Problem with tape library support
 

Hello,
I have the latest FDC3 updates using Yum to kernel 2.6.11-1.14_FC3.

This is a HP DL380 G3 with Smart Array controller 5i and add-in Adaptec 29160N scsi controller.

I have 4 DDS tape drives on one bus that are externally attached to the Adaptec controller and a Sony LIB-152e/a2 attached externally to the 5i controller. In RedHat 8.0 I got a kernel version from HP that supported multiple luns and sg devices. The DDS drives showed up as st devices, the tape library showed up as sg0 and sg1.

Nothing from the tape library shows up in FDC3.

Does anyone know whether this kernel supports multiple scsi luns or do I need to recompile the kernel and modules as well as support for generic devices and multiple luns? Or, am I missing the boat and this won't work at all.

Kent N

Try looking in /boot/config-2.6.11-1.14_FC3 (or whichever kernel you are using), which is the config file corresponding to the compiled kernel. It’s a bit cryptic, but there is a section on multiple LUNs.

If you download/install the kernel source and use the config file as the starting point for “make xconfig”, you would be able to see in a better explained format what native options are available. The update kernel sources are available at http://download.fedora.redhat.com/pu...dates/3/SRPMS/ or from most fedora mirrors. See comment #4 in http://www.linuxquestions.org/questi...hreadid=253261 for a good description of installing the FC3 kernel source. I recommend manually downloading the kernel source to /var/spool/up2date, as opposed to trying to retrieve it using up2date as is described in the thread.

Problem with tape library
 

Hi,
I looked in the config file, and this is set: CONFIG_SCSI_MULTI_LUN=y

Now I'm not so sure that getting Fedora to recognize the library by LUN is the problem. According to the documentation (this is a Sony LIB-152e/a2 single drive) the drive is set with one scsi id and the changer another id. Neither shows up under /proc/scsi/scsi.

Here's a curious thing. I have a Redhat 8.0 machine similar setup (HP DL380) with an Overland Loader Express tape library system attached externally to the Smart Array 5i controller. This has 2 kernel choices. The first is a stock 2.4.18-14 kernel with the stock initrd-2.4.18-14.img. The second is the same kernel with an HP supplied initrd.img. The kernel build config says: # CONFIG_SCSI_MULTI_LUN is not set. So LUN support is not built into the kernel. With the stock boot kernel and image file I don't see the tape library, but with the HP modified initrd I do. The /dev/sgx devices are created and everything works. I don't understand why in Fedora I can't see the tape drive or changer, but I'm beginning to believe that it isn't LUN support but something else.

Kent N

Would anything on the HP support site in the driver downloads area under RHEL4 (http://h18023.www1.hp.com/support/fi...1116_4706.html) be helpful? RHEL4 is essentially FC2 with the bugs fixed.

What caught my eye was the “ProLiant Support Pack for Red Hat Enterprise Linux 4" (http://h18023.www1.hp.com/support/fi...oad/22000.html).

Tape library problem
 

The manufacturer of the tape library says that the drive and changer must have unique scsi id numbers. That makes me believe that the library doesn't even make use of LUNs. You would think that when scanning the bus that something would be found. When I look through dmesg, no devices found but I did find this:


Linux Plug and Play Support v0.97 (c) Adam Belay
pnp: PnP ACPI init
pnp: PnP ACPI: found 8 devices
usbcore: registered new driver usbfs
usbcore: registered new driver hub
PCI: Using ACPI for IRQ routing
** PCI interrupts are no longer routed automatically. If this
** causes a device to stop working, it is probably because the
** driver failed to call pci_enable_device(). As a temporary
** workaround, the "pci=routeirq" argument restores the old
** behavior. If this argument makes the device work again,
** please email the output of "lspci" to bjorn.helgaas@hp.com
** so I can fix the driver.
PCI: Device 0000:00:00.0 not found by BIOS
PCI: Device 0000:00:00.1 not found by BIOS
PCI: Device 0000:00:00.2 not found by BIOS
PCI: Device 0000:00:0f.0 not found by BIOS
PCI: Device 0000:00:0f.3 not found by BIOS
PCI: Device 0000:00:10.0 not found by BIOS
PCI: Device 0000:00:10.2 not found by BIOS
PCI: Device 0000:00:11.0 not found by BIOS
PCI: Device 0000:00:11.2 not found by BIOS
pnp: 00:00: ioport range 0xf50-0xf58 has been reserved
pnp: 00:00: ioport range 0x408-0x40f has been reserved
pnp: 00:00: ioport range 0x900-0x903 could not be reserved
pnp: 00:00: ioport range 0x910-0x911 could not be reserved
pnp: 00:00: ioport range 0x920-0x923 could not be reserved
pnp: 00:00: ioport range 0x930-0x937 has been reserved
pnp: 00:00: ioport range 0x940-0x947 has been reserved

No pci devices are disabled but maybe has something to do with it. I guess I will try the pci=routeirq as a kernel boot argument and see what tha does.

By all indications there is no reason that the tape library should not be recognized.

Kent N

Problem with tape library support (resolved)
 

Hello again,
I've finally got my tape library running on an FDC3 machine with all updates. The problem has always been trying to get the tape librar recognized on the Smart Array controller of a DL380. For the benefit of anyone experiencing the same problem, I'll explain what I've done to fix it.

Original system:
HP DL380 G3
Smart Array 5i controller
Fedora Core 3 with all updates
Kernel 2.6.11-1.14_FC3smp
Sony LIB-152e/a2 AIT 2 tape library with barcode scanner


Test system:
Standard garden variety whitebox
Adaptec 2940UW scsi card
Fedora Core 3 with all updates
Kernel 2.6.11-1.14_FC3
Sony LIB-152e/a2 AIT 2 tape library with barcode scanner

Modification to grub.conf to get it running:
1) kernel /vmlinuz-2.6.11-1.14_FC3smp ro root=/dev/VolGroup00/LogVol00 rhgb quiet pci=noacpi
(without the pci=noacpi library is recognized but unusable)
2) modprobe sg
I don't know quite where to put this, didn't work in modprobe.conf unless I need a specific alias. It did work when I put it in rc.local.

The only reason that I haven't moved the Adaptec card to the DL380 is that it is the older 5v version. The newer cards are 3.3v and have an indentation so you can't mix them up.

Anyway mt and tar commands work on /dev/nst0, /dev/st0 and mtx works great on /dev/sg0 and /dev/sg1

Hope this helps others trying to get tape libraries to work on FDC3.

Kent N