vxconvert(ADM)

vxconvert - convert current file system to a VERITAS File System

Synopsis

vxconvert [-e] [-f] [-nN] [-s size] [-v] [-yY] special

Description

The vxconvert utility converts a supported file system type to VxFS. During the conversion process, vxconvert requires some amount of disk space to convert existing metadata to that usable by vxfs. This space is either taken from the free space available within the file system, or you may specify that vxconvert use the space available immediately after the end of the file system (-s option). In either case the space must reside within the same device/volume that file system resides on.

special is the character (or raw) disk device.

Options

-e

Estimates the amount of space required to complete the conversion. No data is written to the file system and the file system remains clean. This option implies that the file system is not converted to vxfs.

-f

Display the list of supported file system types.

-n

Assume a no response to all questions asked by vxconvert. This option implies that the conversion is never committed. Hence the file system is not converted to vxfs.

-N

A synonym for -n.

-s size

Specifies the size of available disk space at the end of the file system. The size command-line option is in K bytes. If this option is specified, disk space required by the conversion process is taken only from the specified region and the existing free space of the file system remains intact.

-v

Verbose. Shows the progress of the conversion process as inodes are converted. It displays one of the following characters for every inode converted:

d: The inode is a directory.
l: The inode is a symbolic link.
b: The inode is a block special file.
c: The inode is a character special file.
-: The inode is a regular file.
p: The inode is a fifo.
s: The inode is a socket.
?: The inode is unknown.

-y

Assume a yes response to all questions asked by vxconvert. This option implies that the conversion is always committed unless vxconvert fails to allocate the required disk space. If during the conversion any unknown inode types are detected, vxconvert ignores them.

-Y

A synonym for -y.

Conversion process

The conversion process consists of the following steps:

Read the super-block, examine it to ensure it is marked CLEAN.
Based on the information provided by the file system super-block, set up vxfs metadata. This includes initialization of all metadata required by the vxfs Version 4 layout (OLT, log, structural fset, etc.). During this step the original file system super-block is marked DIRTY, unless -e or -s is specified.
Read every inode in the file system and convert it to a vxfs inode.
For every regular file inode, allocate and initialize enough extent data to map all of the file's data blocks. This step only translates the representation of the file's data blocks from the old format to that of vxfs. User data blocks are never copied or relocated.
For every directory inode, allocate sufficient disk space to hold all of its entries. For every directory entry found in that directory, convert it to a vxfs directory entry and write all converted directory blocks.
All symbolic link, character special, block special, fifo, and socket inodes are converted to vxfs symbolic link, character special, block special, fifo, and socket inodes respectively.
Up until this point, all metadata of the original file system is intact and the conversion process can be stopped. The file system can be used after you run a full fsck (see fsck_vxfs(ADM)). If -e or -s is specified, running fsck is not required. The final step of the process involves replacing the original super-block with that of vxfs and clearing any alternate super-blocks written by the original file system. The vxfs super-block is never written if -n or -e is specified. After the super-block is overwritten, the original file system is no longer accessible and is fully converted to vxfs. You must run a full fsck on the converted file system.

Diagnostics

All error messages, I/O failure, and exit messages are displayed on standard-error output.

Notices

Running vxconvert on the raw device is almost always faster.

References

fsck(ADM), fsck_vxfs(ADM), fs_vxfs(F)