directly tpautoconf without scan

[liuyl]

I wonder if the scan cmd should be necessary before running tpautoconf, because most times we do not run scan and directly run tpautoconf -a successfully！

[RiaanBadenhorst]

Scan just does a scan, nothing more. You'll probably find that tpautoconf does it in the background but doesn't output the results, it uses it to configure the devices. It would be sort of silly if it doesn't cause how would it know which devices are there to configure...

[Marianne]

There is no rule that says you MUST run scan.

It is just a small step to confirm that OS and NBU sees devices correctly before you go ahead and add devices to NBU. 
This is where you can see if tape drives have same firmware and decide if it is necessary to update firmware on one or more drives.

The output from the robot portion gives you drive position in the robot and drive serial number (plus firmware).
Quite handy to keep this piece of the output for 'future reference', e.g. your site config docs. 

I personally like to run it before doing device config.

[liuyl]

I find that the tpautoconf just only configures the TL/TDs via opening all the storage device files under the /dev directory！
So the tpautoconf command should have nothing to do with the result of the scan command！
Notes: this phenomenon is just output by using trace option with running the tpautoconf command！

[Marianne]

Seems you are not looking for advice. Merely sharing your own experience, right? 

[Tousif]

Hello,

The tpautoconf command configures the devices visible on the server. The scan command show you the devices visible on that server.

Its always recommended to run the wizard to configure the devices for visibility and you can select specific devices to configure on that media server.

In tpautconf command, it will configure all device and you have to delete unwanted devices on media server. Also, you have to restart the vmd and tld service separately after configuration. One more thing if robot is not visible to that media server then configured device will show AVR state.

Regards,

[liuyl]

I was just suddenly inspired to look for a method that can confirm the relationship between tpautoconf and scan！
So this method is a bit "hit-and-miss" to me in a way ！

[mph999 · Accepted solution]

tpautoconf and scan are kinda similar ...

The way I think of it, scan shows what you have, tpautoconf 'gets' what you have and shoves it into the NBU config ...

The device wizard is a bit of both - it shows what you can configure, and then configures it, but unlike tpautoconf allows you to select what you want to configure.

tpautoconf -a is good, but really only for simple systems/ setups, as has been mentioned, it configures everything, you then have to delete stuff you didn;t want configured.

As Marianne points out, it's not essential, but useful to run scan first.  Put bluntly, if you don't see your drives / robots in scan, they ain't going to magically appear if you run tpautoconf ... 

[Marianne]

@mph999

I'm having flasbacks today:

https://vox.veritas.com/t5/NetBackup/difference/m-p/454855

https://vox.veritas.com/t5/NetBackup/difference/m-p/568551

https://vox.veritas.com/t5/NetBackup/Scan-Tpautoconf-Robtest-tpconfig-Commands/m-p/635403

[liuyl]

Just Perfectly！

[mph999]

Now that's a blast from the past ...

[liuyl]

Could I regard the DW as the scan plus tpautoconf/tpconfig in some way ?
That is,  DW=scan+tpautoconf/tpconfig .  

https://vox.veritas.com/t5/NetBackup/difference/m-p/568551

[mph999]

Yes, you can consider it is a similar way ...

The Device wizard can configure 'everything' in one go, or you can be selective in which media servers it will act on, and further, from the list of devices that appear, you can slect some or all.