Proper way to break mirrors for OS patch installation

[Sunny_Sysadmin]

Based on the following output, what is the proper procedure for breaking mirrors in order to install OS patches or Veritas Volume Manager patches ?

vxprint -htr
Disk group: rootdg

DG NAME NCONFIG NLOG MINORS GROUP-ID
DM NAME DEVICE TYPE PRIVLEN PUBLEN STATE
RV NAME RLINK_CNT KSTATE STATE PRIMARY DATAVOLS SRL
RL NAME RVG KSTATE STATE REM_HOST REM_DG REM_RLNK
V NAME RVG KSTATE STATE LENGTH READPOL PREFPLEX UTYPE
PL NAME VOLUME KSTATE STATE LENGTH LAYOUT NCOL/WID MODE
SD NAME PLEX DISK DISKOFFS LENGTH OFF DEVICE MODE
SV NAME PLEX VOLNAME NVOLLAYR LENGTH OFF AM/NM MODE
DC NAME PARENTVOL LOGVOL
SP NAME SNAPVOL DCO

dg rootdg default default 0 1043117085.1025.dh48018

dm rootdisk c1t0d0s2 sliced 2888 71121402 -
dm rootmirror c1t1d0s2 sliced 2888 71124291 -

v appsvol - ENABLED ACTIVE 41413368 SELECT - fsgen
pl appsvol-01 appsvol ENABLED ACTIVE 41413815 CONCAT - RW
sd rootdisk-04 appsvol-01 rootdisk 25168968 14115654 0 c1t0d0 ENA
sd rootdisk-07 appsvol-01 rootdisk 42358518 27298161 14115654 c1t0d0 ENA

v rootvol - ENABLED ACTIVE 8389656 ROUND - root
pl appsvol-02 rootvol ENABLED ACTIVE 39316401 CONCAT - RW
sd rootmirror-04 appsvol-02 rootmirror 25168968 14115654 0 c1t1d0 ENA
sd rootmirror-07 appsvol-02 rootmirror 65430072 5694219 14115654 c1t1d0 ENA
sd rootmirror-05 appsvol-02 rootmirror 39284622 19506528 19809873 c1t1d0 ENA
pl rootvol-01 rootvol ENABLED ACTIVE 8389656 CONCAT - RW
sd rootdisk-01 rootvol-01 rootdisk 0 8389656 0 c1t0d0 ENA
pl rootvol-02 rootvol ENABLED ACTIVE 8389656 CONCAT - RW
sd rootmirror-01 rootvol-02 rootmirror 0 8389656 0 c1t1d0 ENA
pl swapvol-02 rootvol ENABLED ACTIVE 8389656 CONCAT - RW
sd rootmirror-02 swapvol-02 rootmirror 8389656 8389656 0 c1t1d0 ENA
pl var-02 rootvol ENABLED ACTIVE 8389656 CONCAT - RW
sd rootmirror-03 var-02 rootmirror 16779312 8389656 0 c1t1d0 ENA

v swapvol - ENABLED ACTIVE 8389656 ROUND - swap
pl swapvol-01 swapvol ENABLED ACTIVE 8389656 CONCAT - RW
sd rootdisk-02 swapvol-01 rootdisk 8389656 8389656 0 c1t0d0 ENA

v uservol - ENABLED ACTIVE 3072000 SELECT - fsgen
pl uservol-01 uservol ENABLED ACTIVE 3073896 CONCAT - RW
sd rootdisk-05 uservol-01 rootdisk 39284622 3073896 0 c1t0d0 ENA
pl uservol-02 uservol ENABLED ACTIVE 3073896 CONCAT - RW
sd rootmirror-06 uservol-02 rootmirror 62356176 3073896 0 c1t1d0 ENA

v var - ENABLED ACTIVE 8389656 ROUND - gen
pl var-01 var ENABLED ACTIVE 8389656 CONCAT - RW
sd rootdisk-03 var-01 rootdisk 16779312 8389656 0 c1t0d0 ENA

Disk group: datadg

DG NAME NCONFIG NLOG MINORS GROUP-ID
DM NAME DEVICE TYPE PRIVLEN PUBLEN STATE
RV NAME RLINK_CNT KSTATE STATE PRIMARY DATAVOLS SRL
RL NAME RVG KSTATE STATE REM_HOST REM_DG REM_RLNK
V NAME RVG KSTATE STATE LENGTH READPOL PREFPLEX UTYPE
PL NAME VOLUME KSTATE STATE LENGTH LAYOUT NCOL/WID MODE
SD NAME PLEX DISK DISKOFFS LENGTH OFF DEVICE MODE
SV NAME PLEX VOLNAME NVOLLAYR LENGTH OFF AM/NM MODE
DC NAME PARENTVOL LOGVOL
SP NAME SNAPVOL DCO

dg datadg default default 71000 1103359955.1418.dh48018

dm datadisk c3t0d5s2 sliced 3839 95176320 -

v datavol - ENABLED ACTIVE 94371840 SELECT - fsgen
pl datavol-01 datavol ENABLED ACTIVE 94371840 CONCAT - RW
sd datadisk-01 datavol-01 datadisk 0 94371840 0 c3t0d5 ENA

Disk group: opendg

DG NAME NCONFIG NLOG MINORS GROUP-ID
DM NAME DEVICE TYPE PRIVLEN PUBLEN STATE
RV NAME RLINK_CNT KSTATE STATE PRIMARY DATAVOLS SRL
RL NAME RVG KSTATE STATE REM_HOST REM_DG REM_RLNK
V NAME RVG KSTATE STATE LENGTH READPOL PREFPLEX UTYPE
PL NAME VOLUME KSTATE STATE LENGTH LAYOUT NCOL/WID MODE
SD NAME PLEX DISK DISKOFFS LENGTH OFF DEVICE MODE
SV NAME PLEX VOLNAME NVOLLAYR LENGTH OFF AM/NM MODE
DC NAME PARENTVOL LOGVOL
SP NAME SNAPVOL DCO

dg opendg default default 10000 1107317601.1552.dh48018

dm diskname c2t1d86s2 sliced 3839 117840000 -
dm opensrc c2t1d87s2 sliced 3839 117840000 -

v openvol - ENABLED ACTIVE 235280384 SELECT - fsgen
pl openvol-01 openvol ENABLED ACTIVE 235280640 CONCAT - RW
sd opensrc-01 openvol-01 opensrc 0 117840000 0 c2t1d87 ENA
sd diskname-01 openvol-01 diskname 0 117440640 117840000 c2t1d86 ENA

Should I break the mirrors prior to going into Single user mode for the patch install or after ? Please list the exact syntax needed based on my configuration above please. The system has been up nearly 500 days and I want to also make sure that the patch install goes smoothly. This is using Veritas Volume Manager 3.2 on Solaris 8.

[Volker_Hermin1]

This is a VERY STRANGE configuration. You have a five-way mirror of the rootvol on just two disks, and one of the mirrors appears to have been a mirror of another volume called "appsvol". Also, this mirror is not usable for booting because it is not contiguous. Other mirrors have been taken from /var and swap and brought into rootvol. Then of course, swapvol and /var are NOT mirrored any more. Apparently somebody has been toying with VxVM VERY hard...
This configuration is not only very slow (because of multiple mirrors going to the same disks), it is also wasteful in terms of space and generally does not seem to make any sense at all.
There is no straightforward way of upgrading it. Most certainly, any script or upgrade procedure would not be prepared to handle this.
If I was at the console I could do it for you, but in the form of a blind, remote, one way posting I'm sorry to refrain from trying. Well, actually, let me try to talk you through it, or at least I will give you some hints so you can work out the details on your own if you understand what's happening:
1) Find one plex for the rootvol, /var, and swapvol that resides on you current default boot disk, and remember it. Looks to me to be the rootvol-01 plex for rootvol. swap and /var are not mirrored anyway. There is no need to disable anything on uservol or appsvol, since they will not be active during the upgrade.
2) disable all the other plexes of rootvol using "vxplex -r rootdg off ". The other plexes would be appsvol-02, rootvol-02, swapvol-02, var-02.
3) Go into single-user and upgrade/patch/doSomethingElse.
4) When you come back up, reactivate the plexes by: vxplex -g rootdg on ".

However, this woul KEEP your curren,t useless VxVM-configuration. A better way would be to clean up along the way.
1) Remove the bogus mirrors: vxplex -g rootdg -o rm dis appsvol-02 swapvol-02 var-02
2) Turn off the mirror-plex of your root-Voume: vxplex -g rootdg off rootvol-02
3) Do the upgrade (single-user etc. Whatever your procedure requires).
4) switch root-mirror back on: vxplex -g rootdg on rootvol-02
5) re-mirror your other volumes!!!: vxmirror rootdisk rootmirror

Then you should be back to safety. Right now it's a total nightmare!


Good luck.

[Volker_Hermin1]

Sorry, forgot one thing: after finishing, issue "vxrecover -g rootdg -s" in order to re-synchronize everything that needs to.

[Sunny_Sysadmin]

Thanks much for the information it is greatly appreciated. This whole upgrade of Veritas Volume Manager is due to a SAN migration, I have decided it would be easier to take my data and scp it onto another server and nfs mount to it. I will most likely jump this system and let our jumpstart server setup the configuration correctly. Thanks again for the detail though, I am sure it will come in handy in the future.