device is still screwed up. It must have a SCSI reserve still set. When I try to configure a path for it now, it gives me: ANR8420E DEFINE PATH: An I/O error occurred while accessing drive EPC-LTO1-006. How do you clear the SCSI reserve in a virtual tape drive? I may have to reboot the whole EDL to do it. Best Regards, John D. Schneider The Computer Coaching Community, LLC Office: (314) 635-5424 / Toll Free: (866) 796-9226 Cell: (314) 750-8721 Original Message Subject: Re: [ADSM-L] Retry Dismount Failure that won't clear From: Robert Clark robert.cla...@usbank.com Date: Tue, April 27, 2010 12:25 pm To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU I would make sure RSM on the Windows host is not grabbing the tape drives. What type of library is being emulated? [RC] From: John D. Schneider john.schnei...@computercoachingcommunity.com To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU Date: 04/27/2010 08:25 AM Subject: [ADSM-L] Retry Dismount Failure that won't clear Sent by: ADSM: Dist Stor Manager ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU Greetings, I have been through the archives for help with this one, but I still don't have an answer. I support a TSM 5.4.3.0 server running on AIX 5.3ML9. EMC Disk Library for virtual tape, configured as 64 LTO1 tape drives. This server is the library master for both AIX and Windows Lan-free clients running the 5.4.2.0 Lan-free storage agent. We came in yesterday and found 5 virtual tapes mounted, but in Retry Dismount Failure state: ANR8380I LTO volume V50135 is mounted R/O in drive EPC-LTO1-025 (/dev/epc-lto1-025), status: RETRY DISMOUNT FAILURE. ANR8380I LTO volume V50128 is mounted R/O in drive EPC-LTO1-040 (/dev/epc-lto1-040), status: RETRY DISMOUNT FAILURE. ANR8380I LTO volume V50097 is mounted R/O in drive EPC-LTO1-044 (/dev/epc-lto1-044), status: RETRY DISMOUNT FAILURE. ANR8380I LTO volume V50129 is mounted R/O in drive EPC-LTO1-047 (/dev/epc-lto1-047), status: RETRY DISMOUNT FAILURE.. ANR8380I LTO volume V50317 is mounted R/O in drive EPC-LTO1-006 (/dev/epc-lto1-006), status: RETRY DISMOUNT FAILURE. They have been in this state over 24 hours now, and we can't clear them. We can tell this is problem caused because of a confusion between the Library master and one of the Lan-free agents. My surmise is that the lan-free agent thinks it is finished with the drives, but that message never gets to the TSM server. Later the TSM Server's timeout logic tries to reclaim the drive, but the lan-free server still has a SCSI reserve on the tape drive, so the TSM Server can't open it to talk to it. We went out to the EDL appliance and dismounted the virtual tapes from the drives, so they are empty. We have tried restarting both the TSM server software and Lan-free agent. We have rebooted the Windows server running the Lan-free agent. We have deleted and rediscovered the AIX rmt devices on the library master. All those worked fine. We did an 'update server STL-PVMCONBKP02 forcsync=yes' between the server an TSM server and the lan-free agent, but that didn't help. The 'Retry Dismount Failure' errors still persist. Every little while we still get the following messages in the server activity log. Since the session between the server and the lan-free agent STL-PVMCONBKP02 isn't getting any errors, it is not a simple communication problem between them. 04/27/10 08:16:51 ANR0408I Session 11595 started for server STL-PVMCONBKP02 (Windows) (Tcp/Ip) for library sharing. (SESSION: 11595) 04/27/10 08:16:51 ANR0408I Session 11596 started for server STL-PVMCONBKP02 (Windows) (Tcp/Ip) for library sharing. (SESSION: 11596) 04/27/10 08:16:51 ANR0408I
Re: Retry Dismount Failure that won't clear
Richard, Thanks for your reply. Here is my tape library: tsm: EPIC-TSM00q libr f=d Library Name: CDL-EPC-LIB1 Library Type: SCSI ACS Id: Private Category: Scratch Category: WORM Scratch Category: External Manager: Shared: Yes LanFree: ObeyMountRetention: Primary Library Manager: WWN: 2003000D77FDE5E0 Serial Number: 0012205643260401 AutoLabel: No Reset Drives: Yes Last Update by (administrator): SCHNJD Last Update Date/Time: 03/09/2010 19:16:35 So Reset Drives is yes, which ought to be clearing this, shouldn't it? By the way, I was wrong that the problem went away. The first time the virtual tape drives involved in the problem came up in the rotation, they went right back into Retry Dismount Failure mode. So the problem persists. So then I restarted the Library master instance again, and then they went right back into Retry Dismount Failure mode again. Tomorrow, I am going to delete all the paths and drives for these 5 drives, and redefine them (if I can). Then if that doesn't fix it, I will post again. What a pain this has become! Best Regards, John D. Schneider The Computer Coaching Community, LLC Office: (314) 635-5424 / Toll Free: (866) 796-9226 Cell: (314) 750-8721 Original Message Subject: Re: [ADSM-L] Retry Dismount Failure that won't clear From: Cowen, Richard rco...@sbsplanet.com Date: Tue, April 27, 2010 5:30 pm To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU What do you have for the library option: RESETDrives Specifies whether the server performs a target reset when the server is restarted or when a library client or storage agent re-connection is established.Note: This parameter only applies to SCSI, 3494, Manual, and ACSLS type libraries. Yes Specifies that the target reset is to be performed. Yes is the default for SCSI, 3494, Manual, and ACSLS libraries defined or updated with SHAREd=Yes. No Specifies that the target reset is not performed. No is the default for SCSI, 3494, Manual, and ACSLS libraries defined with SHAREd=No. -Original Message- From: ADSM: Dist Stor Manager [mailto:ads...@vm.marist.edu] On Behalf Of John D. Schneider Sent: Tuesday, April 27, 2010 5:42 PM To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU Subject: Re: [ADSM-L] Retry Dismount Failure that won't clear Robert, That's a good thing to bring up, but Removable Storage Manager is Disabled. We are emulating an IBM3584 library, with 64 virtual LTO1 tape drives. We use the IBMTape drivers on Windows, and Atape on AIX. We just upgraded the drivers a few weeks ago. I guess it is conceivable that we are hitting something caused by the new drivers. Incidentally, the Retry Dismount Failure has disappeared for now, although it will probably come back, since it has happened a few times, although it is always weeks or months in between, so it is tough to nail down the exact circumstance that caused it. Using the advice from an old ADSM-L post, I: 1) deleted the paths to the Lan-free clients, 2) deleted the path to the library master 3) deleted the drive. Then, when I did a q mount, it would still show Retry Dismount Failure, but it wouldn't show what drive! Instead of: ANR8380I LTO volume V50317 is mounted R/O in drive EPC-LTO1-006 (/dev/epc-lto1-006), status: RETRY DISMOUNT FAILURE. it would say: ANR8380I LTO volume V50317 is mounted R/O, status: RETRY DISMOUNT FAILURE. Strange. Then stranger still, about 15 minutes later, the library master instance crashed. We brought it back up, and all the Retry Dismount Failures were gone! I should be happy, but I'm not, for two reasons. First, this is bound to come up again. And second, the virtual tape device is still screwed up. It must have a SCSI reserve still set. When I try to configure a path for it now, it gives me: ANR8420E DEFINE PATH: An I/O error occurred while accessing drive EPC-LTO1-006. How do you clear the SCSI reserve in a virtual tape drive? I may have to reboot the whole EDL to do it. Best Regards, John D. Schneider The Computer Coaching Community, LLC Office: (314) 635-5424 / Toll Free: (866) 796-9226 Cell: (314) 750-8721 Original Message Subject: Re: [ADSM-L] Retry Dismount Failure that won't clear From: Robert Clark robert.cla...@usbank.com Date: Tue, April 27, 2010 12:25 pm To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU I would make sure RSM on the Windows host is not grabbing the tape drives. What type of library is being emulated? [RC] From: John D. Schneider john.schnei...@computercoachingcommunity.com To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU Date: 04/27/2010 08:25 AM Subject: [ADSM-L] Retry Dismount Failure that won't clear Sent by: ADSM: Dist Stor Manager ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU Greetings, I have been through the archives for help with this one, but I still don't have
Re: Does TSM Have a way to Automatically Determine How many CPU'S aka processors a server has
Greetings, I led our team doing a TSM audit on a 2000 server environment about a year ago. The biggest headache I have ever had. There are so many exceptions for each different kind of servers. VMware servers, standalone Windows, NAS, Clusters, AIX Lpars in a sub-processor lpar. It took a couple months, and we still probably had some mistakes in it, but we got REALLY close. We just recently installed IBM License Metric Tool. The early versions were really bad, but the version we recently installed (7.5, I think) seems to work correctly. It even seems to count correctly the AIX sub-processor Lpars, which we thought would confuse it. Deploying it in a large environment will be a project, but it comes with a self-extracting installer that won't be too tough, once we script it. The only problem is that you have to set up a config file that defines where your ILMT server is, and then you have to push that out to each server before you run the installer on each host to install it. In the future we will make it part of our standard build, which will make it more seamless. But I believe that, once we get it deployed, it will really be less work than any other method of counting licenses would be. The other choice would be a capacity-based license. I understand IBM is starting to make these available. The hitch is that each license is individually negotiated with IBM, and you have to count your licenses with PVUs first to establish a baseline for calculating what a fair capacity-based license would be. This sounds like to me like everybody will end up paying a different price for TSM, depending on their mix of TSM clients when they establish their baseline, and what kind of negotiators they are. Best Regards, John D. Schneider The Computer Coaching Community, LLC Office: (314) 635-5424 / Toll Free: (866) 796-9226 Cell: (314) 750-8721 Original Message Subject: Re: [ADSM-L] Does TSM Have a way to Automatically Determine How many CPU'S aka processors a server has From: Robert Clark robert.cla...@usbank.com Date: Mon, April 26, 2010 4:04 pm To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU Funny phrase that, shear amout of work. Unintentional pun? As in fleecing sheep? [RC] From: David Longo david.lo...@health-first.org To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU Date: 04/23/2010 11:25 AM Subject: Re: [ADSM-L] Does TSM Have a way to Automatically Determine How many CPU'S aka processors a server has Sent by: ADSM: Dist Stor Manager ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU I bet a lot of people get extra counts for reasons you mentioned and related ones. David Longo Rick Adamson rickadam...@winn-dixie.com 4/23/2010 2:08 PM We just recently went through an IBM audit and were tasked with collecting this information on several hundred machines, some local and some remote. When I told my management that TSM does not collect this info he got our IBM rep on the phone for confirmation. I spent a considerable amount of time trying to find a way to get a near accurate count without having to worry about hyperthreading fudging my numbers. Intel makes, or made, a small utility call cpucount that does the job. With very little scripting it can gather the numbers. I just created a for loop that referenced a text file with the node names and ported it out to a cvs file. David if you can't find it let me know and I will see if I still have a copy. I STRONGLY suggest that anyone about to attempt this read the IBM license terms regarding PVU's. IBM has no compassion regarding the shear amount of work the it requires and they send third party auditors out to your site that only have the slightest clue what they are doing. In many situations they tried to double count our MS clusters (once for the physical nodes, and again for the virtual instance names. I explained it to them and when we got their analysis report...you guessed it, there it was. I should have known when they had that deer-in-the-headlights look on their face. Thank you, ~Rick -Original Message- From: ADSM: Dist Stor Manager [mailto:ads...@vm.marist.edu] On Behalf Of Richard Rhodes Sent: Friday, April 23, 2010 12:49 PM To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU Subject: Re: [ADSM-L] Does TSM Have a way to Automatically Determine How many CPU'S aka processors a server has We made it throught the ILMT install, but are not in production yet with it. The actual install wasn't that difficult, but the instructions leave much to be desired - a lot of words with little info. For example, it installs DB2 for it's db. Ok . . . I assume it has some built in backup system. Then I read a little comment that for backups refer to the DB2 documentation, and a link to the DB2 infocenter. We're an Oracle shop . . .no one here knows DB2. No help, no cheat sheet, no built in backup scripts - just go read the db2 manuals! One of my tasks now is to become a DB2 dba . . . what fun! (probably a good thing for our eventual migration to TSM v6) Another example . . .it's reporting the wrong
Re: Running a report on what files will expire in the next sixty days
Because of TSM's incremental backup scheme, there is no way to know what files will expire, because their is no way to know what new versions of files will be taking their place in the future. For example, say there is a file called yoda.txt. If that yoda.txt file is backed up once and is never changed, then the backup for it will never expire because the backup of that file remains the active version of that file. If, however, yoda.txt is changed from time to time, and a backup runs every day, then the older versions of the file become inactive versions of the file. Then the inactive versions will expire when they exceed either the number of days or versions that you defined in the policy. So, when I backup yoda.txt today, there is no way to know when this version of yoda.txt is going to expire, unless I have some way to know how many new versions are going to replace it in the future. Can you tell us why you think it is necessary to predict what files will be expired, or when? Since new backup data will be coming in continuously, is it really important to know? Best Regards, John D. Schneider The Computer Coaching Community, LLC Office: (314) 635-5424 / Toll Free: (866) 796-9226 Cell: (314) 750-8721 Original Message Subject: [ADSM-L] Running a report on what files will expire in the next sixty days From: yoda woya yodaw...@gmail.com Date: Tue, April 13, 2010 9:37 am To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU Is there a way to find the list of files/amount of data that will expire in the next 60 days?
Re: Running a report on what files will expire in the next sixty days
Well, I am no expert on this, so I am willing to be corrected by somebody if I don't have this right, but here is my understanding. Yes the deactivate_date will tell you when a given backup object became inactive, but that won't reliably tell you when it will expire, because as I said, you don't know what other versions will be coming along. Newer versions can cause it to expire sooner. What if, in my previous example, yoda.txt is in a management class whose backup copygroup policy is 7 versions for 30 days? The file gets backed up on 4/13/2010. The next day yoda.txt changes, so it gets backed up again on 4/14/2010. So at the next 'expire inventory' the 4/13/2010 version of the file becomes inactive, and deactivate_date gets set to 4/13/2010. If the policy says 30 days, it would be easy to think, yeah, it is going to really expire on 5/13/2010, 30 days later. But what if yoda.txt keeps changing every day? Then yoda.txt from 4/13/2010 is going to expire when 7 new versions have backed up, on 4/20/1010. But what if yoda.txt only changes every other day, or not at all? You can do a select to find out all the files that are deactivated, but the best you could determine is the outside window of how many days they might still be around, based on the number of days in the policy. But I am still not sure why it is useful to run such a report? Best Regards, John D. Schneider The Computer Coaching Community, LLC Office: (314) 635-5424 / Toll Free: (866) 796-9226 Cell: (314) 750-8721 Original Message Subject: Re: [ADSM-L] Running a report on what files will expire in the next sixty days From: Michael Green mishagr...@gmail.com Date: Tue, April 13, 2010 11:19 am To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU John, Please correct me if I'm wrong. select * from syscat.columns where tabname='BACKUPS' shows that there is a column called DEACTIVATE_DATE. I guess if you write a select statement crafted in such a way that it also takes into account current date, the management class (CLASS_NAME from BACKUPS) VERE/VERD/RETE/RETO, then you can conclude if the object is candidate for expiration. Running such a select on a production machine is a whole other story. -- Warm regards, Michael Green On Tue, Apr 13, 2010 at 6:37 PM, John D. Schneider john.schnei...@computercoachingcommunity.com wrote: Because of TSM's incremental backup scheme, there is no way to know what files will expire, because their is no way to know what new versions of files will be taking their place in the future. For example, say there is a file called yoda.txt. If that yoda.txt file is backed up once and is never changed, then the backup for it will never expire because the backup of that file remains the active version of that file. If, however, yoda.txt is changed from time to time, and a backup runs every day, then the older versions of the file become inactive versions of the file. Then the inactive versions will expire when they exceed either the number of days or versions that you defined in the policy. So, when I backup yoda.txt today, there is no way to know when this version of yoda.txt is going to expire, unless I have some way to know how many new versions are going to replace it in the future. Can you tell us why you think it is necessary to predict what files will be expired, or when? Since new backup data will be coming in continuously, is it really important to know? Best Regards, John D. Schneider The Computer Coaching Community, LLC Office: (314) 635-5424 / Toll Free: (866) 796-9226 Cell: (314) 750-8721 Original Message Subject: [ADSM-L] Running a report on what files will expire in the next sixty days From: yoda woya yodaw...@gmail.com Date: Tue, April 13, 2010 9:37 am To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU Is there a way to find the list of files/amount of data that will expire in the next 60 days?
Re: IBM 3584 preventive maintenance schedule
Andy, IMHO, this question should be addressed squarely at your local CE manager or Storage Top-Gun, not ADSM-L. It is their job to keep this library running well, and they have a right to have an opinion in this matter. I am glad you posted it, though, because it is something many people wonder, I am sure. Here are a couple things to think about: 1) Make sure you configure the IBM TSSC (Total Storage Solutions Console) to phone home any problems to IBM, so they are getting records of any problems. 2) Configure more than one drive to be a library control path, and make sure you set up your IBMTape or Atape drives to support that. 3) Plan to upgrade the firmware on the library and drives every 6 months to 1 year. This can be done through the Web interface, and is not usually very intrusive. I prefer to do it while TSM is down and the tape drives are dismounted, but that is just me. At the very least, you should plan on bouncing the TSM server that is the library master after a library firmware update. For the tape drive updates, if scheduling downtime is hard, you could take individual drives offline to TSM, and upgrade their firmware individually. This can be tedious, however, because upgrading them all at once via the Web interface is about the speed of upgrading one. Best Regards, John D. Schneider The Computer Coaching Community, LLC Office: (314) 635-5424 / Toll Free: (866) 796-9226 Cell: (314) 750-8721 Original Message Subject: Re: [ADSM-L] IBM 3584 preventive maintenance schedule From: Huebner,Andy,FORT WORTH,IT andy.hueb...@alconlabs.com Date: Thu, April 08, 2010 4:55 pm To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU The closest we have come to PM on our 3494 was a vacuuming after some DC renovations, but the library is only 8 years old. Andy Huebner -Original Message- From: ADSM: Dist Stor Manager [mailto:ads...@vm.marist.edu] On Behalf Of Lamb, Charles P. Sent: Thursday, April 08, 2010 9:12 AM To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU Subject: [ADSM-L] IBM 3584 preventive maintenance schedule Hi. Would anyone know what the IBM 3584 preventive maintenance schedule should be and what that entails?? This e-mail (including any attachments) is confidential and may be legally privileged. If you are not an intended recipient or an authorized representative of an intended recipient, you are prohibited from using, copying or distributing the information in this e-mail or its attachments. If you have received this e-mail in error, please notify the sender immediately by return e-mail and delete all copies of this message and any attachments. Thank you.
Re: IBM 3584 preventive maintenance schedule
You can always use tapeutil to load the drive or library firmware. It still has to be done one at a time, but is MUCH faster than the GUI version; only a couple minutes per drive. Best Regards, John D. Schneider The Computer Coaching Community, LLC Office: (314) 635-5424 / Toll Free: (866) 796-9226 Cell: (314) 750-8721 Original Message Subject: Re: [ADSM-L] IBM 3584 preventive maintenance schedule From: Richard Rhodes rrho...@firstenergycorp.com Date: Thu, April 08, 2010 8:35 pm To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU This can be tedious, however, because upgrading them all at once via the Web interface is about the speed of upgrading one. We have had problems upgrading the drive microcode. When upgrading all the drives at one time, the update proceeds and finally ends with an error. THe state of the drives is such that some have the new microcode and some do not. TO finish the update we have then manually upgraded the remaining drives one at a time - what a pain! THis has happened more than one, and IBM has not resolved the problem. In talking with our local CE, he said that the issue is that the rs422(?) bus connecting the drives to the processors is overloaded during the upgrade, and cuases timeout conditions. We now let IBM perform the update, and he updates the drives one frame at a time - something the gui doesn't support. Rick - The information contained in this message is intended only for the personal and confidential use of the recipient(s) named above. If the reader of this message is not the intended recipient or an agent responsible for delivering it to the intended recipient, you are hereby notified that you have received this document in error and that any review, dissemination, distribution, or copying of this message is strictly prohibited. If you have received this communication in error, please notify us immediately, and delete the original message.
Re: Archive completed but not big enough.
Tim, Was there an error to indicate why the archive failed? Or did it seem to complete successfully? If so, is it possible that you have compression turned on at the client, through the client setting, or the client options? If so, it is not too surprising that a 76GB file could compress down to 18GB. Best Regards, John D. Schneider The Computer Coaching Community, LLC Office: (314) 635-5424 / Toll Free: (866) 796-9226 Cell: (314) 750-8721 Original Message Subject: [ADSM-L] Archive completed but not big enough. From: Timothy Hughes timothy.hug...@oit.state.nj.us Date: Tue, April 06, 2010 8:39 am To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU Hello all, We did a Archive and it only Archived 18.15GB it should have Archived 76.6 GB, I am going to delete the Archive and try again. Question - By deleting the filespace via command line or GUI that should get rid of the data that was archived correct? Thanks 99 DELETE FILESPACE Deleting file space * (fsId=1) (backup/archive data) for node ADOCGWC_10-16-09: 49344 objects deleted. Thanks in Advance!
Re: ***SPAM*** [ADSM-L] Using tapeutil to examine cleaning tapes
Marcel, This addresses the need quite effectively. This can be incorporated into a script which could send out an email alert any time the number of total cleanings drops below a certain threshold, so the admin at a remote site doesn't have to check manually. Thanks for the info. Best Regards, John D. Schneider The Computer Coaching Community, LLC Office: (314) 635-5424 / Toll Free: (866) 796-9226 Cell: (314) 750-8721 Original Message Subject: Re: [ADSM-L] ***SPAM*** [ADSM-L] Using tapeutil to examine cleaning tapes From: Marcel Anthonijsz marcel.anthoni...@gmail.com Date: Fri, March 19, 2010 3:08 am To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU Curious as I was, I just tried it and it shows the clean remaining: *java -jar TS3500CLI.jar -a lib1 --viewCleaningCartridges* View all cleaning cartridges at 2010/03/19 09:05:13 Volume Serial, Logical Library, Element Address, Media Type, Location, Cleans Remaining, Most Recent Usage CLNU69L1, Cln Cartridge, 0, LTO Ultrium-1, Slot (F1 C1 R2), 42, Not Applicable 2010/3/19 Marcel Anthonijsz marcel.anthoni...@gmail.com Or use the (just released) TS3500 CLI: http://www-01.ibm.com/support/docview.wss?rs=1159uid=ssg1S4000854 Quote: Abstract The IBM TS3500 Command Line Interface (CLI) program can be used to access the TS3500 library from a CLI. This is in addition to the TS3500’s Web Specialist. One of the commands you can issue is: -viewCleaningCartridges : Views all cleaning cartridges. I haven't tried it yet and am not sure if it lists the usecount. Another command is: -removeExpiredCleaningCartridges 2010/3/19 Remco Post r.p...@plcs.nl On 18 mrt 2010, at 17:05, John D. Schneider wrote: Greetings, This is a followup to Wanda's question about cleaning tapes on an IBM3584 library. I wondered if there was any way to do it using tapeutil. When I call tapeutil with: tapeutil -f /dev/smc1 inventory or tapeutil -f /dev/smc1 cartridgelocation either one will give me a report of all the slots in the library and what is in them. But wait a minute, it is not a report of ALL the slots. When I tried to use it to find out what slots had cleaning tapes, I found out that neither of these reports will show the cleaning tapes! They show empty slots, and ones with tapes in them, but they don't show slots that have cleaners. I suppose this is by design, but I can't imagine why. Does anyone know of a way to detect the cleaning tapes with tapeutil (or similar utility like ITDT), so we can determine how many cleanings are left? as said before, with ALMS, the cleaners are owned and managed by the library, they are completely invisible to the systems ,hey don't even take up slots in the systems' library partitions. The only way to find out is through the great web panels Best Regards, John D. Schneider The Computer Coaching Community, LLC Office: (314) 635-5424 / Toll Free: (866) 796-9226 Cell: (314) 750-8721 -- Met vriendelijke groeten/Kind regards, Remco Post -- Kind Regards, Groetje, Marcel Anthonijsz T: +31(0)299-776768 M:+31(0)6-2423 6522 -- Kind Regards, Groetje, Marcel Anthonijsz T: +31(0)299-776768 M:+31(0)6-2423 6522
Questions about ITDT and tapeutil
Greetings, I recently upgraded the Atape drivers on a system, and happened to run tapeutil a couple weeks later, and it spit out: ATTENTION: Tapeutil provides only a subset of device and command support that the IBM Tape Diagnostic Tool (ITDT) provides. The functions and capabilities of tapeutil are now performed by ITDT. Please use ITDT in place of tapeutil, as tapeutil is deprecated. So I installed ITDT, and went to run that utility, and when I did it spit out: IBM Tape Diagnostic Tool Standard Edition - V4.0.0 Build 023 Entry Menu [S] Scan for tape drives (Diagnostic/Maintenance Mode) [U] Tapeutil (Expert Mode) [H] Help [Q] Quit program So when I run tapeutil it says I should stop using it, and use ITDT instead. But when I run ITDT, it just calls tapeutil itself! Am I the only person who fails to see the logic in this? Best Regards, John D. Schneider The Computer Coaching Community, LLC Office: (314) 635-5424 / Toll Free: (866) 796-9226 Cell: (314) 750-8721
Using tapeutil to examine cleaning tapes
Greetings, This is a followup to Wanda's question about cleaning tapes on an IBM3584 library. I wondered if there was any way to do it using tapeutil. When I call tapeutil with: tapeutil -f /dev/smc1 inventory or tapeutil -f /dev/smc1 cartridgelocation either one will give me a report of all the slots in the library and what is in them. But wait a minute, it is not a report of ALL the slots. When I tried to use it to find out what slots had cleaning tapes, I found out that neither of these reports will show the cleaning tapes! They show empty slots, and ones with tapes in them, but they don't show slots that have cleaners. I suppose this is by design, but I can't imagine why. Does anyone know of a way to detect the cleaning tapes with tapeutil (or similar utility like ITDT), so we can determine how many cleanings are left? Best Regards, John D. Schneider The Computer Coaching Community, LLC Office: (314) 635-5424 / Toll Free: (866) 796-9226 Cell: (314) 750-8721
Re: Ejecting cleaning cartridges from the TS3500/3584
Greetings, We have multiple IBM3584s, and have tried both TSM managed tape cleaning, and automatic tape cleaning via ALMS, with 3592 tape drives. With TSM managed tape cleaning, we were having a lot of problems with TSM getting tape errors and failed tape drives. We also found that TSM did not perform a cleaning every time the tape drive asked for one. In other words, TSM did not consistently respond to every cleaning request, which probably accounted for our failed tape drive situation. We turned on ALMS and automatic tape cleaning. Our cleanings went up quite a bit at first, then settled down. The tape drive failures tapered off. I can hardly believe a field service guy from IBM telling Jim he should only clean tape drives when absolutely necessary. How would Jim decide when it was absolutely necessary? When he was trying to recover a production database at 4 am and every tape he mounted was unreadable and he couldn't recover the data? The tape drive firmware automatically detects when it needs to be cleaned. What sense does it make to ignore that functionality and think you can guess for yourself what the drive really needs? The cleaning tapes cost $50. But the data on the tapes might have cost millions to produce. Why take such a risk? Best Regards, John D. Schneider The Computer Coaching Community, LLC Office: (314) 635-5424 / Toll Free: (866) 796-9226 Cell: (314) 750-8721 Original Message Subject: Re: [ADSM-L] Ejecting cleaning cartridges from the TS3500/3584 From: Prather, Wanda wprat...@icfi.com Date: Wed, March 17, 2010 2:23 pm To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU These are TS1130 drives/3592 cartridges, which certainly appear to be cleaning more often than LTO3/4's do. We have the library set to autoclean, which means it inserts the cleaning cart only when the drives request a cleaning. This lib has 4 drives, averaging about 1.5-2 TB migration, + 1.5-2 2 TB backup stgpool, + reclaims daily, ~2000 mounts a day. Using about 1 cleaning cart (50 cleans) a month. Don't know if that's a lot or a little, in terms of cleaning, for TS1130's. -Original Message- From: ADSM: Dist Stor Manager [mailto:ads...@vm.marist.edu] On Behalf Of Jim Zajkowski Sent: Wednesday, March 17, 2010 2:57 PM To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU Subject: Re: [ADSM-L] Ejecting cleaning cartridges from the TS3500/3584 On 3/17/10 1:18 PM, Prather, Wanda wprat...@icfi.com wrote: Is there a way to make the TS3500/3584 do that? ALMS is enabled, multiple partitions, 3592 carts. I certainly don't have a robot that big, but in seven years we've only cleaned the drives a handful of times. Am I doing something wrong? Our field service guy suggested that we only clean them when absolutely necessary because repeated cleaning can cause the head to fail. --Jim
Re: 5.5 - 6.2
Fred, According to the table at: http://www-01.ibm.com/support/docview.wss?uid=swg21302789 the TSM library master could be at 6.1, and the storage agent left behind at 5.5 or even 5.4. You are remembering outdated information, I think. So this should simplify your plans. This was very good news for us, too. We have one library master that serves 9 other TSM servers, plus 5 Lan-free agents. The thought of having to upgrade ALL of them on the same day was daunting indeed. But thankfully, we can do them in groups. Because we have as many as 4 instances on one server, we will be forced by the upgrade requirements to upgrade all of those on the same day. At least, I think that is true. When I upgraded a test server from 5.4 to 6.1 a couple weeks ago, I was told to uninstall 5.4 before installing 6.1, and that they could not exist on the same server. Am I understanding this correctly? Best Regards, John D. Schneider The Computer Coaching Community, LLC Office: (314) 635-5424 / Toll Free: (866) 796-9226 Cell: (314) 750-8721 Original Message Subject: [ADSM-L] 5.5 - 6.2 From: Fred Johanson f...@uchicago.edu Date: Thu, March 04, 2010 4:18 pm To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU We are making plans for the upgrade from 5.5 - 6.2 this Spring. One, of many, thing that's causing much headscratching is consistency. I know that the Library Manager must be first. Since it has no clients, no problems with the conversion. However, the LAN-FREE storage agents, which must be at the same level as the LM, are all on our largest instance, which I'd prefer to leave till last in the conversion schedule. We think that the client level for those machines must also be at the same level as the LM. Also on that instance are the datamovers using NDMP. We're not sure if those must also be at the same level as the LM. We think the approach should be : 1. Upgrade the LM, 2. Upgrade the necessary agents and clients, and 3. Tackle a less complicated instance to convert completely. Are we thinking in the right track here? All thoughts appreciated. Another unanswered question is whether we can do the conversion directly into 6.2, or do we have to go 6.1.0 - 6.2? If the latter, will we have to pass quickly thru 6.1.2? I hope this will be addressed in the documentation, whenever that becomes available. Fred Johanson TSM Administrator University of Chicago 773-702-8464
Re: TSM time Travel
Greetings, My question is, is it necessary to use a production client for this sort of testing? Couldn't they use a test client, take backups, play with the time however they want, and then when they are all done, just delete that TSM client and all it's backups? Even during Y2K testing we used test systems whereever possible. Those test systems were built out of the production systems so the applications were just the same. But in the event of problems there wouldn't be any residual gotchas to contend with after testing was done. If it is absolutely necessary to use a production server, maybe you could still use a test TSM client. If the production TSM client is called MYCLIENT, you could register a TSM client called MYCLIENT_TEST, then on the day you want to time-travel, name the client MYCLIENT_TEST in the TSM options files, and authenticate, and take a first backup. Then they can do any testing they want during the day, and any backups. Then sometime before the nightly backup comes along, switch the TSM client back to MYCLIENT, and restart the services. You could switch back and forth every day they wanted to test if you needed to. Eventually when all the testing is done, you just delete MYCLIENT_TEST from TSM. The only problem with this plan is it still doesn't address the fact that, while time travelling, MYCLIENT may get a bunch of files with future dates. This could still contaminate MYCLIENT's backup data if steps aren't taken to touch each of those files to get the datestamps right again, or restore them from MYCLIENT's last good backup to be sure. Which brings me back to, why use a production server for this sort of testing? Wouldn't a test server be safer? Best Regards, John D. Schneider The Computer Coaching Community, LLC Office: (314) 635-5424 / Toll Free: (866) 796-9226 Cell: (314) 750-8721 Original Message Subject: Re: [ADSM-L] TSM time Travel From: Robert Clark robert_cl...@mac.com Date: Mon, March 01, 2010 9:20 am To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU Back during the run up to Y2K, I was doing storage/backup admin. The team doing Y2K testing didn't tell us anything about what they were doing, and they started to get weird results with attempted restores when they took systems forward and backwards in time. My first reaction was that they were endangering the production TSM servers by testing against them. My second reaction was that they needed to seek out a Time Lord. Part of the problem was the havok the time travel rasied with retention, the other part was the difficulty in figuring out what to restore. Our work around was to script a call to from the time-traveling system to a not-time-traveling system to get the real world time, and then use that text in the description of an archive. When folks wanted to do a retrieve, all they needed to do was look over the description fields to see what dates were available. I was happy to see testing completed, and the archived filespaces/ nodes deleted. Thanks, [RC] On Feb 22, 2010, at 2:42 PM, Steve Harris wrote: Hello Again, I have a client with a requirement to perform testing at different times into the future. They wish to set the clocks, backup, do some testing, backup, set the clock again, and so on. They wish to be able to roll forward and *backward* to any time that they have tested at. Now I realize that the TSM scheduler will have conniptions if the server time is too far out. Assuming that we kick off a backup by some other means, will TSM handle being able to roll back and forth in this manner? Will the client be able to see a backup on march 1 that was taken at a client time setting of October 1 2010? Any pointers/gotchas gladly received. Regards Steve Steven Harris TSM Admin Paraparaumu, New Zealand.
Re: alternatives to TSM due to license costs
Bryan, When you ask a TSM forum to recommend some alternative to TSM, that is sort of like asking a devoutly religious man to recommend some religion that is better than his. :-) What kind of answer do you really expect to get? One alternative to TSM that hasn't been mentioned yet is Avamar, a deduplication appliance sold by EMC. I don't work for EMC, or a company who sells EMC products, so this is not a shrouded sales pitch. Last year I led our TSM Team in a proof-of-concept of Avamar, so that is the only reason I know about it. We are not running it in production today, so I am not expert in my opinion. The reason we looked at Avamar was because our management was disgruntled about a TSM license audit we had to endure. Avamar is a disk-only solution, so you will need enough disk space for your entire backup set, because you can't migrate data to tape. But because it is deduplicating the data on the way in, it requires only a fraction of the disk space. For regular filesystem type data, sometimes it is only 1/20th as much disk; for database data it may be much less; for image data it might not deduplicate much at all. If you are backing up VMs, where many of them were built from the same image, the deduplication may be like 1/100th as much disk. So the kind of data you are backing up has a lot to do with how well it deduplicates. EMC has some tools to help size your solution. Most deduplication appliances work like a network share or a VTL, so you have to have a regular backup product in front of them to feed them data. But Avamar provides it's own clients that run on the servers you are backing up. They also have all the special clients you need to backup databases, etc. That is the thing that made me want to look at Avamar at all. We weren't going to have to pay for TSM licenses, then also pay for the deduplication applicance and all the hardware and software maintencance for all that, too. The company I work for did a proof-of-concept of Avamar, as I said. We spent months and tested Windows, Linux, AIX, SQL, Oracle and Exchange clients and they all worked like we expected them to. We didn't run into any problems with how the appliance worked. We also tested the automated replication from one appliance to another appliance about 3 hours away, and that worked well, too. We have not purchased yet, but only because of budget reasons. We liked the product and will pull the trigger as soon as money becomes available. In our situation, the cost of purchasing Avamar new was higher than paying maintenance on TSM licenses. The licensing scheme for Avamar is totally simple, too. You pay for the capacity of Avamar disk space you buy. That is it. The more drawers of space you buy, the higher the price. There is no charge for any of the client software agents, and it doesn't matter how many servers you are backing up, or how big they are. That is all built in to the capacity pricing. That is another reason I like Avamar. They have kept that part extremely simple. One thing about Avamar is that the reporting is weak. They give you basic reports, but they aren't pretty. If you want pretty, you will have to buy an add-on product like EMC Data Protection Manager, which has a lot of features, but will jack up the price. Best Regards, John D. Schneider Cell: (314) 750-8721 Original Message Subject: [ADSM-L] alternatives to TSM due to license costs From: woodbm tsm-fo...@backupcentral.com Date: Wed, December 30, 2009 1:11 pm To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU Hello all, I have been tasked with looking at alternatives to TSM due to recent Audit from IBM and the amount of money we just shelled out for the TSM License. I am sure most of you have pertaken to this wonderful experience. I don't really want to move away from TSM, but have to provide alternatives to management. Could anyone direct me to where I can begin my search. I have only used TSM my entire time here. What is the industry leader? Any info or documents or links doing a comparison would be helpful. Also, is the license structure the same for other environments as well or is IBM way out of line? I am going to start with EMC's Avamar/Networker. Thanks much, Bryan +-- |This was sent by woo...@nu.com via Backup Central. |Forward SPAM to ab...@backupcentral.com. +--
Where can I find ISC 7.1?
I suspect this is going to be a boneheaded question, but that never stopped me before, so here goes: The online TSM 6.1 installation manual contains the following statements: Note: The Administration Center Version 6.1 is only compatible with the Integrated Solutions Console Advanced Edition Version 7.1. If you currently have downlevel versions of the Administration Center and Integrated Solutions Console installed, you must upgrade both. I went looking for ISC on Passport advantage, and it doesn't seem to be there. The Adminstration Center is there, but not ISC. I found ISC on the IBM software FTP site containing the TSM 6.1 software, but it only has ISC up to 5.5. Can anybody tell me where ISC Advanced Edition Version 7.1 can be found? Or is the manual incorrect, and ISC 5.5 is the correct version? Best Regards, John
Re: SV: Problems recieving E-Mails.
Christian, That must be it. Suddenly and simultaneously, all over the world, nobody had any reason to post to ADSM-L. Bound to happen some time, and I am glad to have been here to see it. :-) Seriously, I saw the same thing. The last post from ADSM-L came on Wednesday afternoon, nothing all day Thursday, until Jimmy's post on Friday morning. Kind of odd, but isn't necessarily a problem unless the administrators of the listserv confess to something. Happy Friday, John D. Schneider The Computer Coaching Community, LLC Office: (314) 635-5424 / Toll Free: (866) 796-9226 Cell: (314) 750-8721 Original Message Subject: [ADSM-L] SV: Problems recieving E-Mails. From: Christian Svensson christian.svens...@cristie.se Date: Fri, November 13, 2009 9:26 am To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU Hi Jimmy, TSM is working perfect for all over the world at the moment. ;) Best Regards Christian Svensson Cell: +46-70-325 1577 E-mail: christian.svens...@cristie.se Skype: cristie.christian.svensson Från: ADSM: Dist Stor Manager [ads...@vm.marist.edu] f#246;r Jimmy Furlong [jfurl...@dunnes-stores.ie] Skickat: den 13 november 2009 16:22 Till: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU Ämne: Problems recieving E-Mails. I haven't recieved any e-mails from usergroup in two days. Is there a problem?. Jimmy Furlong
Re: TSM DB Size
Certainly the architectural limit is a boundary you don't want to get very close to. But besides that, there are issues of database performance as the DB grows and grows. We have TSM servers running four TSM instances on 8-way pSeries AIX servers with redundant FC links to raw logical volumes on EMC Symmetrix or Clariiion disk, with databases ranging from 80-225GB, and their performance is just fine. Expire inventory times are 1-2 hours, Database backup is 1-2 hours max (to LTO4 tape drives). But we also have smaller Windows servers with dual processors and LTO3 tape drives, and with 30-50GB databases the Expire Inventory and Database backups are also 1-2 hours. If we let those Windows TSM databases grow to 225GB they would not perform nearly so well, so we have to watch how big they grow. Best Regards, John D. Schneider The Computer Coaching Community, LLC Office: (314) 635-5424 / Toll Free: (866) 796-9226 Cell: (314) 750-8721 Original Message Subject: Re: [ADSM-L] TSM DB Size From: Richard Mochnaczewski richard.mochnaczew...@standardlife.ca Date: Tue, November 10, 2009 10:51 am To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU We had a health check done by IBM when we were at TSM 5.3 and were told they don't recommend a DB size higher than 120Gb for performance and restore purposes. Rich -Original Message- From: ADSM: Dist Stor Manager [mailto:ads...@vm.marist.edu] On Behalf Of Kelly Lipp Sent: Tuesday, November 10, 2009 11:48 AM To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU Subject: Re: [ADSM-L] TSM DB Size The architectural limit is 500GB. Practically, one should be a good bit smaller. It really boils down to how long do you want a restore of the backed up DB to take? Figure about 150% of the backup time for a restore. Can you live with that? Kelly Lipp Chief Technical Officer www.storserver.com 719-266-8777 x7105 STORServer solves your data backup challenges. Once and for all. -Original Message- From: ADSM: Dist Stor Manager [mailto:ads...@vm.marist.edu] On Behalf Of Huebschman, George J. Sent: Tuesday, November 10, 2009 9:42 AM To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU Subject: Re: [ADSM-L] TSM DB Size We have DB's over 190 Gb in 5.5, on AIX servers: TSM_Server CAP_GB MAX_EXT_GB PCT_UTIL MAX_UTIL --- --- -- AIXPRODXYZ 191.95 0.00 89.4 89.4 AIXPRODDMZ 219.76 4.17 90.3 91.1 -Original Message- From: ADSM: Dist Stor Manager [mailto:ads...@vm.marist.edu] On Behalf Of Richard Mochnaczewski Sent: Tuesday, November 10, 2009 11:35 AM To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU Subject: [ADSM-L] TSM DB Size Hi *, Does anyone know what the maximum size database is for TSM 5.4 and TSM 5.5 ? We were told by IBM when we were at TSM 5.3 that 120Gb was the limit and was wondering what the limit is for 5.4 and 5.5. Currently running TSM 5.4.3.0 on AIX 5.3 TL 9. Rich IMPORTANT: E-mail sent through the Internet is not secure. Legg Mason therefore recommends that you do not send any confidential or sensitive information to us via electronic mail, including social security numbers, account numbers, or personal identification numbers. Delivery, and or timely delivery of Internet mail is not guaranteed. Legg Mason therefore recommends that you do not send time sensitive or action-oriented messages to us via electronic mail. This message is intended for the addressee only and may contain privileged or confidential information. Unless you are the intended recipient, you may not use, copy or disclose to anyone any information contained in this message. If you have received this message in error, please notify the author by replying to this message and then kindly delete the message. Thank you.
Re: TSM 5.4 or 6.1
As Richard said, AIX 5.2 is out of support, and 5.3 won't be in support forever. I work in Healthcare, where vendors are usually very slow to get off older OS versions, so a customer can't always choose their OS, they are bound by the support issues of the vendor. Just this past year we finally got off all our AIX 5.2 and some 5.1, and even a couple AIX 4.3.3 systems. Dinosaurs, all of them, but what could we do? We had to wait for the vendor's support. So the first effort will be to find out what, if anything, is keeping them at AIX 5.2, and lead the charge to upgrade all the ones you can. But does that matter? Will TSM be running on it's own separate server? That is certainly the preferable way to go, in which case you could install a pSeries server that will support AIX 5.3 or AIX 6, and run a modern TSM version. Some of the clients will have to run older TSM clients, but in my experience that has always worked, if you can stay just one version behind. Just because you are running TSM 5.5 server, doesn't mean you have to run TSM 5.5 clients everywhere; you can run older TSM clients if you have to. When we went from TSM 5.3 to TSM 5.4 and 5.5 server, we still had TSM 5.2 and 5.3 legacy clients, and they still backed up (and more importantly) restored OK until 6-9 months later when we finally got them all upgraded. Best Regards, John D. Schneider The Computer Coaching Community, LLC Office: (314) 635-5424 / Toll Free: (866) 796-9226 Cell: (314) 750-8721 Original Message Subject: Re: [ADSM-L] TSM 5.4 or 6.1 From: Richard Sims r...@bu.edu Date: Sat, October 10, 2009 8:37 am To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU An obvious, major consideration for your customer is that AIX 5.2 is out of support: http://www-01.ibm.com/software/support/systemsp/lifecycle/ This may leave them at jeopardy for security problems, and make it difficult to add new hardware. Richard Sims On Oct 10, 2009, at 9:04 AM, Mehdi Salehi wrote: One of our customers is planning to buy TSM for their AIX 5.2 systems. The problem is that the newest version of TSM what supports AIX 5.2 is TSM 5.4. Two solutions: - upgrade AIX systems to 5.3 or 6.1 - forget about TSM 6.1 and use TSM 5.4 You know the application side people are unwilling to move their environment. I am looking for convincing highlights to motivate them to upgrade their operating systems instead of downgrading TSM side. What features of TSM 6.1 do you think could be interesting from executive's point of view?
Re: TSM 5.4 or 6.1
Mehdi, I forgot to speak to your second solution. If you read the ADSM-L listserv regularly, you will probably know that customers are still having significant problems in TSM 6.1. Unless you really need a 6.1 feature and just can't wait, you are probably better off staying on the more stable versions. We still have a group of ten TSM 5.4.3 servers (running on AIX 5.3) in production, and together they back up about 15TB a day, and they are extremely solid and reliable. So even though some people just have to be on the latest version because it makes them feel like studs, I will choose proven and reliable any day. Best Regards, John D. Schneider The Computer Coaching Community, LLC Office: (314) 635-5424 / Toll Free: (866) 796-9226 Cell: (314) 750-8721 Original Message Subject: [ADSM-L] TSM 5.4 or 6.1 From: Mehdi Salehi iranian.aix.supp...@gmail.com Date: Sat, October 10, 2009 8:04 am To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU One of our customers is planning to buy TSM for their AIX 5.2 systems. The problem is that the newest version of TSM what supports AIX 5.2 is TSM 5.4. Two solutions: - upgrade AIX systems to 5.3 or 6.1 - forget about TSM 6.1 and use TSM 5.4 You know the application side people are unwilling to move their environment. I am looking for convincing highlights to motivate them to upgrade their operating systems instead of downgrading TSM side. What features of TSM 6.1 do you think could be interesting from executive's point of view?
Re: TSM 5.4 or 6.1
Mehdi, Yes, I think you need to plan on using the same client and server version in a LAN-free situation. So now the only question that remains then is, whether AIX 5.2 is necessary, or whether you could upgrade to a new AIX version. That will decide your choices of TSM version. By the way, even though I mentioned that TSM 5.4.3 is a reliable version, I didn't mean to imply I would recommend it for someone building a new environnent, because IBM is bound to drop support for it one of these days when 6.1 is more fully accepted. In fact, they may have already announced when; I don't know. Best Regards, John D. Schneider The Computer Coaching Community, LLC Office: (314) 635-5424 / Toll Free: (866) 796-9226 Cell: (314) 750-8721 Original Message Subject: Re: [ADSM-L] TSM 5.4 or 6.1 From: Mehdi Salehi iranian.aix.supp...@gmail.com Date: Sat, October 10, 2009 10:09 am To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU Thanks About using different TSM versions in client and server I should mention one of the requirments for this client is LAN-free and TDP. So, as far as I know, clients should be the same version as server.
Re: Per terabyte licensing
You are right, we eventually got an agreement for a sub-processor license for Oracle, but IBM didn't volunteer that. We insisted, and eventually won the concession after much negotiating. And I am sure part of the reason we got the concession is because of the size customer we are; a smaller customer has no leverage for expecting special pricing. Best Regards, John D. Schneider The Computer Coaching Community, LLC Office: (314) 635-5424 / Toll Free: (866) 796-9226 Cell: (314) 750-8721 Original Message Subject: Re: [ADSM-L] Per terabyte licensing From: Mark Blunden m...@au1.ibm.com Date: Mon, September 28, 2009 7:04 pm To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU IBM does have a sub-capacity license process. You need to talk to your sales rep to find out the details. Basically, if you are only using 2 cpus for Oracle out of 128 total cpus available, then you only have to pay for 2 DB licenses. Obvioulsy other LPARs are probably servicing other data requirements which will need backing up, but you don't have to pay for the lot if you don't use the lot. regards, Mark Kelly Lipp l...@storserver. COM To Sent by: ADSM: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU Dist Stor cc Manager ads...@vm.marist Subject .EDU Re: Per terabyte licensing 29/09/2009 09:48 AM Please respond to ADSM: Dist Stor Manager ads...@vm.marist .EDU And remember, too, that the PVU thing contemplated something like a DB2 license. Perhaps you had two or three systems that would run DB2. It did not contemplate something like TSM where EVERY system in the environment would have the software running. Keeping track of a couple of systems and their various processor/core/PVU stuff is relatively simple. Keeping track of that same thing across several hundred (never mind your case!) is very difficult. The one size fits all mentality of Tivoli software clearly missed the mark with TSM. Kelly Lipp Chief Technical Officer www.storserver.com 719-266-8777 x7105 STORServer solves your data backup challenges. Once and for all. -Original Message- From: ADSM: Dist Stor Manager [mailto:ads...@vm.marist.edu] On Behalf Of John D. Schneider Sent: Monday, September 28, 2009 4:47 PM To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU Subject: Re: [ADSM-L] Per terabyte licensing Kelly, You are right, IBM must build their license model to ensure the profit they expect. We can't blame them for doing this as a business. They can't give their product away for free. But the PVU based licensing model is a huge problem for an environment like ours that has over 2000 clients of all different shapes and kinds. Lots of separate servers, but also VMWare partitions, and AIX LPARs, and NDMP clients, etc. Keeping up with the PVU rules is a huge effort, especially the way IBM did it. In Windows, the OS might tell you that you have 2 processors. But is that a single-core dual processor, or two separate processors. The OS can't tell, but IBM insists there is a difference, because it counts PVUs differently in this case. That is too nit-picky if you ask me, and places too difficult a burden on the customer. There are freeware utilities that will correctly count processors IBM's way, but to run them on 2000 servers is a pain, too. We ended up writing our own scripts to call a freeware tool IBM recommended, then parse the resulting answer to get the details into a summarized format. As if that wasn't enough, the freeware tool crashed about 20 of our servers before we realized it. Boy, was that hard to explain to management! It is also very objectionable to us that they don't have sub-processor licensing for large servers like pSeries 595s. We have a 128 processor p595, with a 2-processor LPAR carved out of it running Oracle. Even if we aren't running Oracle on any of the other LPARs, we have to pay for a 128 processor Oracle license. That is insane, and bad for everybody, including IBM. We also have to pay for 128 processors of regular TSM client licenses, even if we have only allocated half the processors in the p595. These are unfair licensing practices, and just make IBM look greedy. To simplify the license counting problem, we are looking at IBM License Metric Tool, but it is a big software product to install and deploy on 2000 servers, too, just to count TSM licenses. ILMT 7.1 was deeply flawed, and 7.2 just came out, so we are going to take a look at that. From my perspective, a total-TB-under-management model would be very easy on the customer, as long as it was reasonably fair. It would be easy to run 'q occ' on all our TSM servers and pull together the result. You could find out your whole TSM license footprint in 10 minutes. The first time we had to it counting PVUs, it took us two months. Best Regards, John D. Schneider The Computer Coaching Community, LLC Office: (314) 635-5424 / Toll Free: (866) 796-9226 Cell: (314) 750-8721 Original Message Subject: Re: [ADSM-L] Per terabyte licensing From: Kelly Lipp l...@storserver.com Date: Mon, September 28
Re: Per terabyte licensing
Kelly, You are right. IBM's pricing model also has in mind IBM customers that have dozens of Tivoli titles, Websphere, etc., which all use the PVU model. I think that IBM should build the license counting into the product, whether they want to use PVUs or whatever as the metric. There is no reason why the the TSM client code could not be enhanced to gather whatever metric is in use and feed it back to the server. This could be true of Websphere clients and most of the others. Build the code to count the licenses quietly in the background, and provide a simple report you can call from the product to find out what you are using. Compliance would be easy. Best Regards, John D. Schneider The Computer Coaching Community, LLC Office: (314) 635-5424 / Toll Free: (866) 796-9226 Cell: (314) 750-8721 Original Message Subject: Re: [ADSM-L] Per terabyte licensing From: Kelly Lipp l...@storserver.com Date: Mon, September 28, 2009 6:48 pm To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU And remember, too, that the PVU thing contemplated something like a DB2 license. Perhaps you had two or three systems that would run DB2. It did not contemplate something like TSM where EVERY system in the environment would have the software running. Keeping track of a couple of systems and their various processor/core/PVU stuff is relatively simple. Keeping track of that same thing across several hundred (never mind your case!) is very difficult. The one size fits all mentality of Tivoli software clearly missed the mark with TSM. Kelly Lipp Chief Technical Officer www.storserver.com 719-266-8777 x7105 STORServer solves your data backup challenges. Once and for all. -Original Message- From: ADSM: Dist Stor Manager [mailto:ads...@vm.marist.edu] On Behalf Of John D. Schneider Sent: Monday, September 28, 2009 4:47 PM To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU Subject: Re: [ADSM-L] Per terabyte licensing Kelly, You are right, IBM must build their license model to ensure the profit they expect. We can't blame them for doing this as a business. They can't give their product away for free. But the PVU based licensing model is a huge problem for an environment like ours that has over 2000 clients of all different shapes and kinds. Lots of separate servers, but also VMWare partitions, and AIX LPARs, and NDMP clients, etc. Keeping up with the PVU rules is a huge effort, especially the way IBM did it. In Windows, the OS might tell you that you have 2 processors. But is that a single-core dual processor, or two separate processors. The OS can't tell, but IBM insists there is a difference, because it counts PVUs differently in this case. That is too nit-picky if you ask me, and places too difficult a burden on the customer. There are freeware utilities that will correctly count processors IBM's way, but to run them on 2000 servers is a pain, too. We ended up writing our own scripts to call a freeware tool IBM recommended, then parse the resulting answer to get the details into a summarized format. As if that wasn't enough, the freeware tool crashed about 20 of our servers before we realized it. Boy, was that hard to explain to management! It is also very objectionable to us that they don't have sub-processor licensing for large servers like pSeries 595s. We have a 128 processor p595, with a 2-processor LPAR carved out of it running Oracle. Even if we aren't running Oracle on any of the other LPARs, we have to pay for a 128 processor Oracle license. That is insane, and bad for everybody, including IBM. We also have to pay for 128 processors of regular TSM client licenses, even if we have only allocated half the processors in the p595. These are unfair licensing practices, and just make IBM look greedy. To simplify the license counting problem, we are looking at IBM License Metric Tool, but it is a big software product to install and deploy on 2000 servers, too, just to count TSM licenses. ILMT 7.1 was deeply flawed, and 7.2 just came out, so we are going to take a look at that. From my perspective, a total-TB-under-management model would be very easy on the customer, as long as it was reasonably fair. It would be easy to run 'q occ' on all our TSM servers and pull together the result. You could find out your whole TSM license footprint in 10 minutes. The first time we had to it counting PVUs, it took us two months. Best Regards, John D. Schneider The Computer Coaching Community, LLC Office: (314) 635-5424 / Toll Free: (866) 796-9226 Cell: (314) 750-8721 Original Message Subject: Re: [ADSM-L] Per terabyte licensing From: Kelly Lipp l...@storserver.com Date: Mon, September 28, 2009 3:05 pm To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU And the key to that would be to add the phrase in some cases... No matter what IBM does there will be happy people and unhappy people. While a core based model doesn't make sense to many of us, a per TB model may turn out to make even less sense. To argue on their side, they must find a model
Re: Per terabyte licensing
Duane, I asked our TSM rep this question, and he asked Ron Broucek, the North America Tivoli Storage Software Sales Leader. His response was: just a rumor at this time as we occasionally evaluate pricing strategies to make sure we're delivering the right value in the marketplace. Ron Broucek North America Tivoli Storage Software Sales Leader So if he says it is just a rumor, then how do you know IBM is offering both? Do you have this from a reliable source within IBM? Best Regards, John D. Schneider The Computer Coaching Community, LLC Office: (314) 635-5424 / Toll Free: (866) 796-9226 Cell: (314) 750-8721 Original Message Subject: Re: [ADSM-L] Per terabyte licensing From: Ochs, Duane duane.o...@qg.com Date: Mon, September 28, 2009 9:07 am To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU We are actually looking into the cost difference. From what I understand, IBM is offering both. However, per terabyte licensing eliminates sub-capacity licensing. And it is your entire site. Not just where it works out best. We are in the midst of passport renewals and found an increase due to core type upgrades. Previously we had older xeons using 50 PVUs per core. And the new machines replacing the older ones are either same cores but at xeon 5540 cores which are now 70 PVUs or double the cores. They brought up per TB licensing. Since then sales has sent me two E-mails inquiring total number of hosts, total TSM sites and total library capacity at each. I was hesitant to say the least. It's been about a week and I haven't heard back yet. When I hear more I'll drop a line. -Original Message- From: ADSM: Dist Stor Manager [mailto:ads...@vm.marist.edu] On Behalf Of Skylar Thompson Sent: Saturday, September 26, 2009 11:02 AM To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU Subject: Re: Per terabyte licensing We're in that boat too. We have a GPFS cluster we expect to grow into the petabyte range, so unless IBM sets the per-byte cost *really* low we'll get hammered with that licensing scheme. Zoltan Forray/AC/VCU wrote: Or more costly. We have test VM servers with quad-core processors running 15-VM guests. If I started counting by T-Bytes backed-up, it would cost a lot more than 4-CPU's! From: David Longo david.lo...@health-first.org To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU Date: 09/25/2009 03:22 PM Subject: Re: [ADSM-L] Per terabyte licensing Sent by: ADSM: Dist Stor Manager ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU Haven't heard that. My first thought is that it would make licensing a LOT easier to figure out! David Longo Thomas Denier thomas.den...@jeffersonhospital.org 9/25/2009 3:09 PM Within the last few months there was a series of messages on counting processor cores. A couple of the messages stated that TSM is moving to licensing based on terabytes of stored data rather than processor cores. Where can I find more information on this? # This message is for the named person's use only. It may contain private, proprietary, or legally privileged information. No privilege is waived or lost by any mistransmission. If you receive this message in error, please immediately delete it and all copies of it from your system, destroy any hard copies of it, and notify the sender. You must not, directly or indirectly, use, disclose, distribute, print, or copy any part of this message if you are not the intended recipient. Health First reserves the right to monitor all e-mail communications through its networks. Any views or opinions expressed in this message are solely those of the individual sender, except (1) where the message states such views or opinions are on behalf of a particular entity; and (2) the sender is authorized by the entity to give such views or opinions. # -- -- Skylar Thompson (skyl...@u.washington.edu) -- Systems Administrator, Genome Sciences Department -- University of Washington, School of Medicine
Re: Per terabyte licensing
Kelly, You are right, IBM must build their license model to ensure the profit they expect. We can't blame them for doing this as a business. They can't give their product away for free. But the PVU based licensing model is a huge problem for an environment like ours that has over 2000 clients of all different shapes and kinds. Lots of separate servers, but also VMWare partitions, and AIX LPARs, and NDMP clients, etc. Keeping up with the PVU rules is a huge effort, especially the way IBM did it. In Windows, the OS might tell you that you have 2 processors. But is that a single-core dual processor, or two separate processors. The OS can't tell, but IBM insists there is a difference, because it counts PVUs differently in this case. That is too nit-picky if you ask me, and places too difficult a burden on the customer. There are freeware utilities that will correctly count processors IBM's way, but to run them on 2000 servers is a pain, too. We ended up writing our own scripts to call a freeware tool IBM recommended, then parse the resulting answer to get the details into a summarized format. As if that wasn't enough, the freeware tool crashed about 20 of our servers before we realized it. Boy, was that hard to explain to management! It is also very objectionable to us that they don't have sub-processor licensing for large servers like pSeries 595s. We have a 128 processor p595, with a 2-processor LPAR carved out of it running Oracle. Even if we aren't running Oracle on any of the other LPARs, we have to pay for a 128 processor Oracle license. That is insane, and bad for everybody, including IBM. We also have to pay for 128 processors of regular TSM client licenses, even if we have only allocated half the processors in the p595. These are unfair licensing practices, and just make IBM look greedy. To simplify the license counting problem, we are looking at IBM License Metric Tool, but it is a big software product to install and deploy on 2000 servers, too, just to count TSM licenses. ILMT 7.1 was deeply flawed, and 7.2 just came out, so we are going to take a look at that. From my perspective, a total-TB-under-management model would be very easy on the customer, as long as it was reasonably fair. It would be easy to run 'q occ' on all our TSM servers and pull together the result. You could find out your whole TSM license footprint in 10 minutes. The first time we had to it counting PVUs, it took us two months. Best Regards, John D. Schneider The Computer Coaching Community, LLC Office: (314) 635-5424 / Toll Free: (866) 796-9226 Cell: (314) 750-8721 Original Message Subject: Re: [ADSM-L] Per terabyte licensing From: Kelly Lipp l...@storserver.com Date: Mon, September 28, 2009 3:05 pm To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU And the key to that would be to add the phrase in some cases... No matter what IBM does there will be happy people and unhappy people. While a core based model doesn't make sense to many of us, a per TB model may turn out to make even less sense. To argue on their side, they must find a model that is compatible with the industry and that does not diminish their own cash flow. We need for IBM to continue to enhance the product. They do that by keeping us as customers and by attracting new customers. That balance is a lot harder than one may think. I was fairly vocal about this at a previous Oxford. While we're the loudest of the constituent parties, we also matter the least from a cash flow perspective: new customers actually spend more money (they've already gotten ours). The dance is tricky and sometimes comes down to a they won't really leave (where would they go?) so let's worry about them but not too much. As I own my own business I can understand the complexity they face. It's really hard, though, not to simply say it's their problem. Kelly Lipp Chief Technical Officer www.storserver.com 719-266-8777 x7105 STORServer solves your data backup challenges. Once and for all. -Original Message- From: ADSM: Dist Stor Manager [mailto:ads...@vm.marist.edu] On Behalf Of Steven Langdale Sent: Monday, September 28, 2009 12:38 PM To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU Subject: Re: [ADSM-L] Per terabyte licensing He was a bit cagey about the actual cost, but said we should expect approx 20% reduction in overall cost. Not pursued it as yet. Steven Langdale Global Information Services EAME SAN/Storage Planning and Implementation ( Phone : +44 (0)1733 584175 ( Mob: +44 (0)7876 216782 ü Conference: +44 (0)208 609 7400 Code: 331817 + Email: steven.langd...@cat.com Kelly Lipp l...@storserver.com Sent by: ADSM: Dist Stor Manager ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU 28/09/2009 19:00 Please respond to ADSM: Dist Stor Manager ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU To ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU cc Subject Re: [ADSM-L] Per terabyte licensing Caterpillar: Confidential Green Retain Until: 28/10/2009 Really. How much does a TB of storage cost? Kelly Lipp Chief Technical Officer
RPFiles are not being deleted
Greetings, We are running TSM 5.4.3.0 on a bunch of remote Windows TSM servers. Every day running their run of the Daily processing, they do a PREPARE DEVCL=MDCTSM02_CLASS to send their prepare output to another TSM server called mdctsm02, which is in a distant city. This city is the DR site for these remote sites. It is also running 5.4.3.0, under AIX 5.3ML6. One thing I just noticed is that TSM does not seem to be removing old versions of the RPFiles. Please look at the output below: tsm: HTSP-TSM1_SERVER1q rpfile devcl=mdctsm02_class Recovery Plan File Name Node Name Device Class Name -- MDCTSM02.20070804.070832 HTSP-TSM1_SERVER1 MDCTSM02_CLASS MDCTSM02.20080611.064125 HTSP-TSM1_SERVER1 MDCTSM02_CLASS MDCTSM02.20080612.064036 HTSP-TSM1_SERVER1 MDCTSM02_CLASS MDCTSM02.20090412.063058 HTSP-TSM1_SERVER1 MDCTSM02_CLASS MDCTSM02.20090818.064350 HTSP-TSM1_SERVER1 MDCTSM02_CLASS MDCTSM02.20090819.064419 HTSP-TSM1_SERVER1 MDCTSM02_CLASS MDCTSM02.20090820.064440 HTSP-TSM1_SERVER1 MDCTSM02_CLASS MDCTSM02.20090821.070724 HTSP-TSM1_SERVER1 MDCTSM02_CLASS MDCTSM02.20090822.064907 HTSP-TSM1_SERVER1 MDCTSM02_CLASS MDCTSM02.20090823.070331 HTSP-TSM1_SERVER1 MDCTSM02_CLASS MDCTSM02.20090824.064010 HTSP-TSM1_SERVER1 MDCTSM02_CLASS MDCTSM02.20090825.064900 HTSP-TSM1_SERVER1 MDCTSM02_CLASS MDCTSM02.20090826.064517 HTSP-TSM1_SERVER1 MDCTSM02_CLASS MDCTSM02.20090827.064811 HTSP-TSM1_SERVER1 MDCTSM02_CLASS MDCTSM02.20090828.065536 HTSP-TSM1_SERVER1 MDCTSM02_CLASS MDCTSM02.20090829.064838 HTSP-TSM1_SERVER1 MDCTSM02_CLASS MDCTSM02.20090830.063943 HTSP-TSM1_SERVER1 MDCTSM02_CLASS MDCTSM02.20090831.064027 HTSP-TSM1_SERVER1 MDCTSM02_CLASS MDCTSM02.20090901.064827 HTSP-TSM1_SERVER1 MDCTSM02_CLASS MDCTSM02.20090902.064823 HTSP-TSM1_SERVER1 MDCTSM02_CLASS MDCTSM02.20090903.064508 HTSP-TSM1_SERVER1 MDCTSM02_CLASS MDCTSM02.20090904.065014 HTSP-TSM1_SERVER1 MDCTSM02_CLASS MDCTSM02.20090905.065024 HTSP-TSM1_SERVER1 MDCTSM02_CLASS MDCTSM02.20090906.064003 HTSP-TSM1_SERVER1 MDCTSM02_CLASS MDCTSM02.20090907.064032 HTSP-TSM1_SERVER1 MDCTSM02_CLASS MDCTSM02.20090908.064453 HTSP-TSM1_SERVER1 MDCTSM02_CLASS MDCTSM02.20090909.064551 HTSP-TSM1_SERVER1 MDCTSM02_CLASS MDCTSM02.20090910.064847 HTSP-TSM1_SERVER1 MDCTSM02_CLASS MDCTSM02.20090911.065003 HTSP-TSM1_SERVER1 MDCTSM02_CLASS MDCTSM02.20090912.064854 HTSP-TSM1_SERVER1 MDCTSM02_CLASS MDCTSM02.20090913.064845 HTSP-TSM1_SERVER1 MDCTSM02_CLASS MDCTSM02.20090914.064819 HTSP-TSM1_SERVER1 MDCTSM02_CLASS MDCTSM02.20090915.064653 HTSP-TSM1_SERVER1 MDCTSM02_CLASS MDCTSM02.20090916.065214 HTSP-TSM1_SERVER1 MDCTSM02_CLASS MDCTSM02.20090917.064727 HTSP-TSM1_SERVER1 MDCTSM02_CLASS MDCTSM02.20090918.064940 HTSP-TSM1_SERVER1 MDCTSM02_CLASS MDCTSM02.20090919.064905 HTSP-TSM1_SERVER1 MDCTSM02_CLASS MDCTSM02.20090920.064241 HTSP-TSM1_SERVER1 MDCTSM02_CLASS MDCTSM02.20090921.064327 HTSP-TSM1_SERVER1 MDCTSM02_CLASS tsm: HTSP-TSM1_SERVER1q drmstatus Recovery Plan Prefix: Plan Instructions Prefix: Replacement Volume Postfix: @ Primary Storage Pools: TAPEPOOL Copy Storage Pools: COPYPOOL Not Mountable Location Name: NOTMOUNTABLE Courier Name: COURIER Vault Site Name: VAULT DB Backup Series Expiration Days: 5 Day(s) Recovery Plan File Expiration Days: 5 Day(s) Check Label?: No Process FILE Device Type?: No Command File Name: tsm: HTSP-TSM1_SERVER1 tsm: HTSP-TSM1_SERVER1delete volhist todate=-14 type=rpfile Do you wish to proceed? (Yes (Y)/No (N)) y ANR2467I DELETE VOLHISTORY: 0 sequential volume history entries were successfully deleted. Even when I manually issue a 'delete volhist' command, the old plan files are not being deleted. At first I thought that I was misunderstanding the action for 'delete vohist type=rpfile', but I also issued the same command from the target server mdctsm02, and I got the same result. They are not being deleted. Can anyone explain to me what I am doing wrong? Best Regards, John D. Schneider The Computer Coaching Community, LLC Office: (314) 635-5424 / Toll Free: (866) 796-9226 Cell: (314) 750-8721
Re: when a file has only inactive version in TSM server?
Lindsay, I agree that keep everything forever is an extremely expensive policy, even at the relatively low cost of tapes. But I don't agree that keeping inactive files is a waste of space. Perhaps that isn't how you meant it, but some might take it that way. How many versions of files a customer chooses to keep is a design decision, and those are always tradeoffs of cost versus risk. If we allow ourselves to fall into the thinking that the active version is the important one, but the inactive ones are somehow less important, we risk making bad business decision just to save tapes. With database applications especially, sometimes it could take days or weeks before accidental deletion of some data would be detected. So you must keep back enough versions to recover back to the point before the accident occurred. In one of my customer's environment's, they only keep back 14 days of backups of some large Oracle databases. This makes my job easier, because they don't take up much tape in the library. On the other hand, what if a person helped make a bunch of changes to the way a database worked, and then went out on vacation for two weeks, or just got busy with another application, and didn't realize that nightly processing was purging data sooner than it was supposed to? It isn't hard to picture this situation in real life. But since it has been two weeks before the problem was detected, it is too late and the data is gone. Of course, recovering data from that far back, extracting it, then injecting it back into the production database would have been a pain, but at least there would be options. Another scenario like this involves financial applications that do month-end closing. I have seen it happen where the accountants didn't detect a problem that happened with month-end closing until they were getting ready to run the next month-end closing. I usually recommend they keep backups back to 40-45 days, so if necessary, it is possible to restore data back to BEFORE the previous month's closing. Many customers agree it is worthwhile insurance. Best Regards, John D. Schneider The Computer Coaching Community, LLC Office: (314) 635-5424 / Toll Free: (866) 796-9226 Cell: (314) 750-8721 Original Message Subject: Re: [ADSM-L] when a file has only inactive version in TSM server? From: lindsay morris lind...@tsmworks.com Date: Thu, September 17, 2009 8:46 am To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU This is a good question, really. We have found some fairly shocking inactive-file statistics lately: * One customer had 98.6% of their 30 TB of TSM backups in INACTIVE files. Their policy was to keep everything forever. * Another customer did full database dumps every day, and kept them for 180 days. They had about 90% of their 35 TB in inactive backups. Interesting that there is so much wasted storage. (BTW, be careful if you try this at home. This is the oft-mentioned query of the contents tables that kills TSM performance. ART trickles in the data as it runs restore tests, so it does NOT kill TSM's performance.) -- Mr. Lindsay Morris Principal www.tsmworks.com 919-403-8260 lind...@tsmworks.com On Sep17, at 9:07AM, Tchuise, Bertaut wrote: When there is no active version of the file :-) On a serious note, the TSM server will only have inactive versions of a file once the file is deleted from the client and the next incremental backup runs. BERTAUT TCHUISE TSM/NetApp Storage Administrator Legg Mason Technology Services *410-580-7032 btchu...@leggmason.com -Original Message- From: ADSM: Dist Stor Manager [mailto:ads...@vm.marist.edu] On Behalf Of Mehdi Salehi Sent: Thursday, September 17, 2009 9:01 AM To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU Subject: [ADSM-L] when a file has only inactive version in TSM server? Hi, when does a file have only inactive versions in TSM server? Thanks IMPORTANT: E-mail sent through the Internet is not secure. Legg Mason therefore recommends that you do not send any confidential or sensitive information to us via electronic mail, including social security numbers, account numbers, or personal identification numbers. Delivery, and or timely delivery of Internet mail is not guaranteed. Legg Mason therefore recommends that you do not send time sensitive or action-oriented messages to us via electronic mail. This message is intended for the addressee only and may contain privileged or confidential information. Unless you are the intended recipient, you may not use, copy or disclose to anyone any information contained in this message. If you have received this message in error, please notify the author by replying to this message and then kindly delete the message. Thank you.
Re: Centera Backup
Ku, I am afraid I am going to have to question your premise. The EMC Centera is meant to be an archiving appliance, it isn't like a regular drawer of disk. It has it's own interface to the storage, and isn't meant to be backed up. I know that there are companies that provide solutions to backup a Centera, but they are all kludges. IMHO, backing up an archive device implies a misunderstanding of why you are archiving to begin with. Backups are to return production systems back to a running state in the event that the primary running system has suffered a loss of data for some reason. An archive, on the other hand, is for data no longer needed for day-to-day processing, but might be required some time in the future to address a future business requirement, so as responding to litigation, or IRS records rentention policies. An archive is usually a cheaper tier of storage, with slower retrieval characteristics than keeping the data on local disk. However, it is important to think about the offsite/redundancy requirements of your archived data. If the data is worth retaining, it may have sufficient business value to need to survive a site outage. To that end, the Centera has built-in replication software so it can replicate seamlessly to another Centera in another location. That is the best way to provide a DR copy of the data. We have Centeras at our company, and that is how we do it. Best Regards, John D. Schneider The Computer Coaching Community, LLC Office: (314) 635-5424 / Toll Free: (866) 796-9226 Cell: (314) 750-8721 Original Message Subject: [ADSM-L] Centera Backup From: hdkutz spambehael...@hdkutz.de Date: Wed, September 16, 2009 8:44 am To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU Hello, we are looking for a DR Tool for EMC Centera Data. Prefered Platform for this Product should be Unix or Linux. We are actually using TSM (on AIX) with CBRM (on Windows). Are there any alternatives instead of e.g. Storefirst Altus? Cheers, ku -- Princess Leia: Darth Vader. Only you could be so bold.
Re: Antwort: [ADSM-L] handling mount requests
Greetings, I had to set up an environment like this before, and here is what worked for me. 1) I didn't use scratch pools. I defined all my tapes into the storage pool I wanted them in. That way TSM asks for a specific tape to mount, and not a scratch tape. My tape operator was a secretary, and I didn't want her to have to figure out which tapes were scratches. 2) The disk spool was sized big enough to hold all night's backup data, so I didn't need to mount a tape until the next morning. 3) Migration kicked off at 8:00 and asked for a mount of a specific tape. 4) I created a TSM console window using 'dsmadmc -id=xx -password=xx -mountmode' that started up automatically when the secretary logged in. She could minimize it any time she wanted, but each morning she would look at the window to see what tape needed to be mounted. I also asked her to look at it at certain intervals according to the admin schedule I set up. 5) She would mount the tapes according to the prompt. She didn't need to reply to anything. 6) There were two tape drives, so migrations, backup stgpools, and reclamations were handled in like fashion. If I kept enough tapes on hand, reclamations would keep up with demand, and there would be empty tapes to mount. I don't remember having to intentionally delete active data off of tapes. I don't like designing things that way. 7) I wrote some scripts that would email the secretary the output of 'q drmedia wherestate=vaultretrieve' so she knew which offsite tapes were to come back from the 'vault', and 'q drmedia wherestate=vault' so she could verify which tapes were supposed to be offsite. I hope this helps. If you need more details let me know. Best Regards, John D. Schneider The Computer Coaching Community, LLC Office: (314) 635-5424 / Toll Free: (866) 796-9226 Cell: (314) 750-8721 Original Message Subject: [ADSM-L] Antwort: [ADSM-L] handling mount requests From: Ullrich_Mänz uma...@fum.de Date: Fri, September 04, 2009 5:06 am To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU Hello, there are two things that will cause TSM to issue the volume mount request: - the tape inserted in the drive in the evening was already used over night by reaching a migration threshold of the primary pool. In that case check for the mountretention parameter on the devclass definition. You may expand that period up to many hours - the volume inserted in the tape drive is not the volume expected by the TSM server. Because TSM uses a volume as long as there is any space left you will need to mark the volume as full or unavailable just after finishing the migration process. Or, you should create a storagepool for each day. Check the activity log for overnight migration and label readings - as far as I remember there must be a massage that states invalid volume label or something like that. I don't understand why you want to delete the backup data on tape. Is there a full backup every day? Is really all data kept in the diskpool? If you migrate the data from the disk pool you cannot be sure to get a - virtual - backup of your systems copied to tape in the morning. - But yes, the easiest way is to run a delete volume xx discard=yes before overwriting the tape. Have you thought of using two copypools used alternativly each day or week? Best regards Ullrich Mänz System-Integration FRITZ MACZIOL Software und Computervertrieb GmbH Ludwig Str. 180D, 63067 Offenbach, Germany Amtsgericht Ulm, Handelsregister-Nummer: HRB 1936 Geschäftsführer: Heribert Fritz, Oliver Schallhorn, Frank Haines Inhaber: Imtech N.V., Gouda, Niederlande Referenzen finden Sie auf unserer Website, Rubrik 'News'. For References, please click our website, button 'News'. Mail powered by Lotus Notes Version 7 Tuncel Mutlu tuncel.mu...@akbank.com Gesendet von: ADSM: Dist Stor Manager ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU 04.09.2009 11:01 Bitte antworten an ADSM: Dist Stor Manager ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU An ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU Kopie Thema [ADSM-L] handling mount requests Hi, I have a really (another country) remote TSM server (Windows 2003 x32) with 1 x LTO-2 drive. TSM server 5.5.3.0, client version is 5.5.2.2. I have created a disk pool on the TSM server, which I intend to migrate every night to the LTO-2 cartridge. For now only 2 clients (the TSM server one of them). The issue: - Before they had some other software (CA Arcserve v11.5) and they (the stuff onsite) changed the cartridge every morning as they arrived (as it was ejected), one cartridge every day of the weekday (and they take the cartridge home) - I configured it correct (manual library etc), and it is working fine, but when I scheduled a migration job every night it awaits a reply to mount the cartridge. But the cartridge is already inside ? How can I avoid the reply issue ? - I did assume that expiring precisely that tapes that morning every day is difficult and I am thinking of deleting that volume every
Re: TSM client backing up to two TSM servers
David,
Here is a script we use to start and stop multiple dsmcad processes
(we have three TSM clients backing up one VERY large Linux server).
#!/bin/bash
# A script to start up the TSM clients. Note that there are two TSM
clients
# on this system, which connect to two different TSM server instances.
#
# History
# 10/22/2007JDS Original Version
RETVAL=0
DSM_DIR=/opt/tivoli/tsm/client/ba/bin
start() {
echo Starting Tivoli Storage Manager Client xx01:
DSM_LOG=/opt/tivoli/tsm/client/ba/bin01
/opt/tivoli/tsm/client/ba/bin/dsmcad \
-optfile=/opt/tivoli/tsm/client/ba/bin01/dsm.opt \
/dev/null 21
echo Starting Tivoli Storage Manager Client xx02:
DSM_LOG=/opt/tivoli/tsm/client/ba/bin02
/opt/tivoli/tsm/client/ba/bin/dsmcad \
-optfile=/opt/tivoli/tsm/client/ba/bin02/dsm.opt \
/dev/null 21
echo Starting Tivoli Storage Manager Client xx03:
DSM_LOG=/opt/tivoli/tsm/client/ba/bin03
/opt/tivoli/tsm/client/ba/bin/dsmcad \
-optfile=/opt/tivoli/tsm/client/ba/bin03/dsm.opt \
/dev/null 21
RETVAL=$?
echo
return $RETVAL
}
stop() {
echo -n Terminating Tivoli Storage Manager Client:
kill -9 `ps -efw | grep dsmc | grep -v grep | awk '{print $2}'`
echo
return 0
}
# See how we were called.
case $1 in
start)
start
;;
stop)
stop
;;
restart|reload)
stop
start
RETVAL=$?
;;
*)
echo Usage: $0 {start|stop|restart}
exit 1
esac
exit $RETVAL
I hope this helps!
Best Regards,
John D. Schneider
The Computer Coaching Community, LLC
Office: (314) 635-5424 / Toll Free: (866) 796-9226
Cell: (314) 750-8721
Original Message
Subject: [ADSM-L] TSM client backing up to two TSM servers
From: David E Ehresman deehr...@louisville.edu
Date: Tue, September 01, 2009 12:53 pm
To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU
I'm trying (for political reasons) to back up a linux TSM client (v5.4)
to two different servers (v5.4). I have two stansa in dms.sys, each one
pointing to one of the servers. I have two opt files, each one poionting
to a different stanza in the dsm.sys. I can dsmc -optfile=x to each
of the servers. How do I set up two dsmcad's talking to the two servers,
each listening for a schedule?
David
Re: Daily TSM maintenance schedules
Roger, If you find a solution to that last problem, i.e. only 24 hours in a day, please post it to the list. :-) I am trying to understand the schedule you present. Are you saying you run expiration at the same time your backups, backup stgpools, and migration are running? Or do you run expiration as soon as each of those finishes? If it is the former, that certainly isn't ideal. It would seem to me that expiration would severely impact the performance of those, especially backup stgpools. Have you recently timed running an 'expire inv' during a time that nothing else is running, to see how long it takes when it isn't contending with anything else? Do you have an enormous database? Or are the disks behind the database extremely slow? Is bufpoolsize set too low? Those are the main things that affect 'expire inv' speed. Expire inventory isn't something that should take over your system. If everything is tuned right it should only take a couple hours. If your database is an out-of-control size, then maybe it is time to consider splitting into two TSM servers. You can reply back to me alone if you want to discuss further, but not trouble the whole listserv with the particulars. Best Regards, John D. Schneider The Computer Coaching Community, LLC john.schnei...@computercoachingcommunity.com Office: (314) 635-5424 / Toll Free: (866) 796-9226 Cell: (314) 750-8721 Original Message Subject: Re: [ADSM-L] Daily TSM maintenance schedules From: Roger Deschner rog...@uic.edu Date: Sat, August 29, 2009 11:21 am To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU We're big. (2tb/day backup data Mon-Fri nights) Expiration is the 20-ton elephant in the room. If it doesn't run to completion every once in a while, we're in trouble and we have the dreaded database bloat. It has happened, and it wasn't pretty. You can call this schedule crazy, but it's what works for a big TSM system: CLIENT BACKUP + EXPIRATION + RECLAMATION (5PM) BACKUP STGPOOLS + EXPIRATION MIGRATION + EXPIRATION BACKUP DEVCONFIG + BACKUP VOLHIST *** BACKUP DB (incr on weekdays, full on Sun) + RECLAMATION DELETE VOLHIST (triggered by end of BACKUP DB) + RECLAMATION RECLAMATION + EXPIRATION (1-5PM - a relatively slow time. This is my maintenance window.) back to top *** These are fast. Runs while the tape lib is dismounting the migration tapes, and mounting the DB BACKUP tape. Saturday morning only: DELETE FILESPACE (we queue them up all week) You've got to work DELETE FILESPACE into your schedule, because it involves very heavy database I/O. You can't EXPIRE INVENTORY or BACKUP DB during DELETE FILESPACE. MIGRATION won't even start if DELETE FILESPACE is running. We do allow users to do it themselves, but in actual practice they never do. We've got to nag them about ancient, abandoned filespaces, and then we do it for them Sat AM. This is also when we remove old nodes. We use a tape reuse delay of 2 days, as disaster protection for doing things in the wrong order. The idea here is to keep the CPU and the 15,000rpm database disks busy 24/7, and to use as many tape drives as possible for as much of the time as possible. I am constantly tuning this schedule. The basic problem is that there are only 24 hours in a day. Roger Deschner University of Illinois at Chicago rog...@uic.edu Academic Computing Communications Center ==I have not lost my mind -- it is backed up on tape somewhere.= On Fri, 28 Aug 2009, Howard Coles wrote: Correction, it's marked for expiration and it is still recoverable, until the Expire process runs and removes it from the Database. I know this from experience, as we disable our expiration process for a few days due to a server failure, and once due to a legal request. The Expire Process actually removes the DB entry for that version of the file. See Ya' Howard -Original Message- From: ADSM: Dist Stor Manager [mailto:ads...@vm.marist.edu] On Behalf Of Wanda Prather Sent: Friday, August 28, 2009 11:21 AM To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU Subject: Re: [ADSM-L] Daily TSM maintenance schedules Agreed. expire inventory is actually something of a misnomer. If you have your retention set to 14 versions, and someone takes the 15th backup, the oldest version expires right then, you can't get it back. That type of expiration takes place, no matter whether EXPIRE INVENTORY runs or not. The EXPIRE INVENTORY is what updates the %utilization on your tapes, based on the files that have expired. I think it also does some cleanup to make space in the DB for the expired files reusable. So you want to run EXPIRE INVENTORY before reclaim. But I don't think it affects your migration in any way. W On Fri, Aug 28, 2009 at 11:23 AM, Thomas Denier thomas.den...@jeffersonhospital.org wrote: -Sergio O. Fuentes wrote: - I'm revising my TSM administrative schedules and wanted to take an informal poll on how many of you lay out your daily TSM maintenance routines
Re: Seeking wisdom on dedupe..filepool file size client compression and reclaims
Greetings, I already responded to a similar post today that was also about client compression, and I don't want to waste listserv bandwidth beating the same drum, but... I am going to. If you are sick of this subject, don't read further. What we mean by best is highly subjective. Hardware compression is better than software compression if by better you mean, which one takes up the least space on tape. But which one has the most impact on the whole performance of the environment? In TSM data doesn't go only to tape, then stay there forever. It gets moved around over and over. Take the example of a TSM server that absorbs 4TB of new client data per day. No client compression. So in each 24 hour period, the TSM server must: 1) Absorb and process 4TB into memory buffers from its network interface, and write them to 4TB of disk storage pool. 2) Backup stgpool 4TB of disk storage pool to copy storage pool tape, storing it in memory buffers along the way. When it is stored, it only takes up 2TB (2:1 compression typical). 3) Migrate 4TB of disk storage pool to tape, storing it in memory buffers along the way. When it is stored, it only takes up 2TB of tape (2:1 compression typical). 4) Reclaim storage pool tapes. Read some number TB of compressed tape, where the tape drives uncompress it to twice as many TB before returning it to the TSM server, which has to handle that many TB worth of memory buffers, then write them back out to tape, where the tape drive compresses it out to half as much tape. All along the way the TSM server had to handle 4TB of data in network buffers and memory buffers, and pass it through FC and network adapters over and over again. But what about that same situation with client compression? 1) Absorb and process 2TB of client data into memory buffers, because the 4TB of client data was compressed down to 2TB before it got to the TSM server. 2) Only 2TB of memory and I/O is required to write it to disk storage pool, and only 2TB is disk storage pool is required. 3) For the rest of that data's life expectancy, no matter how many times it is migrated or reclaimed, the compressed form is used, so there is half the overhead involved in processing it. *** RANT MODE ON *** :-) Those people who say client compression is only useful for slow networks has never tried it both ways in a large TSM environment. Two years ago we had a 12 hour backup window, and backup stgpool and migration were taking 10 hours, leaving only about 2 hours for reclamation. We were sucking through tapes like you wouldn't believe, because there was no time to reclaim them. We switched to client compression, which took us a few weeks to push everywhere, but once it was on all the clients, our backup stgpool/migration cycle dropped from 10 hours to 5-6 hours, giving us 6 hours for reclamation. In no time we were keeping up. And our 12 hour backup window was no problem either. Some clients that backed up in 1 hour went to 2 hours for example, but what difference did that make? We moved some clients to a different schedule so they would start earlier in the evening, to make sure they were done by 6am, but that was easy to do. There were a few clients that were too slow with compression turned on, but that was maybe 6 out of 900 clients? Something like that. I think client compression was a very good move for us. We have been growing at the rate of 60% per year for the last three years. We started out at 960 clients, about 4.5TB/day. Today we back up ~1700 clients, and about 15TB per day. If we wanted to turn client compression off at this stage of the game, we would really have to beef up the memory and I/O performance of our TSM servers, or they would be totally buried. *** RANT MODE OFF*** Best Regards, John D. Schneider The Computer Coaching Community, LLC Office: (314) 635-5424 / Toll Free: (866) 796-9226 Cell: (314) 750-8721 Original Message Subject: Re: [ADSM-L] Seeking wisdom on dedupe..filepool file size client compression and reclaims From: Roger Deschner rog...@uic.edu Date: Sun, August 30, 2009 9:34 am To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU On Sat, 29 Aug 2009, Stefan Folkerts wrote: TSM guru's of the world, Also client compression, does anybody have an figures on how this effect the effectiveness of deduplication? Because these are both of interest in a filepool, if deduplication works just as good in combination with compression that would be great. Client compression should greatly reduce or eliminate the possibility of deduplication, whether by TSM or by hardware device such as Data Domain. (BTW Client encryption effectively prevents deduplication.) So you need to decide which strategy will save the most space - client compression _or_ deduplication. There are tradeoffs here. Previous studies in this area have compared client compression versus tape drive hardware compression, and in those studies tape drive compression was always
Re: Change TSM Platform
Shawn, You've probably already looked at this, but if you want to stick with shell programs without having to rewrite, we have had good success with Cygwin, a free Windows package that includes pdksh (public-domain korn shell), and all the goodies that a Unix guy likes; grep, tail, cut, mail, etc. Like you, we have mainly AIX TSM servers, but also a handful of Windows ones as well. Cygwin has worked well for the scripts we needed to write for the Windows servers. Best Regards, John D. Schneider The Computer Coaching Community, LLC Office: (314) 635-5424 / Toll Free: (866) 796-9226 Cell: (314) 750-8721 Original Message Subject: Re: [ADSM-L] Change TSM Platform From: Kelly Lipp l...@storserver.com Date: Tue, August 04, 2009 12:29 pm To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU Perfectly rational! That one I can get behind... Kelly Lipp CTO STORServer, Inc. 485-B Elkton Drive Colorado Springs, CO 80907 719-266-8777 x7105 www.storserver.com -Original Message- From: ADSM: Dist Stor Manager [mailto:ads...@vm.marist.edu] On Behalf Of Shawn Drew Sent: Tuesday, August 04, 2009 11:21 AM To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU Subject: Re: [ADSM-L] Change TSM Platform Just a standard. All of our TSM servers are based on AIX in our main data centers. We recently took control of a branch location who has been running on Windows. We are spending a disproportionate amount of time to get our automation, and everything else, to work with Windows just for this little branch. little things like no grep or mail causes headaches. I know there are ways to get this to work, just requires time to work on it, where I'd rather just spend the extra money for an AIX box. Regards, Shawn Shawn Drew Internet l...@storserver.com Sent by: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU 08/04/2009 12:42 PM Please respond to ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU To ADSM-L cc Subject Re: [ADSM-L] Change TSM Platform What is the concern with keeping a Windows TSM platform (I sat in the weeds on this as long as I could)? Kelly Lipp CTO STORServer, Inc. 485-B Elkton Drive Colorado Springs, CO 80907 719-266-8777 x7105 www.storserver.com -Original Message- From: ADSM: Dist Stor Manager [mailto:ads...@vm.marist.edu] On Behalf Of Shawn Drew Sent: Tuesday, August 04, 2009 8:46 AM To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU Subject: Re: [ADSM-L] Change TSM Platform You will have to move the NAS clients over to the new TSM server, and wait for the old backups to expire before you retire the old backup server. That's what I figured, but I'm not keeping that thing around for 7 years. I guess we'll have to stick with Windows :( Regards, Shawn Shawn Drew Internet john.schnei...@computercoachingcommunity.com Sent by: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU 08/03/2009 06:38 PM Please respond to ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU To ADSM-L cc Subject Re: [ADSM-L] Change TSM Platform Shawn, From my understanding, you are going to have to set up a new TSM server, and migrate the clients over to it. You can use the export commands to export policies and client data from one TSM server to another directly across the LAN. That will make it somewhat less painful, but depending on how many clients you have, this could take a few weeks. You will have to have enough storage capacity on the new system to absorb all this data. If you only have one tape library, you will have to set up library sharing, and have enough tapes to have two copies of some clients' data as you migrate clients over. If you want more detailed instructions, please ask. Many of us have been through such migrations before. According to the help on EXPORT NODE, you can't use it on nodes of type NAS. You will have to move the NAS clients over to the new TSM server, and wait for the old backups to expire before you retire the old backup server. Best Regards, John D. Schneider The Computer Coaching Community, LLC Office: (314) 635-5424 / Toll Free: (866) 796-9226 Cell: (314) 750-8721 Original Message Subject: Re: [ADSM-L] Change TSM Platform From: Michael Green mishagr...@gmail.com Date: Mon, August 03, 2009 1:32 pm To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU You will be moving from x86/64 architecture to Power. They are binary incompatible. You cannot upload DB from x86 to Power (this is what backup/restore essentially doees). Your only option is to export DB. Don't know about the NDMP. -- Warm regards, Michael Green On Mon, Aug 3, 2009 at 9:06 PM, Shawn Drewshawn.d...@americas.bnpparibas.com wrote: We are looking at the possibility of changing a branch's TSM 5.4 server from Windows to AIX. As far as I know, you can NOT backup a DB on Windows and restore it to an AIX platform. Is this still the case? If not, can anyone think of a way to move NDMP toc/backups from one TSM server to another? This message and any attachments (the message) is intended solely for the addressees and is confidential. If you receive
Re: Backup Stgpool using 2 drives taking too long
Mario, So, if I understand this correctly, the primary storage pool is LTO4, and the copy storage pool is LTO4, and so the whole backup stgpool is straight tape to tape. Is that correct? When you say the process becomes idle for 20 minutes, how can you tell it is idle? Do you mean the number of bytes copied doesn't get any bigger? The total byte count only gets updated at the end of each aggregated file. That is, if the copy stream hits a 300GB single file, then the copy will proceed to copy that file as fast as tape performance permits, but the total byte count won't increase until that huge file completes. And a multi-hundred GB file could easily take 20 minutes or more. Next time you catch it in this state, look at the size of the current file, and do the arithmetic. Is it possible that is what you are seeing? If you can look at the tape drives themselves, you can tell if the tape drives themselves are reading and writing, or sitting idle, can't you? I suspect that the tape drives will be buzzing away, even though it seems like you aren't making progress. If I have misunderstood, and you can tell that the drives are really idle, then I would look at drive firmware next, then at IBMtape drivers. Make sure you are up-to-date We have 6 TSM Windows servers with IBM libraries and drives, and we are not seeing the symptom you describe, that is, periods of actual stalled backup stgpools. Feel free to contact me offline if you have not done the firmware and driver updates before, and need any assistance. Best Regards, John D. Schneider The Computer Coaching Community, LLC Office: (314) 635-5424 / Toll Free: (866) 796-9226 Cell: (314) 750-8721 Original Message Subject: [ADSM-L] Backup Stgpool using 2 drives taking too long From: Mario Behring mariobehr...@yahoo.com Date: Mon, August 03, 2009 1:34 pm To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU Hi list, The environment is TSM Server 5.5 running on a Windows 2003 box with a IBM ULT3580-TD4 SCSI (2 drives) connected. There is a backup stgpool process running on background for more than 12 hours (several schedules were missed during this time). The process is using both drives, one reading the data and the other writing, as expected. The problem is that, at some point, both drives stay IDLE for more than 20 minutes...then start reading/writing again (for a short time I might add). The process would be long over by now if this was not happening...what could be wrong and how can I put the drives to work non-stop, if possible...?? Any process that uses both drives in this fashion, like an EXPORT for example, is behaving the same way... Thanks Mario
Re: Change TSM Platform
Shawn, From my understanding, you are going to have to set up a new TSM server, and migrate the clients over to it. You can use the export commands to export policies and client data from one TSM server to another directly across the LAN. That will make it somewhat less painful, but depending on how many clients you have, this could take a few weeks. You will have to have enough storage capacity on the new system to absorb all this data. If you only have one tape library, you will have to set up library sharing, and have enough tapes to have two copies of some clients' data as you migrate clients over. If you want more detailed instructions, please ask. Many of us have been through such migrations before. According to the help on EXPORT NODE, you can't use it on nodes of type NAS. You will have to move the NAS clients over to the new TSM server, and wait for the old backups to expire before you retire the old backup server. Best Regards, John D. Schneider The Computer Coaching Community, LLC Office: (314) 635-5424 / Toll Free: (866) 796-9226 Cell: (314) 750-8721 Original Message Subject: Re: [ADSM-L] Change TSM Platform From: Michael Green mishagr...@gmail.com Date: Mon, August 03, 2009 1:32 pm To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU You will be moving from x86/64 architecture to Power. They are binary incompatible. You cannot upload DB from x86 to Power (this is what backup/restore essentially doees). Your only option is to export DB. Don't know about the NDMP. -- Warm regards, Michael Green On Mon, Aug 3, 2009 at 9:06 PM, Shawn Drewshawn.d...@americas.bnpparibas.com wrote: We are looking at the possibility of changing a branch's TSM 5.4 server from Windows to AIX. As far as I know, you can NOT backup a DB on Windows and restore it to an AIX platform.Is this still the case? If not, can anyone think of a way to move NDMP toc/backups from one TSM server to another?
Re: Used 3494 / 3590 equip
David, If you want to email me individually, I can give you a line on both issues. We just retired a 3494, a 3584, and thousands of 3590 and 3592 cartridges about a year ago. Best Regards, John D. Schneider The Computer Coaching Community, LLC Office: (314) 635-5424 / Toll Free: (866) 796-9226 Cell: (314) 750-8721 Original Message Subject: [ADSM-L] Used 3494 / 3590 equip From: Druckenmiller, David druc...@mail.amc.edu Date: Fri, July 24, 2009 1:51 pm To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU Just wondering if anyone knows what the market might be for a 3-frame 3494 with 8 3590-H1A drives. Also, is there market for about 1800 used 3590E cartridges? We just finished migrating off and my boss just wants to trash the whole thing. I'd be curious to know just how much money they're throwing away. Thanks. - CONFIDENTIALITY NOTICE: This email and any attachments may contain confidential information that is protected by law and is for the sole use of the individuals or entities to which it is addressed. If you are not the intended recipient, please notify the sender by replying to this email and destroying all copies of the communication and attachments. Further use, disclosure, copying, distribution of, or reliance upon the contents of this email and attachments is strictly prohibited. To contact Albany Medical Center, or for a copy of our privacy practices, please visit us on the Internet at www.amc.edu.
Re: Desperation, DR, and four TS3100 libraries...
Wanda, Yes, the Web interface would work, you would just have to pay attention to which screen you were on, since all four would look alike. I think it is a lot of key clicks for each tape mount, too, since the Web interface isn't meant to be a regular operator's interface, and doesn't have speed or ease-of-use in mind. Best Regards, John D. Schneider The Computer Coaching Community, LLC Office: (314) 635-5424 Toll Free: (866) 796-9226 Cell: (314) 750-8721 Original Message Subject: Re: [ADSM-L] Desperation, DR, and four TS3100 libraries... From: Wanda Prather wprat...@jasi.com Date: Fri, July 10, 2009 10:15 am To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU Thanks John - I like your idea of the script to do the mounts! It also reminds me, those puppies have a web interface. We could do the moves with that, as well, if I can talk them into setting up 4 IP connections. If not, I'll crank up my perl skills... W On Fri, Jul 10, 2009 at 12:06 AM, John D. Schneider john.schnei...@computercoachingcommunity.com wrote: Wanda, My solution isn't much better, but here goes: 1) Like you said, define 1 manual library, 1 device class, with 4 LTO4 drives, and get them all working and defined to the DR environment. 2) You will be using the IBM drives, of course, so I am presuming the IBM drivers will be installed by you or your DR vendor. 3) Start a TSM administrator window in -console mode, so you can see the tape mount requests. 4) When your tape operator sees a tape mount request, he puts the appropriate tape in the I/O door belonging to that tape drive's library. 5) You didn't say if you were Unix, Linux, or Windows. I will explain it as if it is AIX, and you can transpose. From a Unix shell window, your tape operator uses tapeutil, the linemode library manager that comes with the IBM drivers, to do the tape mounts for you. He can issue the commands to move the tape from the element number of the I/O door straight to the tape drive. 6) When he sees an unmount request, he issues the tapeutil command to move the tape from the drive to the I/O door, and puts the tape back in the stack. If it were me tackling this one, I would write two short ksh scripts called tape_mount and tape_unmount where the tape operator just puts in which tape volser he is mounting, and which drive it should go in, and let the ksh scripts translate that into the actual device name, and tapeutil syntax, so there would be fewer mistakes. Also if it were me, I would build this experimentally using a tape library or libraries and drives while still back home, so I could build the script and debug it, then bring it with me to the DR exercise, and all I would have to change would be the /dev/smcX and /dev/rmtX device names, and start mounting tapes. Do you see any fatal flaws in this? It is a lot like your original idea, but typing the mounts and unmounts on the faceplate of four different TS3100's would drive me buggy. Hopefully this would be less tedious. Best Regards, John D. Schneider The Computer Coaching Community, LLC Office: (314) 635-5424 Toll Free: (866) 796-9226 Cell: (314) 750-8721 Original Message Subject: [ADSM-L] Desperation, DR, and four TS3100 libraries... From: Wanda Prather wprat...@jasi.com Date: Thu, July 09, 2009 8:33 pm To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU I'm drawing a blank here, any suggestions welcomed. I have a TSM customer who makes their copypool tapes using a TS3200 with LTO4 drives. The TS3200 is a rack-mounted, 2 drive, 40-mumble slot standard ASCII library. No issues. One copy pool, tapes vaulted and sent offsite. They want to go to a commercial DR vendor site and do a DR test next week. The commercial DR vendor, unbelievably, has no multi-drive LTO4-capable libraries. Instead, they want us to use 4 (count 'em, four) TS3100 libraries. The TS3100 is a rack-mounted, 1 drive, 20-mumble slot standard ASCII library. There's only 1 copy pool, so all tapes were created on the same device class. Ignoring the which-carts-would-go-in-which-library issue, I can't have a device class pointing to 4 libraries. And, the TS3100 is built in such a way that unlike a TS3500, you can't open the doors and access the drives for manual mounting. (I'd be happy to pull the covers off and try it, ignoring any warranties I might void, but I doubt the vendor will let me attack the thing with a screwdriver/wrench/hacksaw.) If I put all the carts in one TS3100 that will work, but that leaves me only 1 drive to restore all the clients, and they won't likely get done in the desired time window. The only thing I can think of to use all 4 drives, is to define those four TS3100's as 1 manual library with 4 manual drives, and use the front panel of each TS3100 to move tapes from the I/O slot to the drive when TSM requests a mount. (Actually the FIRST thing I thought of, was cancel the DR contract, this is nonsense. But my customer isn't
Re: SV: Desperation, DR, and four TS3100 libraries...
Michael, I don't see how a TSM Library Manager would help in this case. Perhaps you could explain further. It seems like to me the TSM Library Manager would still have to view the four TS3100 libraries as separate libraries, and then so would the client. And that is the rub; four separate libraries won't work if all tapes are in a single pool, single device class. Unless you are thinking of a configuration I am having trouble seeing. The Gresham software could perform this obfuscation, but unless the customer is already using it, it is another expense and another product to get to know just to support this one facet of their DR plan. I would have trouble arguing it was the best solution, since there are at least two other viable ways that have already been suggested that don't cost anything, and use the tools already at Wanda's disposal. Best Regards, John D. Schneider The Computer Coaching Community, LLC Office: (314) 635-5424 Toll Free: (866) 796-9226 Cell: (314) 750-8721 Original Message Subject: Re: [ADSM-L] SV: Desperation, DR, and four TS3100 libraries... From: Michael Hedden mhed...@bellsouth.net Date: Fri, July 10, 2009 12:44 pm To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU Wanda, What about setting up a TSM Library Manager and have him control the library and drives for a TSM Library Client doing all the restores. From: Wanda Prather wprat...@jasi.com To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU Sent: Friday, July 10, 2009 1:06:53 PM Subject: Re: SV: Desperation, DR, and four TS3100 libraries... Thanks - that's what I suspected! On Fri, Jul 10, 2009 at 1:01 PM, Bob Levad ble...@winnebagoind.com wrote: Wanda, We actually tried 2 TS3100s in a test recovery. It didn't go very well. If you attempt it. The Gresham product should be able to present 1 library image to TSM. I don't know at what cost. Without Gresham: Make sure your incremental DB backups are directed to disk or someplace other than the already overloaded libraries. If you have a few months to prepare, break the copypool down to several that will individually fit in a 3100 and give each copypool it's own devclass. Even though the devclass breakdown is not needed at the home site, it will allow you to re-design as needed in a recovery scenario. Bob. -Original Message- From: ADSM: Dist Stor Manager [mailto:ads...@vm.marist.edu] On Behalf Of Wanda Prather Sent: Friday, July 10, 2009 10:31 AM To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU Subject: Re: [ADSM-L] SV: Desperation, DR, and four TS3100 libraries... Thanks Christian, and everyone, for the suggestions. Even if I can convince TSM to work with the tapes spread across the 4 libraries, I think I still lose too much throughput. If I want to restore multiple clients/filespaces in parallel, I think we could easily get into the situation that client 1 is using the drive in library 1, and the restore for client 2 needs a tape that is also in library 1. The only way I can see to keep all 4 drives busy is to use them in manual mode. (Short of doing MOVE NODEDATA to guarantee that every client is on its own tape, which is highly unrealistic for a copy pool. Not that this scenario is realistic to begin with!) Thanks everyone! Wanda (maybe another margarita will bring more enlightenment..) On Fri, Jul 10, 2009 at 5:58 AM, Christian Svensson christian.svens...@cristie.se wrote: Hi Wanda, On my way to work this morning I have been thinking about your situation and I think I have an idea how you can get it to work. But only for restore not for backup... :) I haven't try this yet and probably don't have time to test it for you. But I think this will work. Define 4 SCSI Libraries Define 4 Drives. 1 to each Library Create 3 NEW Copypool Device Class that is pointing to Library 2,3 and 4 (CopyClass2, CopyClass3, CopyClass4) And Update one Device Class to point to the 1st Library. Now do a Audit of the library with Owner=YOUR TSM SERVER In this stage does TSM know that ALL Tape are available but in different libraries. Technically it should work. The database knows what tape TSM need and only change the data entry-path for the tape in the same way it does with the primary (1st) Library you have. This is still just an crazy idea like always that I normally have. Best Regards Christian Svensson Cell: +46-70-325 1577 E-mail: christian.svens...@cristie.se Skype: cristie.christian.svensson Från: ADSM: Dist Stor Manager [ads...@vm.marist.edu] för Wanda Prather [wprat...@jasi.com] Skickat: den 10 juli 2009 03:33 Till: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU Ämne: Desperation, DR, and four TS3100 libraries... I'm drawing a blank here, any suggestions welcomed. I have a TSM customer who makes their copypool tapes using a TS3200 with LTO4 drives. The TS3200 is a rack-mounted, 2 drive, 40-mumble slot standard ASCII
Re: Desperation, DR, and four TS3100 libraries...
Wanda, My solution isn't much better, but here goes: 1) Like you said, define 1 manual library, 1 device class, with 4 LTO4 drives, and get them all working and defined to the DR environment. 2) You will be using the IBM drives, of course, so I am presuming the IBM drivers will be installed by you or your DR vendor. 3) Start a TSM administrator window in -console mode, so you can see the tape mount requests. 4) When your tape operator sees a tape mount request, he puts the appropriate tape in the I/O door belonging to that tape drive's library. 5) You didn't say if you were Unix, Linux, or Windows. I will explain it as if it is AIX, and you can transpose. From a Unix shell window, your tape operator uses tapeutil, the linemode library manager that comes with the IBM drivers, to do the tape mounts for you. He can issue the commands to move the tape from the element number of the I/O door straight to the tape drive. 6) When he sees an unmount request, he issues the tapeutil command to move the tape from the drive to the I/O door, and puts the tape back in the stack. If it were me tackling this one, I would write two short ksh scripts called tape_mount and tape_unmount where the tape operator just puts in which tape volser he is mounting, and which drive it should go in, and let the ksh scripts translate that into the actual device name, and tapeutil syntax, so there would be fewer mistakes. Also if it were me, I would build this experimentally using a tape library or libraries and drives while still back home, so I could build the script and debug it, then bring it with me to the DR exercise, and all I would have to change would be the /dev/smcX and /dev/rmtX device names, and start mounting tapes. Do you see any fatal flaws in this? It is a lot like your original idea, but typing the mounts and unmounts on the faceplate of four different TS3100's would drive me buggy. Hopefully this would be less tedious. Best Regards, John D. Schneider The Computer Coaching Community, LLC Office: (314) 635-5424 Toll Free: (866) 796-9226 Cell: (314) 750-8721 Original Message Subject: [ADSM-L] Desperation, DR, and four TS3100 libraries... From: Wanda Prather wprat...@jasi.com Date: Thu, July 09, 2009 8:33 pm To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU I'm drawing a blank here, any suggestions welcomed. I have a TSM customer who makes their copypool tapes using a TS3200 with LTO4 drives. The TS3200 is a rack-mounted, 2 drive, 40-mumble slot standard ASCII library. No issues. One copy pool, tapes vaulted and sent offsite. They want to go to a commercial DR vendor site and do a DR test next week. The commercial DR vendor, unbelievably, has no multi-drive LTO4-capable libraries. Instead, they want us to use 4 (count 'em, four) TS3100 libraries. The TS3100 is a rack-mounted, 1 drive, 20-mumble slot standard ASCII library. There's only 1 copy pool, so all tapes were created on the same device class. Ignoring the which-carts-would-go-in-which-library issue, I can't have a device class pointing to 4 libraries. And, the TS3100 is built in such a way that unlike a TS3500, you can't open the doors and access the drives for manual mounting. (I'd be happy to pull the covers off and try it, ignoring any warranties I might void, but I doubt the vendor will let me attack the thing with a screwdriver/wrench/hacksaw.) If I put all the carts in one TS3100 that will work, but that leaves me only 1 drive to restore all the clients, and they won't likely get done in the desired time window. The only thing I can think of to use all 4 drives, is to define those four TS3100's as 1 manual library with 4 manual drives, and use the front panel of each TS3100 to move tapes from the I/O slot to the drive when TSM requests a mount. (Actually the FIRST thing I thought of, was cancel the DR contract, this is nonsense. But my customer isn't convinced yet...) Anybody got a better solution? I've already tried a margarita, it didn't help W
Re: VTL Tape Size
Andy, My experience may not map to the problem you are trying to solve, but I chose a relatively small VTL tape size (50GB) and have not regretted it. The trade-off is total number of virtual tapes vs total number of anticipated simultaneous tape mounts. Say you have a 60TB VTL (usable), and you want to emulate LTO4 tapes. If you went with the default size (400GB) you would have about 150 virtual tapes in your pool. Say also that there are 300 TSM clients to be backed up each night. Each one will need at least one virtual tape during their backups, and some of them might need 4 or 8 for performance reasons. You would have only 150 tapes for 300 clients? You could spread out their schedules, of course, but that will still be problematic. After a few weeks you might have a bunch of them full, but not ready to reclaim, or waiting on reusedelay, and not have enough available tapes for all the tape mounts you need. With 50GB tapes, you would have over 1200 virtual tapes. Tapes would fill up sooner, of course, but they could be reclaimed sooner, too, and be returned to scratch. Your overall disk utilization will go up. One thing to bear in mind is that if you have single files that are bigger than your virtual tape size, the file will have to span multiple virtual tapes. This is no problem for TSM, but it does mean that each of the virtual tapes involved in that one file will not be mountable until after that large file is finished backing up. We have seen the unusual situation where a single 300GB Exchange database was backing up, and happened to run over into our 'backup stgpool' window. The 'backup stgpool' was waiting on a tape mount of a certain volume, but when we checked we could see that the volume was not mounted or in use by anybody else. After some digging we noticed that the virtual volume in question had been mounted some hours earlier in a backup session for a single large Exchange file, and that backup was still going on. As soon as that file finished backing up, the virtual tapes mounted and the 'backup stgpool' continued. Another thing to think about is, have you sized the virtual library to have enough capacity for all your primary storage pool needs, or will the primary pool have to migrate to real tape? If so, that is another argument in favor of relatively small virtual tapes, because they won't migrate until they are full. In our case, using the migration threshhold to cause the migration to occur didn't work well because of how TSM calculates percent full, so we ended up writing a script that automatically migrates (using move data) virtual tapes as they age, so that we are sure we always have enough scratch tapes for our next backups. Best Regards, John D. Schneider The Computer Coaching Community, LLC Office: (314) 635-5424 Toll Free: (866) 796-9226 Cell: (314) 750-8721 Original Message Subject: [ADSM-L] VTL Tape Size From: Huebner,Andy,FORT WORTH,IT andy.hueb...@alconlabs.com Date: Tue, July 07, 2009 9:36 am To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU We are about to bring up new TSM servers and one of questions that has come up is how big to make the VTL tapes? We currently use 100GG and have tried 10GB with our test server. The question is what size it popular and why? Andy Huebner This e-mail (including any attachments) is confidential and may be legally privileged. If you are not an intended recipient or an authorized representative of an intended recipient, you are prohibited from using, copying or distributing the information in this e-mail or its attachments. If you have received this e-mail in error, please notify the sender immediately by return e-mail and delete all copies of this message and any attachments. Thank you.
Re: VTL Tape Size
What Nicholas says is totally true. TSM can get very resource constrained when it has lots and lots of simultaneous mounts to manage. In our design, we have a separate TSM instance running on the same server as some of the others (AIX environment) and that instance is just a library master, handling tape mount requests for all the others. This instance sometimes has 170-190 simultaneous tape mounts while servicing 10 TSM instances' tape mount requests. We ended up having to add LIBSHRTIMEOUT 60 to the dsmserv.opt, too, to keep timeouts between the library master and library clients from happening. If I had the choice, we would have sufficient disk space in front of the VTL for 24-48 hours worth of backups, then migrate daily to the VTL with a much smaller number of tape mounts. But management thought it was a waste of money to have disk in front of disk, and at the time I had no strong argument to support it. On the other hand, we have some smaller environments with Windows 2003 TSM servers and 60-150 clients each, and they do their backups straight to VTL, and we schedule them so they only have 20-30 simultaneous mounts at a time, and this works fine. So it depends on the scale of problem you are trying to solve. Best Regards, John D. Schneider The Computer Coaching Community, LLC Office: (314) 635-5424 Toll Free: (866) 796-9226 Cell: (314) 750-8721 Original Message Subject: Re: [ADSM-L] VTL Tape Size From: Nicholas Rodolfich nrodolf...@cmaontheweb.com Date: Tue, July 07, 2009 12:20 pm To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU Andy, Just an opinion here. If you try to provide virtual sequential access mount points for each client session you may need during client processing, you will likely need much more system resources to complete nightly backups. Managing mount points need only be done during daily server maintenance processing. I would still be using a random access disk pool to provide staging space for client backups. The L in VTL stands for Library and it should be treated as such. For many years IBM has recommended that we back up to a staging area to enhance client performance and reduce resource needs. During server maintenance, data should be placed onto longer term storage devices (libraries) for daily expiration and reclamation processing.. I don't think that strategy changes with a VTL. On another not I have a client with a VTL running in a Windows environment with around 200 clients(not sure what you have). Their VTL vendor suggested a volume size of 20Gb. This eventually created ~15000 volumes. When the TSM server used the VTL, the overhead from mounting hoards of virtual volumes brought their server to its knees. I mean it would not even respond to session requests so it could not complete nightly client backups at all. Not to mention the headaches of managing 15000 volumes from the TSM interface (GUI or CLI). They too were trying to backup directly to the VTL during nightly client backups. We had to return there management class destinations back to a random access storage pool and process their data during daily sever maintenance as TSM is designed to do. We set up the VTL to emulate LTO2 (200GB volume size) and used the VTL like a library, migrating the nightly backup data to the VTL. Large Oracle backups do directly to the VTL but are limited in number. The client is fat and happy now, backing up ~1.5TB nightly with plenty of time left and the TSM server performance is stellar. Regards, Nicholas ADSM: Dist Stor Manager ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU wrote on 07/07/2009 11:18:26 AM: [image removed] Re: [ADSM-L] VTL Tape Size John D. Schneider to: ADSM-L 07/07/2009 11:19 AM Sent by: ADSM: Dist Stor Manager ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU Please respond to ADSM: Dist Stor Manager Andy, My experience may not map to the problem you are trying to solve, but I chose a relatively small VTL tape size (50GB) and have not regretted it. The trade-off is total number of virtual tapes vs total number of anticipated simultaneous tape mounts. Say you have a 60TB VTL (usable), and you want to emulate LTO4 tapes. If you went with the default size (400GB) you would have about 150 virtual tapes in your pool. Say also that there are 300 TSM clients to be backed up each night. Each one will need at least one virtual tape during their backups, and some of them might need 4 or 8 for performance reasons. You would have only 150 tapes for 300 clients? You could spread out their schedules, of course, but that will still be problematic. After a few weeks you might have a bunch of them full, but not ready to reclaim, or waiting on reusedelay, and not have enough available tapes for all the tape mounts you need. With 50GB tapes, you would have over 1200 virtual tapes. Tapes would fill up sooner, of course, but they could be reclaimed sooner, too, and be returned to scratch. Your overall disk utilization will go up. One thing to bear in mind is that if you have single files
Re: TSM vs Avamar
Anthony, What you say is just what EMC said, and that is that their preference is that all their customers install the Avamar client directly on each VM. But this is not ideal to us for two reasons: 1) In the main environment I support, there are about 700 VMs and growing. That is a lot of Avamar clients to log in to and configure. The beauty of VCB is that it doesn't require a client install on each machine; there is less administration per VM, which means less time. 2) With the VCB method, the VMware farm does not bear the burden of CPU and I/O and memory consumption involved in performing the backups; that is shifted to the proxy server. Running the Avamar client backup on 700 separate VMs is going to create a burden on the VMware farm. EMC will hand-wave that away by saying that the Avamar client is very light, but in our testing so far it is about even with, or perhaps slightly less than the TSM clients. EMC told us it is a tiny fraction of the performance requirements of the TSM client, but we have not found that to be the case. Either way would work, I agree, but I think there are valid trade-offs depending on the size of your environment, and the amount of backups you do each day. Best Regards, John D. Schneider The Computer Coaching Community, LLC Office: (314) 635-5424 Toll Free: (866) 796-9226 Cell: (314) 750-8721 Original Message Subject: [ADSM-L] TSM vs Avamar From: leontom tsm-fo...@backupcentral.com Date: Wed, June 24, 2009 6:01 pm To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU Hi, If you could accept some additional information from an EMC insider... Actually ,with Avamar, VCB is not really needed for the main backup operations. Indeed, the best is to install the files and applications agents directly within the VMs. In this way, you'll be able to make full daily snap-up of all your VMs with a really minimal impact on your ESX plateform, thanks to the source-based dedup. VCB could, maybe, remains a commodity for full VM quick disaster recovery. Regards, Anthony [quote=John D. Schneider]Hi! 5) Backing up VMs, because they are so similar to each other, sounds like an idea application for deduplication. However, the VMWare VCB proxy solution today is very bad. But in every Avamar presentation I have been to, they completely gloss over how it really works. The way it works today requires each separate VM to be in its own group and its own schedule. In our case, with 600VMs, that was going to be a nightmare. Sometime in the third quarter when VMWare comes out with its next version of VCB, it is supposed to be much better. +-- |This was sent by anthony.mor...@gmail.com via Backup Central. |Forward SPAM to ab...@backupcentral.com. +--
Re: Dedupe
Greetings, Hopefully, this will not be too much traffic about the same topic. There are a zillion people jumping in to the dedupe market, because of the huge opportunity to sell products in this space. Not all products are created equal. Ask questions (or get references from existing customers) to find out what ongoing support has been like, and what problems or maintenance issues have arisen, and how the vendor handled them. In a normal tape environment, or virtual tape library, each backup you do creates a separate copy of your data, at least the changed parts. For data that is changing often, you may have a dozen versions of that data on different media. And presumably, you are also creating a daily offsite copy of that data. In other words, you have redundant, multiple copies of the data on separate media. This is necessary, because no media is perfect. I a dedup appliance, that is exactly what you don't have. The dedup process guarantees that only one copy is kept of each unique block of that data. If a given block of data is lost due to corruption or failure of the media, then potentially all of the copies of a certain file that contains that block of data will be lost. The people who are designing these products, therefore, build their products to mitigate this potential loss by: - Striping data across multiple disks, multiple RAID sets, and sometimes (as in the case of Avamar) even across multiple nodes in the grid. - Building integrity checking into various layers of their protocol, so that incoming data is proven clean as it is received. - Systematic integrity checking of data as it resides on disk. The better designs do a full system scan and check of all data every 24 hours or so. - Replication software that does integrity checking during the replication, so any corruption won't get transferred to the remote copy. These are the kinds of features that didn't exist during early versions of dedupe products. Any corruption due to a failure of the disk or firmware in the array could be catastrophic. But many dedupe products today have a healthy paranoia about the reliability of hardware, and protect themselves accordingly. So when evaluating dedupe products, be sure to ask questions about these sorts of features. Often times, the low end products don't. Best Regards, John D. Schneider The Computer Coaching Community, LLC Office: (314) 635-5424 Toll Free: (866) 796-9226 Cell: (314) 750-8721 Original Message Subject: Re: [ADSM-L] Dedupe From: Strand, Neil B. nbstr...@lmus.leggmason.com Date: Thu, June 25, 2009 8:09 am To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU Ditto on Lindsay's it depends For my NetApp devices, observed NAS filesystem dedupe renges from 10% to 70% depending on the data. VMware NFS shares typically show a good ratio. We for our VM environment, we split our OS apart from data and paging space as depicted below: Filesystem used saved %saved /vol/PROD_VM_OS/ 98314436 227793716 70% /vol/PROD_VM_PAGING/ 3107084 1090756 26% /vol/PROD_VM_DATA1/ 11253900 17343096 61% /vol/DR_VM_OS1/ 105852808 236518940 69% /vol/DR_VM_DATA1/ 431134632 216285060 33% /vol/DR_VM_PAGING1/ 35520 4272 11% The paging space is very dynamic and I don't expect much savings. The OS space (where VM operating systems are installed) is relatively static and redundant and reflects that with high dedup ratios. The data space (where applications and everything else is) has a wide variance - as expected. But the end result is that I am saving disk space and actually improving overall performance because redundant data has a higher probability of residing in cache and the reference to a particular bit of redundant data has a higher probability of residing in the cached lookup table. If you are looking for dedupe on tape media, I don't think it is feasable nor desired. Simple compression now allows me to put nearly 3TB on a single 3592 tape (again depending on the data). At a nominal cost of $150/tape this results in about 5 cents/GB. Not too shabby. I make a second offsite copy of the same data resulting in an overall cost of 10 cents to provide +five nines probability that my company's data is recoverable for the next 6 years. This is less than the cost of electricity for disk based storage for the same time period. Dedupe has it's place as do most technologies. It is not a golden egg unless you force it to be ... and then, when it hatches, it may be a fine goose or it may be a platypus - it depends on your environment. Cheers, Neil Strand Storage Engineer - Legg Mason Baltimore, MD. (410) 580-7491 Whatever you can do or believe you can, begin it. Boldness has genius, power and magic. -Original Message- From: ADSM: Dist Stor Manager [mailto:ads...@vm.marist.edu] On Behalf Of Ochs, Duane Sent: Thursday, June 25, 2009 7:35 AM To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU Subject: Re: [ADSM-L] Dedupe For common practice de-dup is not a tape oriented process. It is usually to reduce data on disks. One
Re: TSM vs Avamar
Shawn, I have found it very important when working with EMC (or any vendor, really) to very carefully verify everything they say, or ask to have it explained so you understand it thoroughly. I don't mean to imply that they lie about anything, but I have frequently seem them exaggerate their claims. Here are a couple examples: - The first time we heard about Avamar was at an EMC event where the speakers whole thrust was that this was the best solution out there for backing up lots of VMs. But as I said in my earlier post, right now it is a terrible solution for VM if you want to use VCB. If you don't mind installing and running the Avamar client directly on each VM you can do that, but that is certainly labor intensive and VCB exists to get customers away from doing that. - There was a speaker at an EMC event that used a specific customer as an example. They told about what great efficiencies the customer had realized, and how great the deduplication was, and how much money the customer had saved, and so on. They were extremely specific and clear. Well, I asked our EMC rep if I could talk to this company so I could ask them some questions about the their implementation. This customer happens to be the same city as we are. After a couple days they came back and explained that the customer hadn't actually bought Avamar yet. They had evaluated it and liked what they saw, and were getting ready to install some Proof of Concept gear. But that is miles away from the impression they gave during this presentation. These are isolated incidences, and things are not alway like this with EMC. I am just saying, do your best to verify what you hear, or test it for yourself. Best Regards, John D. Schneider The Computer Coaching Community, LLC Office: (314) 635-5424 Toll Free: (866) 796-9226 Cell: (314) 750-8721 Original Message Subject: Re: [ADSM-L] TSM vs Avamar From: Shawn Drew shawn.d...@americas.bnpparibas.com Date: Wed, June 24, 2009 9:24 am To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU Wow, great info everyone. The last note you put in there about there not having an archive solution. I can't remember the details now, but the sales guy said there was some kind of archive feature involving VMware. Something along the lines of creating a standard VM with the archive data or something like that. Do you know what they were talking about? I should probably get more details. Regards, Shawn Shawn Drew Internet john.schnei...@computercoachingcommunity.com Sent by: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU 06/23/2009 05:40 PM Please respond to ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU To ADSM-L cc Subject Re: [ADSM-L] TSM vs Avamar Hi! I am just finishing up a multi-month proof-of-concept for Avamar. It has many benefits, but you need to keep in mind these things: 1) It is a disk-only solution, it has no tape backend. You will have to scale your Avamar footprint to completely contain all your backups, for however many days retention you need, so it all fits on one (or more) Avamar grids. If you scale it too small, you are going to be making a disk purchase to keep up. If you let it fill up, you are in trouble! You can't just shove more inexpensive tapes into the library. On the other hand, since Avamar's consumption of disk will be a tiny fraction as much as disk storage pool, you won't have to buy as much disk to get where your job done. Your consumption of disk is space varies widely depending on or mix of filesystem, database, NAS data types, so get help from EMC sizing the solution. 2) Avamar is RAIN technology (Redundant Array of Independent Nodes). Each grid of nodes will require 1 node for administration (called a utility node), and 1 spare. The nodes in the grid can contain either 1TB or 2TB. Redundant copies of that data are distributed across the nodes in the grid. Although it will scale to bigger grids, best practice is to keep the grids to around 14 nodes in size. This is not a terrible thing, but can add significantly to the cost. 3) Avamar comes with replication built in. Replication can be one-one, one-many, many-one. But replication takes time, and you should not plan to do your backups during replication; the performance will be significantly impacted. 4) Avamar also requires regular scheduled garbage-collection. They tell me it typically needs to run 2-4 hours per day. During this time the grid operates in read-only mode; you cannot do backups to it. So if you have hourly Oracle archive log backups, or some such, you will have build them to live without Avamar for these periods of time, because garbage collection is a necessity. 5) Backing up VMs, because they are so similar to each other, sounds like an idea application for deduplication. However, the VMWare VCB proxy solution today is very bad. But in every Avamar presentation I have been to, they completely gloss over how it really works. The way it works today requires each separate VM to be in its own
Re: TSM vs Avamar
Hi! I am just finishing up a multi-month proof-of-concept for Avamar. It has many benefits, but you need to keep in mind these things: 1) It is a disk-only solution, it has no tape backend. You will have to scale your Avamar footprint to completely contain all your backups, for however many days retention you need, so it all fits on one (or more) Avamar grids. If you scale it too small, you are going to be making a disk purchase to keep up. If you let it fill up, you are in trouble! You can't just shove more inexpensive tapes into the library. On the other hand, since Avamar's consumption of disk will be a tiny fraction as much as disk storage pool, you won't have to buy as much disk to get where your job done. Your consumption of disk is space varies widely depending on or mix of filesystem, database, NAS data types, so get help from EMC sizing the solution. 2) Avamar is RAIN technology (Redundant Array of Independent Nodes). Each grid of nodes will require 1 node for administration (called a utility node), and 1 spare. The nodes in the grid can contain either 1TB or 2TB. Redundant copies of that data are distributed across the nodes in the grid. Although it will scale to bigger grids, best practice is to keep the grids to around 14 nodes in size. This is not a terrible thing, but can add significantly to the cost. 3) Avamar comes with replication built in. Replication can be one-one, one-many, many-one. But replication takes time, and you should not plan to do your backups during replication; the performance will be significantly impacted. 4) Avamar also requires regular scheduled garbage-collection. They tell me it typically needs to run 2-4 hours per day. During this time the grid operates in read-only mode; you cannot do backups to it. So if you have hourly Oracle archive log backups, or some such, you will have build them to live without Avamar for these periods of time, because garbage collection is a necessity. 5) Backing up VMs, because they are so similar to each other, sounds like an idea application for deduplication. However, the VMWare VCB proxy solution today is very bad. But in every Avamar presentation I have been to, they completely gloss over how it really works. The way it works today requires each separate VM to be in its own group and its own schedule. In our case, with 600VMs, that was going to be a nightmare. Sometime in the third quarter when VMWare comes out with its next version of VCB, it is supposed to be much better. 6) It is not an Archive solution, so if you have multi-year long-term archive requirements, you will be needing a separage solution for those. Best Regards, John D. Schneider The Computer Coaching Community, LLC Office: (314) 635-5424 Toll Free: (866) 796-9226 Cell: (314) 750-8721 Original Message Subject: Re: [ADSM-L] TSM vs Avamar From: Shawn Drew shawn.d...@americas.bnpparibas.com Date: Tue, June 23, 2009 11:32 am To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU They do have hardware at the multiple sites for DR. This is a hot DR site as opposed to a cold site that you can do with tapes. This does fit our environment however. We have multiple data centers that are DR sites for each other. Currently we use TSM with VTLs at multiple sites and just replicate with backup stgpools over the WAN. In reality, we run into more bad tapes than we do with bad disks. I can't remember if I've ever had to run a restore stg on a VTL. We only use tape for long term stuff Regards, Shawn Shawn Drew Internet nrodolf...@cmaontheweb.com Sent by: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU 06/23/2009 12:07 PM Please respond to ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU To ADSM-L cc Subject Re: [ADSM-L] TSM vs Avamar What does Avemar offer for DR purposes? I don't know any customers that are ready to totally rely on electrically powered disk drives as a DR solution. The recent CommVault topic inspired this one. Our EMC reps are doing a good marketing job for Avemar. While I'm not necessarily looking for ammo to shoot them down, I am having trouble finding the negatives of Avamar versusTSM. The main marketing claims that interested me: - Dedupe at the client. They also claim that since they can do it at the client, the ratio they can achieve is much higher than Falconstor or DataDomain backend deduplication. - They have some kind of directory tree hash marking. The claim for this is that if you have directories with millions of files, it will have hashes for each directory level. If one file changes, it can detect which directory has changed through these hashes and will prevent complete file system scanning for every backup. Sounds like it's an alternative for the TSM journaling feature. - They have some kind of Vmware appliance generation thing which they use to create long term archives assuming they won't fit on the million:1 deduped storage! As far
Re: Making sure clientactions start
Greetings, In order for a Define Clientaction to work right away, you have to either restart the scheduler service (or daemon) so it checks for the next schedule, or run the client in 'schedmode prompted' mode. I don't think you mentioned if you were in 'schedmode prompted' or not. If not, add that to your options file and restart the service. It should start within five minutes. We do 5-10 of these every day at least. Another problem that can happen is IP problems between the server and client, like not being able to resolve the host name, or some such. But if regular schedules have been running OK, it probably isn't that. The activity log will show you if the TSM server is trying to start the schedule, and if the client is ignoring the server, or rejecting the connection, or whatever. You should check the activity log. It you are in 'schedmode polling' instead of 'prompted', you won't get anything in the activity log, because the TSM server is content to wait until the client happens to check to see if a new schedule has been created for it. Best Regards, John D. Schneider The Computer Coaching Community, LLC Office: (314) 635-5424 Toll Free: (866) 796-9226 Cell: (314) 750-8721 Best Regards, John D. Schneider The Computer Coaching Community, LLC Office: (314) 635-5424 Toll Free: (866) 796-9226 Cell: (314) 750-8721 Original Message Subject: Re: [ADSM-L] Making sure clientactions start From: Huebner,Andy,FORT WORTH,IT andy.hueb...@alconlabs.com Date: Fri, June 19, 2009 2:25 pm To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU I agree, we run about 1,200 of these each night without a problem related to the define clientaction command. Andy Huebner -Original Message- From: ADSM: Dist Stor Manager [mailto:ads...@vm.marist.edu] On Behalf Of John Monahan Sent: Friday, June 19, 2009 2:02 PM To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU Subject: Re: [ADSM-L] Making sure clientactions start I think something is still wrong or unique in your environment. I deploy scripts that run immediate clientactions all the time at several of my customers and they always start within a minute or two unless there is a problem. __ John Monahan Infrastructure Services Consultant Logicalis, Inc. 5500 Wayzata Blvd Suite 315 Golden Valley, MN 55416 Office: 763-226-2088 Mobile: 952-221-6938 Fax: 763-226-2081 john.mona...@us.logicalis.com http://www.us.logicalis.com -Original Message- From: ADSM: Dist Stor Manager [mailto:ads...@vm.marist.edu] On Behalf Of Lee, Gary D. Sent: Friday, June 19, 2009 1:46 PM To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU Subject: Re: Making sure clientactions start Status on server is pending. Communications is good, client backs up nightly as it is supposed to. We were testing an include option. I agree with Richard, there needs to be some way to specify when it should run. I checked the server log, and after two hours the scheduler had not attempted to contact the client. This is a recurring problem with clientactions, and needs to be addressed. Thank you all for your suggestions. Gary Lee Senior System Programmer Ball State University phone: 765-285-1310 -Original Message- From: ADSM: Dist Stor Manager [mailto:ads...@vm.marist.edu] On Behalf Of John Monahan Sent: Friday, June 19, 2009 2:37 PM To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU Subject: Re: Making sure clientactions start Is the status from the server side pending or started (or something else)? The client can only run one scheduled task at a time. Another possibility is it is still running something else. __ John Monahan Infrastructure Services Consultant Logicalis, Inc. 5500 Wayzata Blvd Suite 315 Golden Valley, MN 55416 Office: 763-226-2088 Mobile: 952-221-6938 Fax: 763-226-2081 john.mona...@us.logicalis.com http://www.us.logicalis.com -Original Message- From: ADSM: Dist Stor Manager [mailto:ads...@vm.marist.edu] On Behalf Of Huebner,Andy,FORT WORTH,IT Sent: Friday, June 19, 2009 11:37 AM To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU Subject: Re: Making sure clientactions start Is the client running is schedule mode? If so stop and start the acceptor and wait 1 minute then check the log. If you are looking for reason, then check the server log, a quick search on the node name should help. Our most common problem is the server cannot contact the node due to an IP resolution problem. When the scheduler contacts the server IP resolution is not needed to start the job. Andy Huebner -Original Message- From: ADSM: Dist Stor Manager [mailto:ads...@vm.marist.edu] On Behalf Of Lee, Gary D. Sent: Friday, June 19, 2009 10:17 AM To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU Subject: [ADSM-L] Making sure clientactions start I have a clientaction defined for a node whose schedmode is set to prompted. However, I have now been waiting for 45 minutes for the action to take place. Is there a way to get
Re: Making sure clientactions start
Gary, There ought to be way to nail this one down. You seem to be getting a behavior that cannot be explained by the facts, given our collective experience with the product. So let's replay the details and see if we are all overlooking the same thing. Tell me if any of my facts are wrong: 1) Your client option is set to schedmode prompted. 2) The client service has been restarted since schedmode prompted was added? 3) Since the last time you restarted the client service, the scheduler has run a regular client backup. 4) You are running a fairly recent version of the client and server? I don't think you said what versions are involved. 5) You have checked the dsmsched.log and you know there is not already a backup currently running or hung. 6) When you do a 'q event * * node=xx' you only see the client action, and it is pending. You don't see any other events still running? What if you add 'begint' and 'begind' to your 'q event' and go back in time a ways? 6) You have checked the server actlog and you don't see any messages from the server trying to connect to the client but being refused? These messages may only contain the IP address of the client, not the client name, so be sure you don't search through the activity log and filter for the client name only. 7) There is not a firewall or other IP filter between client and server? I have seen a firewall mess up a client action, even when the regular client schedule was working. The fix was to restart the client service one more time after the client action was scheduled. Let me know if any of these ideas yield fruit. (By the way, my nephew and his wife are both grad students at Ball State. They say it is a great school.) Best Regards, John D. Schneider The Computer Coaching Community, LLC Office: (314) 635-5424 Toll Free: (866) 796-9226 Cell: (314) 750-8721 Original Message Subject: Re: [ADSM-L] Making sure clientactions start From: Lee, Gary D. g...@bsu.edu Date: Fri, June 19, 2009 1:46 pm To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU Status on server is pending. Communications is good, client backs up nightly as it is supposed to. We were testing an include option. I agree with Richard, there needs to be some way to specify when it should run. I checked the server log, and after two hours the scheduler had not attempted to contact the client. This is a recurring problem with clientactions, and needs to be addressed. Thank you all for your suggestions. Gary Lee Senior System Programmer Ball State University phone: 765-285-1310 -Original Message- From: ADSM: Dist Stor Manager [mailto:ads...@vm.marist.edu] On Behalf Of John Monahan Sent: Friday, June 19, 2009 2:37 PM To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU Subject: Re: Making sure clientactions start Is the status from the server side pending or started (or something else)? The client can only run one scheduled task at a time. Another possibility is it is still running something else. __ John Monahan Infrastructure Services Consultant Logicalis, Inc. 5500 Wayzata Blvd Suite 315 Golden Valley, MN 55416 Office: 763-226-2088 Mobile: 952-221-6938 Fax: 763-226-2081 john.mona...@us.logicalis.com http://www.us.logicalis.com -Original Message- From: ADSM: Dist Stor Manager [mailto:ads...@vm.marist.edu] On Behalf Of Huebner,Andy,FORT WORTH,IT Sent: Friday, June 19, 2009 11:37 AM To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU Subject: Re: Making sure clientactions start Is the client running is schedule mode? If so stop and start the acceptor and wait 1 minute then check the log. If you are looking for reason, then check the server log, a quick search on the node name should help. Our most common problem is the server cannot contact the node due to an IP resolution problem. When the scheduler contacts the server IP resolution is not needed to start the job. Andy Huebner -Original Message- From: ADSM: Dist Stor Manager [mailto:ads...@vm.marist.edu] On Behalf Of Lee, Gary D. Sent: Friday, June 19, 2009 10:17 AM To: ADSM-L@VM.MARIST.EDU Subject: [ADSM-L] Making sure clientactions start I have a clientaction defined for a node whose schedmode is set to prompted. However, I have now been waiting for 45 minutes for the action to take place. Is there a way to get the server to kick itself and prompt the client to perform the actions in a clientaction? Gary Lee Senior System Programmer Ball State University phone: 765-285-1310 This e-mail (including any attachments) is confidential and may be legally privileged. If you are not an intended recipient or an authorized representative of an intended recipient, you are prohibited from using, copying or distributing the information in this e-mail or its attachments. If you have received this e-mail in error, please notify the sender immediately by return e-mail and delete all copies of this message and any attachments. Thank you.
