SUMMARY: NSR savepnpc - what am I doing wrong.

From: Kevin Criss <kcriss_at_dwd.state.in.us>
Date: Tue, 06 Apr 1999 17:34:46 -0500

     ----------------------------------------------------------------------
     [Contents]
     
     Attached you will find an [Overview] which defines the savepnpc
     problem we were trying to resolve.
     
     We also included a brief explanation on [What is savepnpc] with links
     to a savepnpc man pages.
     
     The obligatory [Thank You] section which acknowledges the people who
     responded to or who showed interest in our [Q] query.
     
     A [Summary] section written in a narrative email style.
     
     A description of a [Common savepnpc hang-up] and how to get unhung.
     
     Plus we including two (2) bonus sections on configuring NSR to
     automatically shutdown and restart Oracle databases. We got it to
     work in the [How to for Digital UNIX] and [How to for Windows NT]
     sections.
     
     Plus you will find our original [Q] AND [Q continued] sections at the
     bottom of this [Summary].
     
     
     ---------------------------------------------------------------------
     [Overview]
     
     Networker savepnpc will execute client-scripts at the beginning of a
     backup group and then execute client-scripts at the completion of a
     backup group. We were having problems making NSR's savepnpc facility
     work us. Specifically we could not get savepnpc to shutdown or
     restart our Oracle8 databases. This problem was resolved.
     
     Our thanks go out to those who helped us or showed interest in our [Q]
     query for assistance. We feel the problem we experienced was on the
     cutting edge because not many people from the mailing list responded
     with suggestions, but lucky for us, we were able to resolve this
     problem through our support agreement with Compaq. See the file on
     ticket #C990329-2340.
     
     The real resolution for this bug lies either with Legato 5.2 and/or
     Oracle 8.0.4 because it is really their bug, however you can apply a
     patch locally to fix this problem at your site it you choose to. Jump
     down to the [Summary] section to find out about this patch.
     
     Oracle users take note! My DBAs assure me if your not doing one of
     the following three scenarios, NSR is not giving you a good backup of
     your database. To successfully backup your Oracle database with NSR,
     you must be doing one of the following:
     
     1) Invest in the Oracle Business Suite so you can do "HOT ON THE
        FLY" backups and other good things.
     
     2) Use the "savepnpc" feature to automate database shutdowns and
        restarts before/after NSR performs its "COLD" off-line backup of
        your database.
     
     3) If you choose not to use the Business Suite, or "COLD" automation
        through savepnpc you must manually shutdown your database instance
        before your backup process begins and then manually restart that
        instance upon completion of the backup. Suppose your backup group
        contains (10) ten clients and each client has a database, you must
        manually shut down each client's database instance before the
        backup group runs. If you aren't off-line-ing these databases you
        aren't getting a good backup of them. That's how I understand it
        and that's the main assumption for this [Q] and [Summary] review.
     
     To resolve our savepnpc problems, I think we logged three separate
     calls on the subject because we had several problems to resolve,
     however once you learn the tips, tricks, and trade-secrets of
     savepnpc, getting it to work is really quite easy.
     
     
     ----------------------------------------------------------------------
     [What is savepnpc]
     
     savepnpc is a feature of Legato's NSR beginning with release 5.2.
     This feature provides Legato customers a mechanism for executing
     scripts prior to backing up a client group and for executing scripts
     at the completion of the backup for that client group. You create
     your backup groups, giving them names, and deciding which clients
     belong to that group. It is very easy to add or remove one or more
     clients from a given backup group using the nwadmin GUI.
     
     You need savepnpc to shut down processes that are running because we
     believe NSR skips over resources attached to running processes, and if
     you shut a process down you'll probably want to restart it after your
     backup completes. Savepnpc does this for you. :)
     
     (********* savepnpc in a nutshell **********)
     http://www.adcomp.ch/cluhelp/appb37.htm#50217
     
     
     ----------------------------------------------------------------------
     [Thank You]
     
     John Speno speno_at_isc.upenn.edu
     Partin.Kevin KPartin_at_hou.mdc.com
     Russ Fish Russ_Fish_at_idx.com
     Harish Arora arisharora_at_hotmail.com
     Gene Zurik zurik_at_alf.dec.com
     Lannie Loh loh_at_decatl.alf.dec.com
     Sakellaris Alexander asakelaris_at_cosmote.gr
     Mike Gaunnac MGaunnac_at_DWD.State.IN.US
     
     
     ----------------------------------------------------------------------
     [Summary] [Q] NSR savepnpc - what am I doing wrong 02/26/1999
     
     ---
     Kevin,
     
     If you find reasonable answer to this problem then please forward it
     to me also. I am also looking for this functionality. TIA!
     
     -Harish Arora 02/26/1999
     ---
     
     
     ---
     Harish,
     
     I will but I am not having any luck with this thing yet, and its
     really starting to bug me. Savepnpc looks so easy to use too! I don't
     know what I'm doing wrong either. Cause I followed the directions. :(
     
     -Kevin
     ---
     
     
     ---
     Kevin,
     
     Are these commands working by hand? If yes, then use full path
     instead of changing directory by cd command ie sh /sbin/init.d/oracle
     stop
     
     -Alexander Sakellaris 02/26/1999 ---
     
     
     ---
     Alex,
     
     You are probably on to something with this "full path" suggestion of
     yours. I am just not ready to hear what you are saying. Sorry, I am
     just kind of dense and stupid, maybe next time I will listen to you
     sooner. :)
     
     -Kevin 02/26/1999
     ---
     
     
     ---
     I give up. I'm posting another query to the mailing list and logging
     another service call to Compaq on this.
     
     -Kevin 03/29/1999
     ---
     
     
     ---
     Compaq Resolution #C990329-2340 03/29/1999
     
     Hi Kevin,
     
     I took a short lunch and looked at your [Q]continued web page.
     
     This is what I think has happened...
     Since it couldn't find "su", "data", and "touch" command, your pre
     command failed. When it failed, it wouldn't create
     a /nsr/tmp/<groupname>.tmp file. When the second saveset started,
     savepnpc though the pre command hasn't been run yet, so it ran again.
     Then it failed again... This repeated for all savesets. I think
     this is why you see savepnpc tried to run your script multiple times.
     
     Please try to use full path for those commands to see if it works.
     Please let me know the result.
     
      Thanks,
     -Lannie
     ---
     
     
     ---
     Lannie,
     
     So what you are saving is, all the commands in the script
     /sbin/int.d/oracle need to be fully qualified in order to make
     Networker's savepnpc facility function correctly.
     
     Is this due to some deficiency in the way Legato's coded their
     savepnpc facilities or could it be some environmental setting in our
     .dtprofile or .profile as it relating to my PATH variables? I don't
     think the paths /usr/opt/networker/bin or /usr/var/nsr/res are set in
     my PATH statements for the NSR administrators.
     
     Reference: NSR: savepnpc what am I doing wrong now?
     http://www.ornl.gov/its/archives/mailing-lists/alpha-osf-managers/1999
     /03/msg00611.html
     
     -Kevin
     ---
     
     
     ---
     Hi Kevin,
     
     If you don't use full path, you need to define your PATH environment
     variable correctly in your script.
     
     Savepnpc runs your script as root, but I don't think it should inherit
     PATH from root login since it didn't run root's login file, .profile
     or whatever it's using, and it shouldn't run. This is just like you
     run a script thru cron. The default PATH for root is very minimum.
     If you print the value of the PATH in your script, you'll see what you
     get.
     
      Thanks,
     -Lannie
     ---
     
     
     ---
     Lannie,
     
     Your suggestion appears to be working. I am not sure who wrote the
     /sbin/init.d/oracle script. I assume it was the vendor any way one of
     our DBA's, Ramesh, made the changes you suggested and it appears to
     have resolved our savepnpc problems.
     
     Lannie, you may close out the problem ticket. Thank you for working
     our problem. We really appreciate it.
     
     -Kevin
     ---
     
     
     ---
     Hi Kevin,
     
     I am glad that the problem was solved, and thanks for letting me know.
     Have a nice day!
     
     -Lannie
     ---
     
     
     ---
     We believe the root of the problem lies somewhere between the Legato's
     5.2 and Oracle's 8.0.4 release. We hope somebody will read this
     summary and address the problem in future releases. Until they do
     this, you need to address it locally. Edit your /sbin/init.d/oracle
     script and fully qualify the paths to the commands: "date", "touch",
     and "su" to path locations appropriate for your shop..
     
     -Kevin
     ---
     
     ----------------------------------------------------------------------
     [common savepnpc hangups]
     
     On 02/24/1999 we noticed savepnpc quit working for us. We could tell
     it was hung by looking at date and time stamp information in the
     /nsr/logs/messages and /nsr/logs/savepnpc.log files. They stopped
     accruing new messages. If this happens to you it means your savepnpc
     pre and post command scripts are not getting executed. Your hung up.
     These hang-ups can occur to one or more clients of a given group while
     other groups work correctly without a glitch. If this happens you
     need to check locally at each client for the presence of
     /nsr/tmp/your-NSRgroup-name.tmp and remove those files.
     
     ---
     Dear Compaq,
     
     Savepnpc quit working on 02/24/1999. I have the command savepnpc
     entered in the client's Backup Command attribute, I believe this use
     to work but recently it quit working. We are just now ramping
     Networker into a production environment after a couple of months
     experimentation. I believe savepnpc quit working for us on
     02/24/1999. Can you help?
     
     - Kevin
     ---
     
     
     ---
     Kevin,
     
     Here is a suggestion that Lannie had. Check for the presence of the
     following files.
     
     /nsr/tmp/group.tmp where group is your group name
     
     If it exists, remove it and delete the group.res files from /nsr/res
     and let nsr create the default files. Then
     wait and see what happens.
     
     - Gene Zurik problem resolution #C990305-1359 ---
     
     
     ---
     Gene,
     
     Yes that fixes my problem. I guess I hosed NSR somehow, and those
     temporary files got stuck. I checked all my clients for stray
     /nsr/tmp/*.tmp files and removed all tmp files I could find. Savepnpc
     is working again.
     
     -Kevin
     ---
     
     
     ----------------------------------------------------------------------
     [How to for Digital Unix]
     
     1) Using the nwadmin GUI create a group and add your clients to that
        group. This is a fairly easy thing to do, you just play with it.
        You can't hurt anything playing with this.
     
     2) Using the nwadmin GUI, for each client you want to use savpnc with
        go to {client} {client setup} pulldown menu and highlight the
        desired client. Then type the following word in that client's
        backup command field >> savepnpc <<. Don't type in these >> <<
        characters though.
     
     3) What was the name of the group you created in step 1? lets call
        it your-group-name.
     
        On each client in that group with a database create this file
        /nsr/res/your-group-name.res
     
        Then edit this file /nsr/res/your-group-name.res and type in the
        following commands.
     
        ---
        type: savepnpc;
        precmd: "/usr/bin/sh /sbin/init.d/oracle stop", "/bin/sleep 60";
        pstcmd: "/usr/bin/sh /sbin/init.d/oracle start", "/bin/sleep 60";
        timeout: "12:00pm";
        ---
     
        That's it end of step 3, don't keyin the --- characters.
     
      4) There is a bug somewhere between Legato 5.2 and Oracle 8.0.4 you
         can correct it though. Apply this local patch. Edit the
         following file /sbin/init.d/oracle. Fully qualify the paths to
         the "su", "date", and "touch" commands. Fix-qualify all
         references to these commands.
     
         Ours commands use to look like this: Now they look like this:
            su /usr/bin/su
            date /usr/bin/date
            touch /usr/bin/touch
     
         That's it end of step 4.
     
       5) You are ready to go, don't experiment during business hours
          because you will bring down your database. Using the nwadmin GUI
          touch on the group button, highlight the your-group-name group
          and press the start button. Watch out your database is going
          down, its going to get backed up and restarted too!
     
     ----------------------------------------------------------------------
     [How to for Windows NT]
     
     
     ---
     From Mike Gaunnac
     3/2/99 11:40:15 AM (rev. 3/19/99 11:24:41 AM)
     
     If you want to use the NET START and NET STOP commands of Windows NT
     to control your Oracle Database:
     
     1. Set service OracleService<SID> to start manually
     
     2. Set service OracleStart<SID> to start automatically
     
     3. Set registry entry HKLM/SOFTWARE/ORACLE/ORA_SHUTDOWN = TRUE
     
     4. Shutdown and restart the instance
     
     5. In command mode :
     NET STOP OracleTNSListener80
     NET STOP OracleStart<SID>
     NET STOP OracleService<SID>
     
     NET START OracleStart<SID>
     NET START OracleTNSListener80
     
     These commands may be used to bracket a cold-backup session.
     
     6. For Networker set up the file C:\WIN32APP\NSR\RES\<group_name>.RES
         as follows:
     
     type: savepnpc;
     precmd: "NET STOP OracleTNSListener80","NET STOP
     OracleStart<SID>","NET STOP OracleService<SID>";
     pstcmd: "NET START OracleStart<SID>","NET START OracleTNSListener80";
     timeout: "12:00pm";
     
     See "Oracle8 Enterprise Edition Getting Started" Chapter 10 if you
     need further instructions.
     
     - Mike Gaunnac
     ---
     
     ---
     Thanks Mike, I can see your script is working. Thanks a million, I
     appreciate your help.
     
     - Kevin
     ---
     
     ----------------------------------------------------------------------
     [Q] NSR: savepnpc - Continued, what am I doing wrong now? 03/29/1999
     
     Below you will find our group resource file. The goal is to shutdown
     the Oracle8 databases before the backup job begins. Below you will
     find the savepnpc group resource file that we experiment with.
     
     /nsr/res/Alpha123-backup.res
     type: savepnpc;
     precmd: "/usr/bin/sh /sbin/init.d/oracle stop", "/bin/sleep 60";
     pstcmd: "/usr/bin/sh /sbin/init.d/oracle start", "/bin/sleep 60";
     timeout: "12:00pm";
     
     Diagnostics produced after running this group would indicate the
     pre-command is executing once for each save set instead of "AS
     ADVERTISED" once for each client in the backup group.
     
     There are (3) clients in the backup group. He are sample diagnostics
     of what we are getting.
     
     --- Unsuccessful Save Sets ---
     * alpha1.dwd.state.in.us:/ 1 retry attempted
     * alpha1.dwd.state.in.us:/ past first iffi set *
     alpha1.dwd.state.in.us:/ LOG config
     * alpha1.dwd.state.in.us:/ /sbin/init.d/oracle: touch: not found *
     alpha1.dwd.state.in.us:/ Test of stop begins here
     * alpha1.dwd.state.in.us:/ /sbin/init.d/oracle: date: not found *
     alpha1.dwd.state.in.us:/ stopping V2 listner
     * alpha1.dwd.state.in.us:/ stopping Oracle database
     * alpha1.dwd.state.in.us:/ /sbin/init.d/oracle: su: not found
     * alpha1.dwd.state.in.us:/usr /sbin/init.d/oracle: touch: not found *
     alpha1.dwd.state.in.us:/usr Test of stop begins here
     * alpha1.dwd.state.in.us:/usr /sbin/init.d/oracle: date: not found *
     alpha1.dwd.state.in.us:/usr stopping V2 listner
     * alpha1.dwd.state.in.us:/usr stopping Oracle database
     * alpha1.dwd.state.in.us:/usr /sbin/init.d/oracle: su: not found
     * alpha1.dwd.state.in.us:/a1u00 /sbin/init.d/oracle: touch: not found
     * alpha1.dwd.state.in.us:/a1u00 Test of stop begins here
     * alpha1.dwd.state.in.us:/a1u00 /sbin/init.d/oracle: date: not found
     * alpha1.dwd.state.in.us:/a1u00 stopping V2 listner
     * alpha1.dwd.state.in.us:/a1u00 stopping Oracle database
     * alpha1.dwd.state.in.us:/a1u00 /sbin/init.d/oracle: su: not found .
     .
     .
     etc. etc. etc. for each save set of all (3) clients
     
     ---
     Additional Info follows:
     
     All thre clients run NSR 5.2, under Digitial UNIX 4.0E with no patch
     kits applied. Plus each client has two network interface cards
     configured with the host names for these containing either mixed case
     letters and/or hyphens. I.E. alpha1, alpha1-nsr, alpha2, alpha2-nsr,
     alpha3, alpha3-nsr.
     
     Also we are not using the Business Suite module for Oracle8 even
     though the licenses packs were purchased, enabled and authorized
     through NSR. We don't because our DBA's figure why do hot on the fly
     backups when we have the time at night for cold offline backups.
     ---
     
     - Thanks
     Kevin Criss
     
     ----------------------------------------------------------------------
     [Q] NSR: savepnpc what am I doing wrong? 02/26/1999
     
     http://www.ornl.gov/its/archives/mailing-lists/alpha-osf-managers/1999
     /02/msg00615.html
Received on Tue Apr 06 1999 - 22:44:07 NZST

This archive was generated by hypermail 2.4.0 : Wed Nov 08 2023 - 11:53:39 NZDT