[rescue] Throw me a bone please

[N. Miller]

On Tue, 27 May 2003 12:03:54 -0400 (EDT), "Curtis H. Wilbar Jr."
<rescue at hawkmountain.net> said:

 
> Sounds to me like your card/StorEdge are JBOD (Just a Bunch of Disks). 
> If that is the case, DiskSuite will allow you to setup software RAID 5, or
> RAID 0+1, etc.  If you have a graphical console, DiskSuite has a nice
> GUI interface (although have they integrated this into the new Java
> based entire system admin tool (which I'm blanking on the name since I've
> never used it)).

I can't answer this, but I can say that for a beginner, you will find
the GUI very helpful in figuring out all the meta-slice mumbo jumbo
(assuming it gives you graphical representations of the slices).
This was the hardest thing about ODS back in the days before Veritas
Volume Manager, and I never really understood it until I used the GUI
in VM to get a "picture" of what was going on.
 
> DiskSuite (at least in Solaris 8) is on one of the discs (can't recall
> which).  It may or not be still in the early access ("EA") directory.
> It has been a while since I installed DiskSuite from CD.  The majoriting
> of systems I've setup are done via jumpstart, and all packages, etc are
> handled by the jumpstart config.

IIRC, if you did an "install everything" selection of Solaris, ODS should
be
in /opt.

Also, a warning from the old days.  Never use slice 2 as the "full" disk 
under ODS.  Instead, partition the disk with another slice with all the 
cylinders.  If you use slice 2, and that disk fails, should you replace
it
with the exact same disk model (e.g. exact same disk geometry), it 
will think you are putting the same *broken* disk back into the RAID.
I don't quite understand it--I assume it's got something to do with 
the fact that slice 2 is the "logical" descriptor of the disk.  (I never
really took the time to investigate it, just took the lesson to heart,
and *never* use slice 2 for anything!)

Dunno if this still holds true of the current ODS, but I'd be leary of 
doing it.

I got bit in the a$$ several times while I was a very green sys admin b/c
a sr. sys admin in our team was a lazy #$% and wouldn't take the time
to build a separate partition.  Whomever was on call had to eat his dog
food when it bit the farm.

Have fun--
=Nadine=
-- 
  N. Miller
  vraptor at promessage.com