A stepwise how-to guide for Ignite tape backup. Includes media check commands, backup log analysis, and troubleshooting steps.

Ignite is an OS backup solution for HPUX. This tool is developed by HP and available under the brand name Ignite-UX. It’s used to take system backup like a ghost image in the case of Windows. Complete OS can be restored using an ignite backup solution in case of any system failure. Ignite offers a network backup solution and tape backup solution. During network backup, OS backup is stored on ignite server over the network, and in event of restoring it’s restored over the network only (System should be booted with PXE boot). In tape backup, OS backed up in locally connected tape drive and restoration happens by booting system through bootable tape.

One needs to install this utility since it’s not native to HPUX. You can check if it’s installed or not using below command :

# /usr/sbin/swlist -l product |grep -i ignite
  Ignite-UX             C.7.12.519     HP-UX System Installation Services

If not installed, you need to purchase it and install on your HPUX machine.

In this post we will see how to take ignite tape backup along with its logs, troubleshooting and media check commands.

Media check :

Before starting your backup on tape you need to check if tape drive and media are functioning properly. After connecting your tape drive to the system and powering it on, you can identify it using ioscan -fnCtape & insf -e command. Its device name should be something like /dev/rmt/0mn . Once you identify device name for the tape you can check its status wit mt command:

# mt -t /dev/rmt/0mn status
Drive:  HP Ultrium 2-SCSI
Format:
Status: [41114200] BOT online compression immediate-report-mode
File:   0
Block:  0

Once you are able to get the status of media means tape drive is functioning properly and correctly identified in the kernel. Now you can go ahead with the backup procedure.

Taking ignite tape backup :

Ignite tape backup can be run using the command make_tape_recovery. This binary resides in /opt/ignite/bin. This command supports a list of options but we are seeing here most used ones :

• -A: Checks disks/volume group and adds files in backup which are specified for backup inclusion
• -v: Verbose mode
• -I: Cause the system recovery process to be interactive when booting from the tape.
• -x : Extra options (include=file|dir, exclude=file|dir,  inc_entire=VG or Disk) define inclusion/exclusion of file/dir/vg/disk
• -a: tape drive address
• -d: Description which will be displayed for archive
• -i: Interactive execution

Since ignite is aimed at OS backup, normally we take VG00 i.e. root volume group’s backup only in Ignite tape backup. Let’s see one example :

# /opt/ignite/bin/make_tape_recovery -AvI -x inc_entire=vg00 -a /dev/rmt/0mn -x exclude=/data

=======  12/27/16 03:00:00 EDT  Started /opt/ignite/bin/make_tape_recovery.
         (Tue Dec 27 03:00:00 EDT 2016)
         @(#) Ignite-UX Revision B.4.4.12
         @(#) net_recovery (opt) $Revision: 10.611 $


       * Testing pax for needed patch
       * Passed pax tests.

----- output clipped -----

In the above example, we have started to ignite backup with all VG00 included (-x inc_entire=vg00), excluding /data mount point which is part of vg00 (-x exclude=/data), on tape drive at 0mn (-a /dev/rmt/0mn) with the interactive boot menu in the backup (-I). Verbose mode (-v) starts printing all outputs on the terminal screen as shown above.

It takes normally half an hour or more to complete backup depending on the size of your files included in the backup. If your terminal timeout is short value then you can put this command in the background (with below command) so that it won’t get killed when your terminal timed out and disconnect.

# /opt/ignite/bin/make_tape_recovery -AvI -x inc_entire=vg00 -a /dev/rmt/0mn -x exclude=/data >/dev/null 2>&1

Don’t worry all outputs are being logged to a log file so that you can analyze it later. Last few lines of output are as below which

declares backups has been completed successfully.

----- output clipped -----
       /var/tmp/ign_configure/make_sys_image.log
       /var/spool/cron/tmp/croutFNOa01327
       /var/spool/cron/tmp/croutBNOa01327
       /var/spool/cron/tmp/croutGNOa01327

       * Cleaning up old configuration file directories


=======  12/27/16 03:12:19 EDT make_tape_recovery completed successfully.

You can even schedule an Ignite backup in crontab on a monthly, weekly, or daily basis depending on your requirement.

Log files :

Your latest run output is saved under /var/opt/ignite/recovery/latest/recovery.log. All other run’s details are saved under  /var/opt/ignite/recovery directory. Whenever command runs it links the latest directory to the current run’s directory. See the below output to get an idea.

# ll /var/opt/ignite/recovery
total 14240
drwxr-xr-x   2 root       root          8192 Nov 27 03:12 2016-11-27,03:00
drwxr-xr-x   2 root       root          8192 Dec 27 03:12 2016-12-27,03:00
lrwxr-xr-x   1 root       sys             16 Dec 27 03:00 latest -> 2016-12-27,03:00
----- output clipped -----

If ignite fails then recovery.log is the first place to look for a reason for failure.

Troubleshooting :

This part is really hard to cover since there can be numerous reasons why Ignite fails. But let me cover few common reason here –

1. Tape media is faulty (check EMS logs, Syslog)
   • Solution: media replacement
2. The tape drive is faulty (check ioscan status, EMs, Syslog) 
   • Solution: hardware replacement
3. One or more VG exist in /etc/lvmtab but not active on the system (verify /etc/lvmtab with bdf)
   • Solution: Remove inactive VG from lvmtab or made them active on the system
4. One or more LVOLs  exist in /etc/lvmtab but not active on the system  (verify /etc/lvmtab with bdf)
   • Solution: Remove inactive lvol from lvmtab or mount them on system
5. ERROR:   /opt/ignite/bin/save_config failed : One of the system attached disk/lun is faulty.
   • Solution: check hardware and replace it.