Introducing VERITAS Foundation Suite for AIX

Introducing VERITAS Foundation Suite for AIX

by KyeongWon Jeong, Anita Govindjee, Fred Sherman, Jason Littin, Shona Robertson
Released November 2002
Publisher(s): IBM Redbooks
ISBN: None

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Book description

VERITAS Software products, such as VERITAS Volume Manager (VxVM) and VERITAS File System (VxFS), are popular on other UNIX platforms, and VERITAS announced these products for AIX in the early of May 2002. VERITAS Foundation Suite for AIX includes VERITAS Volume Manager for AIX and VERITAS File System for AIX. These products will be useful for people who are familiar with the same products on other UNIX platforms since VERITAS Foundation Suite for AIX provides a similar environment for them. That means they can use their same skills and knowledge in the AIX environment.

This IBM Redbooks publication will not only help system administrators who are familiar with VERITAS Foundation Suite on other UNIX platforms but also AIX system administrators who are familiar with AIX’s native Logical Volume Manager (LVM) and Journaled File Systems (JFS) and would like to learn more about VERITAS Foundation Suite for AIX.

This book will compare VERITAS Foundation Suite for AIX with VERITAS Foundation Suite for Sun Solaris as well as AIX’s native LVM and JFS/JFS2. One of the main focuses is the procedures, hints, and tips to migrate the existing environment to the AIX environment. It will also cover all the details about the functionalities of these products, including planning, installation, configuration, administration, performance, tuning, and troubleshooting. This book also introduces VERITAS Cluster Server in Appendix D for those interested in setting up a clustered environment.

Table of contents

  1. Figures
  2. Tables
  3. Notices
    1. Trademarks
  4. Preface
    1. The team that wrote this redbook
    2. Become a published author
    3. Comments welcome
  5. Chapter 1: Introduction
    1. What is VERITAS Foundation Suite for AIX
      1. Additional VERITAS products on AIX 5L Version 5.1
      2. Other supported platforms of VERITAS Foundation Suite
      3. VERITAS NetBackup on AIX
    2. IBM-VERITAS relationship
      1. History of VERITAS
      2. Joint agreements, offerings, and activities
      3. VERITAS programs focused on interoperability
    3. VERITAS Foundation Suite on the AIX Bonus Pack
    4. Why use VERITAS Foundation Suite on AIX
    5. Support for LVM and JFS for AIX
  6. Chapter 2: Components
    1. Overview
      1. VERITAS Volume Manager overview
      2. VERITAS File System overview
      3. VERITAS Enterprise Administrator overview
    2. VERITAS Volume Manager
      1. Features
      2. Physical objects
      3. Device discovery
      4. Enclosure-based naming
      5. Virtual objects
      6. Volume layouts (1/2)
      7. Volume layouts (2/2)
      8. Layered volumes
      9. Online relayout
      10. Hot relocation
      11. Dirty Region Logging (DRL)
    3. VERITAS File System
      1. Features
      2. Disk layout
      3. Extent-based allocation
      4. Inodes
      5. Caching
      6. Journaling
      7. Online file system resizing
      8. Online defragmentation
  7. Chapter 3: Planning and installation
    1. Pre-installation planning
      1. Hardware requirements
      2. Operating system and software requirements
      3. File system space
      4. Licensing
      5. Selecting disks for use in VxVM
    2. Installation
      1. Installation using VRTSinstall
      2. Installation using SMIT
      3. Installation using installp
    3. Post-installation tasks
      1. Installing product licenses
      2. Initializing VERITAS Volume Manager (1/3)
      3. Initializing VERITAS Volume Manager (2/3)
      4. Initializing VERITAS Volume Manager (3/3)
      5. Post-installation verification
      6. Uninstalling VxFS and VxVM
  8. Chapter 4: Basic administration
    1. System startup and process control
      1. Startup process
      2. Managing processes
    2. Methods of administration
      1. Command-line interface
      2. VEA Java GUI
      3. VERITAS supplied utilities
      4. Using SMIT
    3. Basic administration tasks
      1. Adding disks
      2. Creating disk groups
      3. Creating volumes (1/3)
      4. Creating volumes (2/3)
      5. Creating volumes (3/3)
      6. Viewing VxVM object information (1/2)
      7. Viewing VxVM object information (2/2)
      8. Creating file systems
      9. Mounting file systems
      10. Resizing file systems
      11. Monitoring for failures
  9. Chapter 5: Advanced administration
    1. Dynamic multipathing
    2. Volume administration
      1. Monitoring tasks
      2. Creating volumes using vxmake
      3. Adding a mirror to a volume
      4. Removing a mirror from a volume
      5. Adding a log to a volume
      6. Creating layered volumes
      7. Changing volume layouts
      8. Renaming volumes
      9. Removing volumes
    3. Disk group administration
      1. Adding and removing disks from disk groups
      2. Removing disk groups
      3. Deporting and importing disk groups
    4. Backups and restores
      1. File system snapshots
      2. Volume snapshots
      3. Split mirror backups
      4. Using vxdump and vxrestore
    5. Problem prevention and resolution
      1. Hot relocation
      2. Hot sparing
      3. Evacuating volumes from a disk
      4. Replacing or removing disks
    6. File system administration
      1. Setting block and intent log size
      2. Quotas
      3. Defragmenting file systems
      4. Optionally licensable features
  10. Chapter 6: Comparisons
    1. Comparisons with other UNIX platforms
      1. ODM and SMIT integration
      2. Disk devices and the VxVM
      3. VxVM and LVM co-existence
      4. VxVM at system startup and shutdown
      5. VxVM/VxFS command differences
      6. VxVM/VxFS device drivers and kernel extensions
      7. Installation and packaging
      8. The 64-bit kernel
      9. Debugging information
      10. Dynamic MultiPathing (VxDMP)
    2. AIX LVM, JFS/JFS2 and VxVM, VxFS compared
      1. Logical volume concepts (1/2)
      2. Logical volume concepts (2/2)
      3. Volume layouts (1/2)
      4. Volume layouts (2/2)
      5. Backup
      6. Hot spare management
      7. JFS/JFS2 and VxFS comparison
  11. Chapter 7: Migration considerations
    1. Reasons for migration
    2. Planning for migration
      1. Applications
      2. Operating system considerations
    3. Migration of VxVM and VxFS on Solaris to AIX
      1. Test environment configuration
      2. Cloning volume layouts
      3. File system recreation
      4. Tape backup and recovery
      5. Using network facilities
      6. Deport/import of VxVM disk groups
      7. Using VERITAS Volume Replicator (VVR)
    4. Migration from AIX LVM to VxVM
      1. Test environment configuration
      2. Converting LVM volume groups to VxVM disk groups (1/2)
      3. Converting LVM volume groups to VxVM disk groups (2/2)
      4. Manual migration of LVM and JFS to VxVM and VxFS
    5. Other migration scenarios
      1. Single platform migration
      2. Migration of a UNIX File system (UFS) to VxFS on AIX
    6. Summary and recommendations
  12. Chapter 8: Performance, tuning, and scalability
    1. Basic performance guidelines for VxVM and VxFS
      1. Physical disks and data assignment
      2. VxVM logs
      3. Extent-based allocation
      4. Inode and directory optimizations
      5. VxFS create options
      6. Mount command options
    2. Monitoring VxVM and VxFS
      1. vxstat and vxtrace
    3. Tuning
      1. VxVM global parameters
      2. VxFS global parameters
      3. Self tuning file systems
      4. File system tuning parameters
    4. Application interface support
      1. Cache advisories
      2. Other programatic advisories
    5. Scalability
      1. Architectural scalability
      2. Administrative scalability
      3. Scaling services
  13. Chapter 9: Troubleshooting and technical support
    1. How to get patches
      1. How to get patches from VERITAS
      2. How to get patches from IBM
    2. How to get technical support
      1. How to get technical support from VERITAS
      2. How to get technical support from IBM
    3. Installation issues
      1. VERITAS patches
      2. IBM APARs
      3. Possible installation issues
    4. Administration issues
    5. References for troubleshooting
  14. Appendix A: LVM and VxVM command comparison tables (1/2)
  15. Appendix A: LVM and VxVM command comparison tables (2/2)
  16. Appendix B: JFS/JFS2 and VxFS command comparison tables
  17. Appendix C: Sample installation scripts (1/3)
  18. Appendix C: Sample installation scripts (2/3)
  19. Appendix C: Sample installation scripts (3/3)
  20. Appendix D: The VERITAS Cluster Server for AIX
    1. Executive overview
    2. Components of a VERITAS cluster
    3. Cluster resources
    4. Cluster configurations
    5. Cluster communication
    6. Cluster installation and setup
    7. Cluster administration facilities
    8. HACMP and VERITAS Cluster Server compared
      1. Components of an HACMP cluster
      2. Cluster resources
      3. Cluster configurations
      4. Cluster communications
      5. Cluster installation and setup
      6. Cluster administration facilities
      7. HACMP and VERITAS Cluster Server feature comparison summary
  21. Abbreviations and acronyms
  22. Related publications
    1. IBM Redbooks
      1. Other resources
    2. Referenced Web sites
    3. How to get IBM Redbooks
      1. IBM Redbooks collections
  23. Index (1/3)
  24. Index (2/3)
  25. Index (3/3)
  26. Back cover

Product information

  • Title: Introducing VERITAS Foundation Suite for AIX
  • Author(s): KyeongWon Jeong, Anita Govindjee, Fred Sherman, Jason Littin, Shona Robertson
  • Release date: November 2002
  • Publisher(s): IBM Redbooks
  • ISBN: None