vxdiskadd(ADM)

vxdiskadd - add one or more disks for use with the Volume Manager

Synopsis

vxdiskadd disk-address-pattern-list

Description

The vxdiskadd utility configures disks for use by the Volume Manager. Disks must already have been formatted (format(ADM)) and have a valid VTOC (prtvtoc(ADM)). vxdiskadd prompts the user for a disk group name and disk name for the disks. If no disk group name specified, the disks will be left as unassigned replacement disks for future use. A new disk group may be created that will become the disks' disk group. If a disk group is specified for the disks, the user is prompted for whether the disks should be designated as spares for the disk group. If a disk is found to already contain non-Volume Manager partitioning, the user will be asked whether the disk should be encapsulated. Encapsulation will turn each partition of the disk into a volume. A disk should be encapsulated if it contains file systems or data that should not be overwritten. If encapsulation is not desired for a disk, the disk can be initialized as a new disk for use by the Vo One or more disks may be specified with a disk-address-pattern-list. The basic form of a disk address is cCbBtTdD. Any leading portion of this address may be specified to indicate that all disks that match that leading portion should be used. For example c2b0t0 may be used to specify all disks on controller 2, busid 0, target 0. More than one disk address or address pattern may be specified on the command line. The word all may be used to specify all disks on the system. Disk address names relate directly to device node names in the /dev/dsk and /dev/rdsk directories. Here are more examples:

	all:        all disks
	c3 c4b0t2:  all disks on controller 3 and controller 4, busid 0, target 2
	c3b0t4d2:   a single disk

The files /etc/vx/cntrls.exclude and /etc/vx/disks.exclude may be used to exclude disks or controllers from use by vxdiskadd. Each line of cntrls.exclude specifies the address of a controller to exclude, e.g. c2. Each line of disks.exclude specifies a disk to exclude, e.g. c0b0t3d0.

All courses of action that do not involve clear failure conditions require prompts from the user, with defaults supplied as appropriate. Help is made available at every prompt. Entering ? in response to a prompt displays a context-sensitive help message.

vxdiskadd supports the following general classes of actions:

Reconnecting a drive that was temporarily inaccessible.: This situation is detected automatically, by noting that the specified drive has a disk ID that matches a disk media record with no currently associated physical disk. After reconnection, any stale plexes referring the disk will be reattached, and any stopped volumes referring the disk will be restarted. This reattach action will be performed by calling the vxrecover script.
Encapsulation of disks that have existing contents.: This is the default action for disks that do not have a valid, existing Volume Manager private region, but that do have a VTOC. Encapsulation is performed by calling vxencap.
Initialization of a disk with reserved regions and partitions.: Initialization of the disk is performed by calling vxdisksetup.
Adding a disk to an existing disk group.: This operation can be performed independently of the initialization of the disk drive, and will add the disk to the group so that its storage will be added to the free space pool in that disk group. The vxassist utility may subsequently allocate from that free space.
Creation of new disk groups in which to import a new disk.: If disks are added that are required to be put into a disk group that does not exist, then the option of creating the disk group will be offered.

References

format(ADM), prtvtoc(ADM), vxassist(ADM), vxdisk(ADM), vxdiskadm(ADM), vxdisksetup(ADM), vxencap(ADM), vxintro(ADM), vxrecover(ADM)