Repartitioning Contiguous Space in Linux

As a follow up to the same under Solaris, I thought I'd detail
repartitioning in-use, contiguous space in Linux. To recap the
situational setup, a filesystem (FS) has run out of space and the data
contained on it couldn't be removed or compressed to free up space.

Repartitioning Contiguous Space in Solaris

Recently, a system owner aked me for help because they had run out of space on one of their filesystems (FS). As a result, this was causing problems with the application they had running. Unfortunately, this FS was being used for database files so we couldn't just remove or

VxVM DG Disabled

During a recent SAN maintenance, we ran into an issue on a few hosts that
were unfortunately single pathed to the SAN and lost connectivity to it.
The SAN-presented disk devices were under Veritas Volume Manager (VxVM)
control which started to present I/O errors as a result and displayed

Creating an MD Root Mirror in Linux

For whatever reason, you originally set up your Linux host without a root
disk mirror and now you want it mirrored.  One could say "just re-install,"
but surely there is another way, and there is.  The solution isn't quick
or simple, though it isn't impossible.  Our host details are:

Missing GRUB Config in Linux

Having recently written up how to restore GRUB to a missing / corrupted
master boot record (MBR), it seemed appropriate to follow up with
resolving a missing GRUB config file.  Our host details for this
situation are:

GRUB, a Corrupted MBR, and Linux

Recently, after cloning a root disk in Linux, I ran into an issue because
I failed to setup the master boot record (MBR) on the alternate disk.
Everything else was configured, including the boot image files and grub
configuration under /boot/grub, but the MBR wasn't setup.  The following

Adding Swap Space in Linux

We've discussed FreeBSD and Solaris, now it's time to have a look at
adding swap space in Linux.  As previously handled, the setting up
of swap on a free disk partition or else a swap file is discussed.
The following details our example host:

Adding Swap Space in Solaris

Following up on "Adding Swap Space in FreeBSD", we take a look at the same
with Solaris.  As in the FreeBSD writeup, the usage of a free disk slice
or else a swap file is discussed.  The following details our host info:

Adding Swap Space in FreeBSD

While it shouldn't occur too frequently, it is likely at some point as a
sysadmin, you will need to add additional swap space to a box.  At that
time, your options will be to use a free disk partition with suitable
space or to create a swapfile on an existing filesystem.  The following

BIOS Boot Device - Solaris

In 'Host Info - Boot Parameters', we saw how the boot device on Solaris
could be identified using 'prtconf'.  The output was similar to:

        boot-device:    '/pci@1e,600000/ide@d/disk@0,0:a

Replacing VxVM with SVM for the rootdisk

The purpose of this post is to illustrate how to replace Veritas Volume
Manager (VxVM) with Sun Volume Manager (SVM) for control of the root disk
while leaving application volumes under VxVM control.  I had originally
tested this against Solaris 9 sparc running VxVM 4.0, though have updated

Overlaid Mount Problem

In UNIX environments, it's not uncommon to see various file systems (FS)
mounted, be it local storage, fiber attached from a SAN, network based
like NFS, etc.  These mounts may be exist for any number of reasons,
such as application data, user home directories, additional log space,

Host Info - Disks

Continuing the 'host info' series, we check out what disks are presented
to the system.  As usual, the details of our hosts are:

        HOSTS:          snorkle (sunhost), tux (linhost), beastie (bsdhost)

Identifying DMP Subpaths in Solaris

Recently I stumbled across one of my notes detailing a quick way to
identify the underlying subpaths supporting VxDMP devices:

        frost [0] /usr/sbin/vxdisk path

Logical Disk Names In Solaris

Anyone familiar with Solaris instantly recognizes c1t3d0s4 and that
it identifies slice 4 on disk c1t3d0.  That's great, but what does the
rest mean.  On other UNIX OSes, you might get sdb3 or da2s1a to identify
a disk slice / partition and have to use a variety of means to determine

Reassociating a Failed Disk in Veritas

Recently we had a situation wherein Vertias Volume Manager (VxVM)
marked a disk as 'failed' while additionally presenting the disk
available for use though unconfigured.  The weird part was that VxVM
continued to allow use of the volume until the volume was stopped.

Creating a Mirrored Volume with Geom (FreeBSD)

INTRO

While it's not uncommon to find a Solaris host with some sort of RAID
configuration in place, within some environments, RAID configurations

Solaris Devpath Enumeration

The purpose of this doc is show how to physically identify and enumerate
your disk devices on a Sun branded box.  The reasons to do this may
include identifying a disk for replacement, determining the bus it is
attached to, I/O balancing, etc.  Of note, this doc is only valid with Sun

ZFS Pool and FS Creation

Volume and file system management are traditionally separate affairs,
being created and maintained individually of one another.  With Sun's
ZFS, the line between the two become blurred.  As a brief understanding,
a 'zpool' can be generically considered a volume, comprised of multiple

Breaking and Syncing a SVM Root Mirror (Solaris)

INTRO

The information detailed below is to assist with proactive planning for
the potential demise and recovery of a host back to the state it was