HPUX : Matching Error Messages to Physical Disks and Volume Groups

Often an error message contains the device number for a device, rather than the device file name.

For example, you might see the following message in

/var/adm/syslog/syslog.log:

Asynchronous write failed on LUN (dev=0x3000015)

IO details : blkno : 2345, sector no : 23

To map this error message to a specific disk, search under the /dev directory for a device file

with a device number that matches the printed value. More specifically, search for a file whose

minor number matches the lower six digits of the number following dev:. The device number in

this example is 3000015; its lower six digits are 000015, so search for that value using the

following command:

# ll /dev/*dsk | grep 000015

brw-r----- 1 bin sys 3 0x000015 May 26 20:01 disk43

crw-r----- 1 bin sys 23 0x000015 May 26 20:01 disk43

Use the pvdisplay command to determine which volume group contains this physical volume as

follows:

# pvdisplay /dev/disk/disk43 | grep "VG Name"

VG Name /dev/vgtest

If the pvdisplay command fails, search for the physical volume in the LVM configuration files

/etc/lvmtab and /etc/lvmtab_p as follows:

# lvmadm -l -V 1.0

--- Version 1.0 volume groups ---

VG Name /dev/vg00

PV Name /dev/disk/disk36_p2

VG Name /dev/vgtest

PV Name /dev/disk/disk43

VG Name /dev/vg03

PV Name /dev/dsk/c2t2d0

If your version of lvmadm does not recognize the –l option, use the strings command as follows:

# strings /etc/lvmtab | more

/dev/vg00

/dev/disk/disk36_p2

/dev/vgtest

/dev/disk/disk43

/dev/vg03

/dev/dsk/c2t2d0

Based on the output of these commands, the error message refers to physical volume /dev/disk/disk43,

 which belongs to volume group vgtest.

Similarly, some LVM error messages in /var/adm/syslog/syslog.log contain the device

number for a volume group. For example:

LVM: VG 128 0x002000: Lost quorum.

The major number 128 indicates that this is a Version 2.x volume group. A Version 1.0 volume

group has a major number of 64. To map this error message to a volume group, search under the

/dev directory for a volume group device file with a device number that matches the major and

minor numbers. In this example, the major number is 128 and the minor number is 0x002000,

so search for those value using the following command:

# ll /dev/*/group | grep 128.0x002000

crw-r----- 1 root sys 128 0x002000 Jan 7 08:27 /dev/vgtest2/group