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Unix Date Format Examples

admin — Thu, 11 Feb 2010 02:53:34 +0000

Unix date format is needed in the scripts, timestamped log files and script generated reports . This article attempts to simply date formatting with several examples . Date command in Unix is used to format date as well as time . First portion of this article covers Date function and the second portion has the time function covered .

Unix Basic date format

$date “+

Where Parameters is any one or more Parameter from the list below and separator is a any field separator like hyphen( – ) , slash \ , colon : and it is optional.

Unix Date Format Examples

lets get the parameter for year , month and date and produce a hyphen separated date format

$date “+%Y-%m-%d”

2010-02-10

%Y is keyword for four digit year
%m is keyword for two digit month
%d is keyword for two digit date
Hyphen is separator here .

If you change the separator here to slash the format would look like

$date “+%Y/%m/%d”
2010/02/10

You can switch date keyword anyway you want , if you need month first and year last ,

$date “+%m-%d-%Y”
02-10-2010

Weekdays

You can have additional weekday information in your date with %A as

$date “+%m-%d-%Y %A”
02-10-2010 Wednesday

$date “+%A %m-%d-%Y”
Wednesday 02-10-2010

These are options you can select for weekday

%a weekday, abbreviated Wed
%A weekday, full Wednesday
%d day of the month (dd), zero padded 10
%e day of the month (dd) 10
%j day of year, zero padded 000-366
%u day of week starting with Monday (1), i.e. mtwtfss 3
%w day of week starting with Sunday (0), i.e. smtwtfs 3

Month

You can have additional month information in your date with %B as

$date “+%m-%d-%Y %B”
02-10-2010 Februrary

$date “+%B %m-%d-%Y”
February 02-10-2010

These are options you can select for month

%m mm month as two digits
%b Mon, locale’s abbreviated Feb
%B locale’s full month, variable length February

Year

You can have additional year information as two digit or four digit with %y or %Y as

$date “+%m-%d-%y ”
02-10-10

$date “+%m-%d-%Y ”
02-10-2010

These are options you can select for year

%y yy two digit year 00–99
%Y ccyy year 2010

Additional date format parameters which can be used :

Week

%U week number Sunday as first day of week 01–53
%W week number Monday as first day of week 01–53
%V week of the year 01–53

Century

%C cc century 00–99

Date

%D mm/dd/yy 02/10/10
%x locale’s date representation (mm/dd/yy) 02/10/2010
%F %Y-%m-%d 2010-02-10

Date and Time time stamp

%c locale’s date and time Wed Feb 10 10:02:33 PST 2010

Time function

Time function is simple to use and date command is used to format & display time as well . You can use date and time parameters to format your date time stamp as per your requirment

A simple time stamp with date can be generated as :

$date “+%c”
%c locale’s date and time Sat Nov 04 12:02:33 EST 1989

Date function have some preformated time stamps to make things easier

Example :

$date “+%r”
05:28:55 PM

More preformated options :

%R hours, minutes (24 hour clock) hh:mm e.g. 17:28
%T hours, minutes, seconds (24-hour clock) 17:28:55
%X locale’s time representation (%H:%M:%S) 05:28:55 PM

Custom time format

Examples

Time stamp with 12 hr clock

$date “+%l:%M:%S
5:22:45

Time stamp with 24 hr clock

$date “+%H:%M:%S”
20:22:45

Time stamp with AM/PM

$date “+%l:%M:%S %p”
5:22:45 PM

Additional date time parameters :

Hours
%l (Lowercase L) hour (12 hour clock) 8
%I (Uppercase I) hour (12 hour clock) zero padded 08
%k hour (24 hour clock) 20
%H hour (24 hour clock) zero padded 20
%p locale’s upper case AM or PM (blank in many locales) PM
%P locale’s lower case am or pm (really!) pm

Minutes
%M MM minutes 28

Seconds
%s seconds since 00:00:00 1970-01-01 UTC (Unix epoch) 1265833735
%S SS second 00–60
%N nanoseconds 000000000–999999999

Time zone
%z -zzzz RFC-822 style numeric timezone -0500
%Z time zone (e.g., EDT) nothing if no time zone is determinable EST

Php Date Format

admin — Sat, 06 Feb 2010 02:09:57 +0000

Date time formatting in PHP
Many scripts written in php need date and time function . PHP has many predfined date formats and you can also customized it as per your need .

Here are some of the date format examples and additional details for php.

Examples
Variable $today has different formats as we set the format types in the following examples :

$today = date(”F j, Y, g:i a”); -> February 5, 2010, 6:20 pm
$today = date(”m.d.y”); -> 02.05.10
$today = date(”j, n, Y”); -> 5, 2, 2010
$today = date(”Ymd”); -> 20100205
$today = date(’h-i-s, j-m-y, it is w Day’); -> 06-20-25, 5-02-10, 2028 2025 5 Fripm10
$today = date(’\i\t \i\s \t\h\e jS \d\a\y.’); -> it is the 5th day.
$today = date(”D M j G:i:s T Y”); -> Fri Feb 5 18:20:25 PST 2010
$today = date(’H:m:s \m \i\s\ \m\o\n\t\h’); -> 18:02:25 m is month

Options for php date format

Character	Description	Example
d	Day of the month, 2 digits with leading zeros	01 to 31
D	A textual representation of a day, three letters	Mon through Sun
j	Day of the month without leading zeros	1 to 31
l (lowercase ‘L’)	A full textual representation of the day of the week	Sunday through Saturday
N	ISO-8601 numeric representation of the day of the week (added in PHP 5.1.0)	1 (for Monday) through 7 (for Sunday)
S	English ordinal suffix for the day of the month, 2 characters	st, nd, rd or th. Works well with j
w	Numeric representation of the day of the week	0 (for Sunday) through 6 (for Saturday)
z	The day of the year (starting from 0)	0 through 365
Week
W	ISO-8601 week number of year, weeks starting on Monday (added in PHP 4.1.0)	Example: 42 (the 42nd week in the year)
Month
F	A full textual representation of a month, such as January or March	January through December
m	Numeric representation of a month, with leading zeros	01 through 12
M	A short textual representation of a month, three letters	Jan through Dec
n	Numeric representation of a month, without leading zeros	1 through 12
t	Number of days in the given month	28 through 31
Year
L	Whether it’s a leap year	1 if it is a leap year, 0 otherwise.
o	ISO-8601 year number. This has the same value as Y, except that if the ISO week number (W) belongs to the previous or next year, that year is used instead. (added in PHP 5.1.0)	Examples: 1999 or 2003
Y	A full numeric representation of a year, 4 digits	Examples: 1999 or 2003
y	A two digit representation of a year	Examples: 99 or 03
Time
a	Lowercase Ante meridiem and Post meridiem	am or pm
A	Uppercase Ante meridiem and Post meridiem	AM or PM
B	Swatch Internet time	000 through 999
g	12-hour format of an hour without leading zeros	1 through 12
G	24-hour format of an hour without leading zeros	0 through 23
h	12-hour format of an hour with leading zeros	01 through 12
H	24-hour format of an hour with leading zeros	00 through 23
i	Minutes with leading zeros	00 to 59
s	Seconds, with leading zeros	00 through 59
u	Microseconds (added in PHP 5.2.2)	Example: 654321
Time zone
e	Timezone identifier (added in PHP 5.1.0)	Examples: UTC, GMT, Atlantic/Azores
I (capital i)	Whether or not the date is in daylight saving time	1 if Daylight Saving Time, 0 otherwise.
O	Difference to Greenwich time (GMT) in hours	Example: +0200
P	Difference to Greenwich time (GMT) with colon between hours and minutes (added in PHP 5.1.3)	Example: +02:00
T	Timezone abbreviation	Examples: EST, MDT …
Z	Timezone offset in seconds. The offset for timezones west of UTC is always negative, and for those east of UTC is always positive.	-43200 through 50400
Full Date/Time
c	ISO 8601 date (added in PHP 5)	2004-02-12T15:19:21+00:00
r	» RFC 2822 formatted date	Example: Thu, 21 Dec 2000 16:01:07 +0200
U	Seconds since the Unix Epoch (January 1 1970 00:00:00 GMT)	See also time()

Special Purpose Date time formatting

DateTime::ATOM
DATE_ATOM Atom (example: 2005-08-15T15:52:01+00:00)
DateTime::COOKIE
DATE_COOKIE HTTP Cookies (example: Monday, 15-Aug-05 15:52:01 UTC)
DateTime::ISO8601
DATE_ISO8601 ISO-8601 (example: 2005-08-15T15:52:01+0000)
DateTime::RFC822
DATE_RFC822 RFC 822 (example: Mon, 15 Aug 05 15:52:01 +0000)
DateTime::RFC850
DATE_RFC850 RFC 850 (example: Monday, 15-Aug-05 15:52:01 UTC)
DateTime::RFC1036
DATE_RFC1036 RFC 1036 (example: Mon, 15 Aug 05 15:52:01 +0000)
DateTime::RFC1123
DATE_RFC1123 RFC 1123 (example: Mon, 15 Aug 2005 15:52:01 +0000)
DateTime::RFC2822
DATE_RFC2822 RFC 2822 (Mon, 15 Aug 2005 15:52:01 +0000)
DateTime::RFC3339
DATE_RFC3339 Same as DATE_ATOM (since PHP 5.1.3)
DateTime::RSS
DATE_RSS RSS (Mon, 15 Aug 2005 15:52:01 +0000)
DateTime::W3C
DATE_W3C World Wide Web Consortium (example: 2005-08-15T15:52:01+00:00)

Date Time Operations & Preformating in PHP

DateTime::add
— Adds an amount of days, months, years, hours, minutes and seconds to a
DateTime object
DateTime::__construct
— Returns new DateTime object
DateTime::createFromFormat
— Returns new DateTime object formatted according to the specified format
DateTime::diff
— Returns the difference between two DateTime objects
DateTime::format
— Returns date formatted according to given format
DateTime::getLastErrors
— Returns the warnings and errors
DateTime::getOffset
— Returns the timezone offset
DateTime::getTimestamp
— Gets the Unix timestamp
DateTime::getTimezone
— Return time zone relative to given DateTime
DateTime::modify
— Alters the timestamp
DateTime::__set_state
— The __set_state handler
DateTime::setDate
— Sets the date
DateTime::setISODate
— Sets the ISO date
DateTime::setTime
— Sets the time
DateTime::setTimestamp
— Sets the date and time based on an Unix timestamp
DateTime::setTimezone
— Sets the time zone for the DateTime object
DateTime::sub
— Subtracts an amount of days, months, years, hours, minutes and seconds
from a DateTime object
DateTime::__wakeup
— The __wakeup handler

NISplus Installation & Administration

admin — Tue, 29 Dec 2009 22:08:24 +0000

NISplus is network which allows you to store client information at a
central place where all the clients have access. This enables system
administrators to manage a group of servers from a central place.
This article discusses the nisplus objects , installation of servers ,clients and administration commands.

1.0 Introduction to NIS+

1.1 Objects in NIS+

1.2 Standard tables in NIS+

1.3 Groups in NIS+

2.0 Preparing for Install

2.1 Installing Server

3.0 Installing Client

4.0 Administration commands
___________________________________

1.0 Introduction to
NIS+

NIS + is network information services
which allows you to store client information at a central place
where all the clients have access. The information
can be user passwords , home directories, network services .

etc .
The information is stored in NIS+ tables .
Some of the standard tables (16 in number) comes with predefined
structure when NIS+ is installed . The other tables can be created
as per requirement using NIS+ commands.
NIS+ uses hierarchical structure and can
have multiple domains servers .
NIS+ uses the client server model . The
primary server is called master server and the backup
server is called the replica server . Both server
runs NIS+ and have copies of tables . The changes in master server
are propagated to replica servers in increments.
For security it uses both authentication and
authorization for securing the access to system and resources.
Authentication verifies validity of a user ; Authorization
verifies if the user is allowed to have access to the
resources. Access to any NIS+ table can be controlled through the
table permissions.
Clients have a configuration file /etc/nsswitch.com
; entries in this file determines where the clients should look
for the information , in local files or NIS+ maps at the server.

1.1 Objects in NIS +
There are three objects in NIS+
1. Parent domain - represented by domain
name e.g. planet.com.: (Parent domain )

2. org_dir – which contains all the NIS+ tables .
3. groups_dir – contains the groups information , by default only admin
group is there.

1.2 Standard Tables in NIS+

They contain same type of information as standard files of the same
name .The passwd table however contains the encrypted password information
also .
passwd
group
auto_master     auto_home

Bootparams cred ethers
hosts

mail_aliases sendmailvars
netmasks netgroup

networks protocols
rpc
services

timezone client_info

1.3 Groups in NIS+
By default only admin group is created at the time of installation of NIS+
.

2.0 Preparing for Install
First step is to prepare the data files for NIS+ maps .This can be done by
coping the files which needs to be put in the nis+ tables for centralized
administration . The files are located in /etc and mostly have the same name
as NIS+ tables

If you want only passwords , groups , hosts , home directories to be
administered then you need to copy the these files in some other directory – say
nisfiles. You can make additional changes here .

#cp /etc/passwd      /export/home/nisfiles
#cp /etc/group       /export/home/nisfiles
#cp /etc/hosts       /export/home/nisfiles

auto_home can be created by editing a copy of passwd file and keeping
only the login name and home directory .

A typical auto_home will consists of following entries

#vi auto_home
+auto_home
peter 10.20.30.40:/home/&
john 10.20.30.40:/home/&

First column is user names followed by name of the machine
providing home directories & home directory path.

2.1 Installing Server
a) Define a default domain if not defined already in /etc/defaultdomain.

    #domainname
    planet.com
    #domainname > /etc/defaultdomain

b) As root ; change directory to the /usr/lib/nis or add PATH to this
directory.
    Run server initialization program.

    #nisserver -r

To setup server in NIS compatibility mode

#nisserver -r -Y

The above commands will setup the NIS+ server software.

Reboot the server

c) Login as root ; change directory to the one containing the files
auto_home , passwd and group.
    Run the command to populate the empty nis+ tables.

    #cd /export/home/nisfiles
    #nispopulate –v –F
    This will try to populate all the standard tables from
the files in local directory . you can also
    specify a particular file name in for populating
a single    table e.g.

    #nispopulate –v –F auto_home
    auto_home is the local file containg the entries in
proper format.

3.0 Installing Client
a.) Login as root in client
   Define a default domain name – planet here.
b.) Run the client initialsation programme.
   #nisclient –i -h jupiter -d panet.com
        h     is
for nis+ server host name .
        d     is
for nis+ domain name .

     reboot the client machine.
c.) Login again and open /etc/nsswitch.conf
    check to see that only entries coreesponding to the
populated tables are
    pointing to nisplus first and then files. Rest of
them should be files and nisplus.

4.0 Administration Commands

Following are some of the useful command for administering nis+

Listing table & objects in NIS+

#nisls ;Gives the total objects in NIS+
#nisls org_dir ;Lists the tables listed in the
directory.

Listing a contents of tables

#niscat passwd.org_dir

Listing table structure

#niscat -o passwd.org_dir ;lists structure of
password table.

Adding A user

#nistbladm -a name=john uid=123 gid=111 home=/home/john
shell=/bin/sh passwd.org_dir

Changing the user information in passwd table (Super user only

Fill in the corresponding values in <>

#nistbladm –a name=<> passwd=<> uid=<> gid=<>
home=<> shelll=<> passwd.org_d

example

#nistbladm -a name=john uid=123 gid=234 home=/home/john
shell=/bin/sh passwd.org_di

to change only shell

#nistbladm -m shell=/usr/local/bin/bash [name=john],passwd.org_dir

Changing user passwd

As root

# nispasswd ;user has to update his key
through chkey -p

As user

$ nispasswd ;update encrypted key
$chkey -p ;(user NIS+ passwd and login passwd are the
same.)

Adding user credentials

#nisaddcred -p 123 -P john local
# nisaddcred -p unix.123@planet.com -P john.planet.com. des

123 is userid and john is the user name.

Adding / removing a user dir entry in auto_home table :

#nistbladm -a key=john value=10.20.30.40:/home/john
auto_home.org_dir
#nistbladm -r key=john auto_home.org_dir ;If key is not
unique then more fields needs to be defined .

Removing a user

#nistbladm -r name=john passwd.org_dir

Modifying the tables for multiple
entries.

#nisaddent -d passwd > /tmp/passwd ;Dump the
table to a file
#vi /tmp/passwd ;Edit the dumped file
# nisaddent -r -f /tmp/passwd passwd ;Put back
the dumped file.

nisaddent command is available only for some of the
standard tables, for others either nispopulate or nistbladm has to
be used .

Sun Certification FAQs

admin — Tue, 29 Dec 2009 22:01:52 +0000

Strategy for Multiple Choice Certification Exams

admin — Tue, 29 Dec 2009 21:58:40 +0000

Basics

Take the list of exam objective and study carefully its
scope
Organize your study keeping these objectives in mind.

You may be knowing theoretical or practical much and is confident but
still you need to check up the objectives carefully so that you do not
miss anything in your study. This will narrow down your focus area to
individual topic or subtopic.

Study material

Once you know the topics look around you for the study material.
Generally the official web sites will have most of the
documentations and some commercially available books specifically
written for the purpose of exams are also available . But always try to
refer to two – three different sources as this gives a more
clear view of a topic and makes understanding clear.

How to study

We have been taking the exams since the school days and people have
developed their own style of study .some like to study in the day
time others in the night still others like a background music while
studying . Whatever may be your style stick to it but keep in mind
that in multiple choice questions you have to be exact and should be
able to differentiate between very similar answers.

You must have a peaceful place of study without any
distraction so that you can read between the lines . A distracted
study results in surfing the text – missing the key points.
Understand and visualize the process as whole – this will help
in addressing to practical problems in real environment as
well as some unsuspecting questions .
Note down important point - note down important point
while reading look for something which is not obvious and
different from the rest .
Try to recollect these point later - This will give an idea
of your preparation and helpful in revising later on .

In the exam

In multiple choice type questions there is one advantage
– answers are already there and one has to simply choose the
correct one but the problem is each answer looks
like correct one .So until your concepts are very clear it is
very likely that wrong answer is selected .But no one is
perfect so you will have to think a bit if you don’t
know the answer to a question . Since the answers are already there
you can start eliminating the incorrect answers by using your
knowledge and some logical thinking .

One common mistake is to select the first obvious looking answers
without checking the other options so always examine all the
options , think & choose the right answer .

It is always better to pass the questions ,of which your are not
sure, & come back there are few advantages for this

You avoid the tension and frustration of a suspected answer
which could affect the rest of answers.
You are able to use the time thus saved to answer the questions
you know
The solution may come to your mind till the time you come
back again
The later part of the questions may contains some clues to
the answers .

Time management in the exam

Generally the time is sufficient to answer all the questions but
if too much time is wasted on a few questions then it becomes
difficult . The best strategy would be to pass the difficult
question after carefully reading and attempt to them later.

Making it second time

If you can’t make it in first attempt – Prepare for the
second attempt , stay calm and focused . Don’t feel over confident
that it will be a piece of cake next time .If you can
recollect and write down the questions asked in the exam it will
help you in providing a focused area of study .

Sample Question – Solaris Certification

admin — Tue, 29 Dec 2009 21:52:03 +0000

Sample Question – Solaris Certification
Following are some sample questions . These are some of the representative questions and is meant to demonstrate the type of question you might expect in Solaris Certification examination and plan your study accordingly. No answers are given out of the belief that anyone preparing for the exam should be able to work it out .

Choose all the correct answers.

1) In Solaris how many disk slices a disk can have ?

a) 8 b) 7 c) 6 d)1

2)Which file is used to set the default mask in Solaris ?

a)/etc/profile b) .profile c) /etc/system d) /etc/inittab

3)What are the advantage for making disk partitions ?

a) Easy to maintain b) Easy for backing up
c) Limits problems to one partition only d) Space can be monitored easily.

4 )What does a + sign in /etc/hosts.equiv indicates ?

a) All hosts are allowed b) Only known hosts are allowed c) All users are allowed d) Unknown hosts are also allowed .

5 )Which command is used to mount local file system ?

a) mount -l b) mountall c) mount d) mount -r

6) Which command line option gives a run level and output headings ?

a) who -b b) who -r c) who -rh d) who -rH

7) which command is used to change the auto-boot feature in sun ultra ?

a) eeprom “auto-boot?”=true b) eeprom auto-boot?=true c) eeprom autoboot? true d) eeprom auto-boot = true ..

8 ) If patch id is 123456-10 then its revision number is -

a)123 b)456 c)10 d)6-10

9)Which commands can be used to make a device alias

a) devalias ay OK prompt b) dvalias at root prompt
c) nvram at ok prompt d) drvconfig at root prompt.

10) Where in Solaris encrypted passwords are stored ?

a) /etc/passwd b) /etc/shadow c)/etc/default/passswd d)/etc/initttab

11) What is required in a diskless workstation for Solaris workstation

a) cpu, monitor, keyboard, hard disk b) cpu, monitor, keyboard, cdrom drive
c) cpu, monitor, keyboard, Ethernet card d) cpu and Ethernet card only.

12)Which of the following points to virtual file system ?

a) /dev/dsk/c0t0d0s3 b) /dev/rdsk/c0t0d0s3
c) /dev/md/dsk/c0t0d0s3 d) /dev/vx/rdsk/data/vol1

13) Which Solaris command is used to correct filesystem problems?.

a) newfs b) fssck c) mkfs d) format

14) Which is the configuration file for the tip command

a)/etc/tip.conf b) /etc/remote c) /etc/inittab.d d) .profile

15) When automounter daemon needs to be restarted ?.

a) When direct map is changes b) When indirect map is changes
c) No need to restart d) When a new user is created

16) What is the default configuration cluster in Solaris installation ?.

a) Developer b) Core c) End user d) Entire Distriidution

17) Which utility is used to administer the port monitor ?

a)sacadm b) pmadm c) ttyadm d) admintool

18) What is the command to assign a ip address to qfe network interface ?

Write the command ……………………………………..

19) 10 30 * * 4 /usr/bin/loginfo entry in crontab will execute the program

a) Every Friday at 10.30 b) Every Thursday at 10.30
c) Every Saturday 10.30 d) Every Wednesday at 10.30

20) What do you need for a fresh Solaris Installation ?.

a) Host Name b) IP Address c) Net mask d) Domain name

21) How can you see the prom version ?

a) show version b) prom c) banner d) version

22) Which file enables you to disable root login on terminals ?.

a) /etc/profile b) .profile
c) /etc/default/login d) /etc/system

23 ) Which directory contain run level control scripts ?.

a) /etc/rc2.d b) /etc/init.d c) /etc/rc3.d d) /usr/bin

24) Which command show the patch installed in the system ?

a) patchadd -p b) showrev -p c) showpatch d) patchlist

25) What are the advantage of having a virtual file system ?.

a) Large capacity volumes b) Increased File system size
c) Performance enhancement d) backup becomes easy

26) Which file is used to define default run level for init process at booting time ?.

a) /etc/ttyyab b) /etc//ttyadm
c) /etc/inittab d) /etc/profile

27) Which command shows kernel parameters and and driver module information ?.

a) sysconfig b) prtconfig
c) dmesg d) prtconf

28) A multiuser operating system is one – in which

a) Many users can work simultaneously b) Many Processes can work simultaneously
c) A large number of users can be created d) A number of user home directories can be created.

29) What is true about software packages ?.

a) It is group of files & directories b) They are grouped to form clusters

c) It is standard way of delivering software in Solaris d) They can be installed using pkgadd command.

30)What type of names are used for administering disk drives in Solaris environment

a) Physical b) Logical c) Virtual d) disk instance

Solstice DiskSuite – Admin’s Guide

admin — Tue, 29 Dec 2009 21:17:20 +0000

**Table of Contents**
1.Advantages of Disksuite 2. Disksuite terms 3. Disksuite Packages 4. Installing DiskSuite 4.2.1 in Solaris 8 5. Creating State Database 6. Creating MetaDevices 6.1. Concatenated Metadevice 6.2. Striped Metadevice 6.3 Mirrored Metadevice 6.3.1 Simple mirror 6.3.2 Mirroring a unmountable Partition 6.3.3 root mirroring & /usr mirroring 6.3.4 Making alternate root disk bootable 6.3.5 Setting alternate boot path for root mirror 6.4 RAID 5	6.5 TransMeta Device 6.5.1 TransMeta device for unmountable partition 6.5.2 TransMeta device for non unmountable partition. 6.5.3 TransMeta device using Mirror 6.6 Hotspare Pool 6.6.1 Adding a Hotspare to Mirror 6.6.2 Adding a Hotspare to RAID5 6.6.3 Adding a disk to Hotspare Pool. 6.7 disksets 6.7.1 Creating two diskset 6.7.2 Adding disk to diskset 6.7.3 Creating Mirror in Diskset 7. TroubleShooting 7.1) Recovering from Stale State Database replicas 7.2) Metadevice Errors

1. Advantages of Disksuite

Solstice disk suite provides three major functionalities :

1. Over come the disk size limitation by providing for joining of
multiple disk slices to form a bigger volume.

2. Fault Tolerance by allowing mirroring of data from one disk to another
and keeping parity
information in RAID5.

3. Performance enhancement by allowing spreading the data space over
multiple disks .

2. Disksuite terms

Metadevice :A virtual device composed of several physical devices -
slices/disks . All the operations are carried out using metadevice
name and transparently implemented on the individual device.

RAID : A group of disks used for creating a virtual volume is called array and
depending on disk/slice arrangement these are called various types of RAID
(Redundant Array of Independent Disk ).

RAID 0 Concatenation/Striping

RAID 1 Mirroring

RAID 5 Striped array with rotating parity.

Concatenation :Concatenation is joining of two or more disk slices to add up the disk space
. Concatenation is serial in nature i.e. sequential data operation are performed
serially on first disk then second disk and so on . Due to serial nature new
slices can be added up without having to take the backup of entire concatenated
volume ,adding slice and restoring backup .

Striping :Spreading of data over multiple disk drives mainly to enhance the performance
by distributing data in alternating chunks – 16 k interleave across the stripes
. Sequential data operations are performed in parallel on all the stripes by
reading/writing 16k data blocks alternatively form the disk stripes.

Mirroring : Mirroring provides data redundancy by simultaneously writing data on to two
sub mirrors of a mirrored device . A submirror can be a stripe or concatenated
volume and a mirror can have three mirrors . Main concern here is that a mirror
needs as much as the volume to be mirrored.

RAID 5 : RAID 5 provides data redundancy and advantage of striping and uses less space
than mirroring . A RAID 5 is made up of at least three disk which are striped
with parity information written alternately on all the disks . In case of a
single disk failure the data can be rebuild using the parity information from
the remaining disks .

3. Disksuite Packages :

Solstice disk suite is a part of server edition of the Solaris OS and is not
included with desktop edition . The software is in pkgadd format & can be
found in following locations in CD :

Solaris 2.6 – “Solaris Server Intranet Extensions 1.0” CD.

Solaris 7 – “Solaris Easy Access Server 3.0”

Solaris 8 – “Solaris 8 Software 2 of 2”

Solaris 2.6 & 2.7 Solstice Disk suite version is 4.2 . Following packages are part of it but only the "SUNWmd" is the
minimum required package and a patch.

SUNWmd – Solstice DiskSuite

SUNWmdg – Solstice DiskSuite Tool

SUNWmdn – Solstice DiskSuite Log Daemon

Patch No. 106627-04 (obtain latest revision)

Solaris 8 DiskSuite version is 4.2.1 .Following are the minimum required packages ..

SUNWmdr Solstice DiskSuite Drivers (root)

SUNWmdu Solstice DiskSuite Commands

SUNWmdx Solstice DiskSuite Drivers (64-bit)

4. Installing DiskSuite 4.2.1 in Solaris 8

# cd /cdrom/sol_8_401_sparc_2/Solaris_8/EA/products/DiskSuite_4.2.1/sparc/Packages

# pkgadd -d .

The following packages are available:

1 SUNWmdg Solstice DiskSuite Tool