bpimmedia - file read failed

[ianG]

Hey folks,

Following an upgrade from 6.5.3.1 to 6.5.4 we're getting an error when doing bpimmedia queries:

C:\>bpimmedia -mediaid 05261S
file read failed

Now this is a frozen tape, that may or may not be blank, so initially I thought it was blank, and just returning a non-specific error... however, same command on a pooled tape:

C:\>bpimmedia -mediaid 05812S | findstr /i image
IMAGE headora008s 8 headora008s_1259374475 headora008s-sap 17 Default-Application-Backup-weekly 2 3 10 1290988800 0 0
IMAGE headora008s 8 headora008s_1259374436 headora008s-sap 17 Default-Application-Backup-weekly 2 3 11 1290988800 0 0
IMAGE headora008s 8 headora008s_1259374247 headora008s-sap 17 Default-Application-Backup-weekly 2 3 11 1290988800 0 0
IMAGE headora008s 8 headora008s_1259374246 headora008s-sap 17 Default-Application-Backup-weekly 2 3 10 1290988800 0 0
IMAGE headora008s 8 headora008s_1259373855 headora008s-sap 17 Default-Application-Backup-weekly 2 3 8 1290988800 0 0
IMAGE headora008s 8 headora008s_1259370699 headora008s-sap 17 Default-Application-Backup-weekly 2 3 176 1290988800 0 0
IMAGE headora008s 8 headora008s_1259367612 headora008s-sap 17 Default-Application-Backup-weekly 2 3 86 1290988800 0 0
IMAGE headora008s 8 headora008s_1259367611 headora008s-sap 17 Default-Application-Backup-weekly 2 3 85 1290988800 0 0
file read failed

So at a bit of a loss..

Found this but no real discussion on it, so am wary - that and I've not mucked with NBCC or the db before

[Andy_Welburn]

bpexpdate -deassignempty

That would indicate "bad image headers" as per the link you quoted.

If that is the case there are a few T/Ns that cover this:

All Log Entries or Problems Log reports show: "Bad image header," indicating a problem with the NetB...

GENERAL ERROR: The "bpexpdate -deassignempty" command fails with "Could not update media list, file ...

DOCUMENTATION: How to manually identify and remove zero-byte or corrupt image header files which are...

GENERAL ERROR: The "All Log Entries" or "Problems" reports display a "Bad image header" message, ind...

[ianG]

Thanks for the reply Andy - much appreciated

ran the deassignempty command there, and it appears to have completed ok

Search for empty media that meet the following criteria:
        Media id: All

Continue? y/n (n)y
No media matching criteria were found to be deassigned.
no entity was found

The 'no entity was found' was what I used to get with 6.5.3.1 when bpimmedia -mediaid'g a blank tape

I'll have a read through the technotes to see if theres any other indication we may be suffering from the bad headers - thanks again for the links

[Andy_Welburn]

admin log when you run the bpimmedia command?

"...
bpimmedia sends its  error  messages  to  stderr.
bpimmedia sends  a log of its activity to the NetBackup admin log file for the current day.
..."

[ianG]

Quite a lot of stuff in the admin log alright - think the below is most relevent? There is a fair bit of reference to 6.5.3.1 (our old version, which alot of clients are still on)

09:21:03.419 [2752.1900] <16> imagemedia: unexpected return value from db_IMAGEreceive: file read failed 13
09:21:03.419 [2752.1900] <4> bpimmedia: 0 matches were found. Number of images printed: 0
09:21:03.419 [2752.1900] <2> bpimmedia: file read failed
09:21:03.419 [2752.1900] <2> bpimmedia: EXIT status = 13

[Andy_Welburn]

Points us back to error code 13 which is ..... you guessed it ..... "file read failed".

From the GUI help:
"...
A read of a file or socket failed. Possible causes include:
*  An I/O error occurred during a read from the file system.
*  Read of an incomplete file or a corrupt file.
*  Socket read failure. A network problem or a problem with the process that writes to the socket can cause socket read failure.
*  A problem specific to NetBackup Snapshot Client (see recommended actions).
..."

and almost everything on the KnowledgeBase with regards to EC13 relates to backups & network issues, so not much to go on.

Wondering: "does the bpimmedia command need to connect to media servers? If so have you decommissioned a media server recently & maybe missed a step or two?"

Maybe there is a corruption in the db & so beneficial to run the NBCC? If so you may feel more comfortable with Symantec guiding you thru' this?

For info: Links to the latest NBCC / NBCCR downloads.

(NBCC & NBCCR should already be installed on 6.5.4, but the above also has some useful documentation)

[ianG]

Had a colleague look at this and what he's discovered, is by setting a date range when running the bpimmedia query it runs as it used to...(?)
For the start and end dates, I'll put in the time assigned, and todays dates, and the query runs normally, no file read probs on any I've tried so far

Z:\>bpimmedia -mediaid 05537s | findstr IMAGE
file read failed
IMAGE headora008s 8 headora008s_1244027514 headora008s 0 Monthly 0 8 692660 1275477114 0 0

and then:

Z:\>bpimmedia -mediaid 05537s -d 06/03/09 00:00:00 -e 12/02/09 16:00:00 | findstr IMAGE
IMAGE headora008s 8 headora008s_1244027514 headora008s 0 Monthly 0 8 692660 1275477114 0 0

Not really sure what to make of this, but happy my queries are working again

[Andy_Welburn]

Wonder if there is a corrupt image then & using the date delimiters is excluding it from the "search"?

[Marianne · Accepted solution]

bpdbm is timing out due to the size of the image database. Have a look at this TechNote: seer.entsupport.symantec.com/docs/273884.htm

Please remember to stop/start NBU afte creating/modifying DBMto file.

You do realize that bpimmedia will only query the NBU catalogs and not verify actual data on tape?
To list the actual contents on tape, you need 'media contents report' (might have to add media server hostname as well):
bpmedialist -U -mcontents -m <media_id> [-h <hostname>]

You may also want to have a look at bpverify.