Cloud DevOps Admin Guide

If you find any critical hardware or software issuess in errpt of a AIX server, you need to call IBM support .

 IBM support contact number - 1-800-426-7378 (1-800-IBM-SERV)

Check the information about the last recorded system dump (sysdumpdev –L). If this command reports no previous dump was recorded, then you will not be able to submit a system dump testcase. A dump will not be recorded if:
# sysdumpdev -L
0453-039
Device name: /dev/lg_dumplv
Major device number: 10
Minor device number: 11
Size: 21010432 bytes
Date/Time: Tue Feb 12 13:05:33 CST 2002
Dump status: 0
dump completed successfully

Ensure the Date/Time is the actual time when the system crashed or hung. If the time stamp is old, the dump will not contain any information about the latest outage and there is no need to create a system dump testcase.

Check the dump status: If the status is 0 (Succesful dump) OR -2 (Dump device is too small) OR -3 (Dump crashed or didn't start): Proceed to step to create the system dump testcase.

If the status is -4 (Dump failed due to i/o error): There might not be a system dump if Size is 0 bytes. This usually indicates a bad disk or disk adapter. Check the error report for disk or disk adapter errors. If hardware errors exist, consider also opening a ticket with IBM Hardware Support. Even if the size of the dump is 0 bytes, proceed to step to create the system dump testcase so that AIX Software Support can assist with determining why the dump failed.

If the status is -1 (No dump device is defined): There is no system dump. A dump device should be configured so that a dump can be captured the next time the system crashes.

The snap command will be be used to create the testcase in the file system of your choice. The command creates a number of sub-directories including a directory named dump that will include a compressed copy of the system dump. The -c option on the snap command will create a compressed pax archive of the sub-directories named snap.pax.Z and this is the testcase file that should be ftp'ed to IBM. You will need to find a file system with sufficient space to hold all of the testcase data. In general, the file system you choose should have enough free space to hold about 2.5 times the size of the compressed system dump if the system is using dump compression. Dump compression is always used on AIX 6.1 or higher, but is optional on AIX 5. The sysdumpdev -L command can be used to obtain the size of the system dump to use in determining how much space will be required to hold the testcase. 

AIX 6.1 or higher:

The output from sysdumpdev -L will contain the following line that shows the size of the
compressed system dump.
Size: N (this is the size of the compressed dump in bytes)
Find a file system with at least 2.5 times this value.

AIX 5

If the system is using dump compression, the output from sysdumpdev -L will include
the following two lines:
Size: N (this is the size of the compressed dump in bytes)
Uncompressed: N (this is the size of the uncompressed dump in bytes)
Find a file system with at least 2.5 times the size of the compressed system dump.
If the system is not using dump compression, the output from sysdumpdev -L will
include the following line:
Size: (this is the size of the uncompressed dump in bytes)
In this case, find a file system with at least 1/2 the size of the uncompressed dump.
In the instructions that follow, the file system you choose to contain the testcase will be referred to as /thefs. Replace all occurrences of /thefs with the path to the filesystem you have chosen. If you choose the /tmp filesystem to contain the testcase data, the snap command will automatically create a subdirectory in /tmp named ibmsupt and this is where the testcase data will be stored. The snap.pax.Z file will be located at /tmp/ibmsupt/snap.pax.Z.