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Diagnosis Guide


Preparing for your first problem before it happens

This section explains how to obtain and record information about your SP system that you will need when you first problem occurs. You may not have the time or the means to obtain this information after a failure has occurred. The best strategy is to prepare this information before a failure occurs, and to have it handy before investigating possible problems.

Knowing your SP structure and setup

Problem investigation efforts are streamlined considerably by knowing the characteristics of the SP system at the time that a problem occurs. This includes what node types are being used, what software is installed on these nodes, what level of software is installed, what software service is installed, and so forth.

Create a log of your SP structure and setup

PSSP: Planning Volume 1 provides guidance in planning your physical site and selecting your hardware. PSSP: Planning Volume 2 provides guidance for logically laying out the SP system structure and the SP administrative network, and selecting your software.

Examine your SP system, its structure and its software setup, and record this information in a log. Keep this log in a place where you will always have access to it, regardless of whatever failure occurs on your system. To avoid the possibility of losing this log to an online failure, it is best to keep this log in hardcopy format.

This list is the minimum amount of information to record in the log:

  1. Your customer information:
  2. Control workstation Information
  3. System Partitioning or Cluster information - what nodes are in the system partition or cluster. Also, what software is installed and active on that cluster.
  4. Node information

Update the log whenever a failure occurs

Whenever an actual or suspected failure occurs on the SP system, make an update to this log. Record symptoms that are noticed at the time of the failure, and system conditions such as:

Recording this information serves several purposes:

Update the log whenever system conditions change

Using outdated or incomplete information when investigating a failure leads to wasted time. The wrong information is obtained and analyzed, the wrong diagnostic procedures are performed, and in some cases an incorrect solution is applied. This causes problem conditions to remain the same or become worse. It also may introduce additional problems. To avoid this wasted effort, be sure to update this log whenever the SP system structure or setup changes.

Update the log whenever the following occurs:


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