SUMMARY: Moving system boot disk

From: DEBRULER, BONNIE <DEBRULER_at_eglin.af.mil>
Date: Tue, 20 Feb 1996 17:57:27 -0600 (CST)

Thanks to all those who responded to my query.

Jon Buchanan (Jonathan.Buchanan_at_ska.com)
Dr. Tom Blinn (tpb_at_zk3.dec.com)
Martin Moore (martin_at_jerry.alf.dec.com)
Carlos Sanchez (csanchez_at_cirp.es)
Tim W. Janes (janes_at_signal.dra.hmg.gb)
Micahel Matthews (matthewm_at_sgate.com)
Michel Cyr (cyrmich_at_sidoci.qc.ca)
Alan (alan_at_nabeth.cxo.dec.com)
Barb Baker (baker.barb_at_tchden.org)
Paul Rockwell (rockwell_at_rch.dec.com)
(waldorf!daleb_at_uunet.uu.net)

Everyone had wonderful advice, tips, and pointers. But as I feared it was
not quite as easy as that! BUT it wasn't so hard either, once I
determined to be brave and march on.

(please excuse my humor in the following summary...but it's been a long
day...)


First, I did not have to go to single user mode, as I am currently, the
only user! One happy item. So I thought I would be home free--no messing
with bcheck* and partial o/s's, but.... Not yet.

I did the disklabel on the external drive and then, being VERY conservative
-- that's the word I prefer, feel free to substitute your own -- I compared
the two disks and found that the current system disk did not have anything
close to the default disklabel. (There is probably a flag that would have
given me the proper disklabel - right!?) So I modified the external disk's
disklabel to match and continued on my fearful (is that fearless?)
journey....

    Actual commands: #disklabel -wr new-device rz28
                                     #disklabel -r old-device

                                     #disklabel -e new-device
                                       ...quick cut and paste here...

Next I simply used the free mount point to create a new fs's and mounted
them on the external partitions associated with / and later /usr.
Performed a dump from the internal device piped to a restore to the
external device and proceded to Mt. Omeomy....editting **** system files
****!

    Actual commands: #newfs new-device_a for /
                                     #mount /dev/new-device_a /mnt
                                     #dump - 0f - /dev/old-device_a | (cd /mnt; restore -xf x)
                                     #df
                                     #umount /mnt

                                     #newfs new-device_g for /usr
                                     #mount /dev/new-device_g /mnt
                                     #dump - 0f - /dev/old-device_g | (cd /mnt; restore -xf x)
                                     #df
                                     #umount /mnt

Next I remounted the new-device's / fs and grep'd for any references to the
old-device. Quickly changed them and thought, so I'm finished.... Not even
yet!

I rebooted and the system seemed to be coming up fine, until a whole truck
(nice word--not the one I wanted) load of CAM errors scrolled by so fast
that they were illegible. (This is a 266MHz box ya'know!)

No problem, I had noticed that all these CAM errors seemed to arise when
attempting to access the 2nd of the two external drives. So I unplugged
that drive and rebooted very cleanly.

Thinking that I would be able to see these errors in the message log, I
went there and found only what appeared to have been a successful boot.
(?) There were only two boots at that time on the external drives and both
were practically identical--certainly no CAM errors....

Where did these errors go to? They are like little lost sheep out there
and have left not a single track to follow.

The good news is that after researching all I could concerning CAM errors
in general, I think the reseating of the problem drive must have solved the
situation. After all I have been up and running all day on the external
drive and even placed the production area out on the second external drive.
(Not everything scares me -- only the unusual.)

I would like to see what the actual CAM error was though. So, if anyone
does know where the CAM errors are logged, if they are, please send money
-- I mean the information to my email address.


The thing about UNIX that scares me is that UNIX scares me!

I hope the humor of the above summary is appreciated. It wasn't even 1/4
as bad as I thought it would be. Actually, this was a rather interesting
little process that took all of about 90 minutes, considering my quivering
fingers, I was quite proud of myself!


Thanks for your help, all!
Like so many before me have said, "This is a wonderful list!"--and much
appreciated.


Bonnie DeBruler
debruler_at_eglin.af.mil
Received on Wed Feb 21 1996 - 01:59:06 NZDT

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