Environment
Novell Open Enterprise Server 2 (OES 2) Linux Support Pack 3
Situation
Running Novell Open Enterprise Server 2 Support Pack 3, release code up to and including the oes2sp3-May-2011-Scheduled-Maintenance Patch, hosting a NSS volume with a shadow volume.
After running a policy that moves data from the Primary Volume towards the Shadow volume, the data hosted on the Shadow volume becomes unavailable after the ndsd is restarted.
Restarting ncp2nss does not bring back the files hosted on the Shadow volume, only a full reboot will enable acces to these files and folers.
This happens mainly when the name used for the Shadow NSS volume starts with the full name used for the Primary NSS volume (for instance DATA as primary and DATA_SH or DATA01 as Shadow volume).
Resolution
This has been addressed in the November 2011 Maintenance Patch for OES2 SP3 7744 release.
Novell Open Enterprise Servers running this code or later are no longer affected.
Novell Open Enterprise Servers running this code or later are no longer affected.
Additional Information
This phenomena did not occure when both the Primary and Shadow volume have unique names and the full name of the primary volume is not the initial part of the shadow volume's name (for instance USERDATA as primary volume and USERSHADOW as volume for the shadow volume).
Therefore
the workaround at the time was to avoid naming the Shadow volume using a
name that starts with the full name of the primary volume or renaming
the shadow volume so it does not start with the name of the primary
volume.
Renaming the volume already actively used as shadow requires a couple steps, mainly in Novell Remote Manager (http://serverip:8008) :
01. Under Manage NCP Services > Manage Shares, use the "Unmount" button for the primary volume.
02. In the same screen click on the "information icon" in front of the name of the name of the Primary Volume.
03. Tick the "Check to leave existing files on shadow volume" checkbox, then click on the "Remove Shadow" button.
04. Trough nssmu or iManager rename the Pool and Volume to a suiting name, as described in the online documentation.
05. In Remote Manager, Manage NCP Services > Manage Shares, click the "NCP/NSS Bindings" button.
06. Locate the renamed volume and tick "No", then the "Save Selection" button.
07. In Remote Manager, Manage NCP Services > Manage Shares, use the "Mount" button for the Primary Volume.
08. Click on the "Information icon" in front of the name of the primary volume and click on the "Add Shadow volume" button.
09. Fill out the full path to the renamed volume (ie. /media/nss/USERSHADOW ), leave "Create if not present" unselected and click on "Create".