NFS - IRIX client issues

NFS - IRIX client issues

[Orion Poplawski]

Hello -

    I was wondering if there were and know NFS issues with IRIX clients? 
  I'm seeing a problem where an IRIX 6.5.17m client
accessing a linux 2.4.18 (redhat 7.2: -18.7.x) server will hang trying
to access a mount.  No traffic appears to make it to the server so it
appears to be locked up on the client end, but I don't know why.

  Thanks!

  - Orion

Re: NFS - IRIX client issues

[Samuel Flory]

Orion Poplawski wrote:

> Hello -
>
>    I was wondering if there were and know NFS issues with IRIX 
> clients?  I'm seeing a problem where an IRIX 6.5.17m client
> accessing a linux 2.4.18 (redhat 7.2: -18.7.x) server will hang trying
> to access a mount.  No traffic appears to make it to the server so it
> appears to be locked up on the client end, but I don't know why.


  Can you give a few more details?  Does the nfs share mount, or hang at 
mounting?  What type of mount are you trying to do? (IE nfs v3 tcp, or 
v2 udp)


PS- Are you certain you aren't running iptables or ipchains? 
"/etc/init.d/ipchains stop"  Also try mounting with out locking.  "mount 
foo:/foobar /mnt/nfs -onolock"  Have you tried nfs v2? "mount -o 
nfsvers=2 foo:/foobar /mnt/nfs"

Re: NFS - IRIX client issues

[Orion Poplawski]

Samuel Flory wrote:

> Orion Poplawski wrote:
>
>> Hello -
>>
>>    I was wondering if there were and know NFS issues with IRIX 
>> clients?  I'm seeing a problem where an IRIX 6.5.17m client
>> accessing a linux 2.4.18 (redhat 7.2: -18.7.x) server will hang trying
>> to access a mount.  No traffic appears to make it to the server so it
>> appears to be locked up on the client end, but I don't know why.
>
>
>
>  Can you give a few more details?  Does the nfs share mount, or hang 
> at mounting?  What type of mount are you trying to do? (IE nfs v3 tcp, 
> or v2 udp)
>
>
> PS- Are you certain you aren't running iptables or ipchains? 
> "/etc/init.d/ipchains stop"  Also try mounting with out locking.  
> "mount foo:/foobar /mnt/nfs -onolock"  Have you tried nfs v2? "mount 
> -o nfsvers=2 foo:/foobar /mnt/nfs"
>
>
>
The mount comes up fine and works for quite a while and then crashes. 
 This is under relatively heavy load (tar files being unpacked, data 
files manipulated, etc.).  No iptables/chains.

The mount is automounted,  the resulting mtab entry on IRIX is:

lego:/export/turb3 /data/turb3 nfs vers=3,rw,dev=100007 0 0

I believe the mount is UDP,  I'm not specifying any special options.

I'll look into trying nolock and v2.  SHould I try TCP?

- Orion

Re: NFS - IRIX client issues

[Samuel Flory]

Orion Poplawski wrote:

>>
> The mount comes up fine and works for quite a while and then crashes. 
> This is under relatively heavy load (tar files being unpacked, data 
> files manipulated, etc.).  No iptables/chains.
>
> The mount is automounted,  the resulting mtab entry on IRIX is:


  Are you using amd or autofs?  Does it occur when you manually mount 
the share? "mount lego:/export/turb3 /data/turb3"

>
> lego:/export/turb3 /data/turb3 nfs vers=3,rw,dev=100007 0 0
>
> I believe the mount is UDP,  I'm not specifying any special options.
>
> I'll look into trying nolock and v2.  SHould I try TCP?


  You could, but I was wondering if you could be hitting a TCP bug.

Re: NFS - IRIX client issues

[Orion Poplawski]

Samuel Flory wrote:

> Orion Poplawski wrote:
>
>> The mount is automounted,  the resulting mtab entry on IRIX is:
>
>
>
>  Are you using amd or autofs?  Does it occur when you manually mount 
> the share? "mount lego:/export/turb3 /data/turb3"


autofs.  Do you realy think there is a difference between using mount 
and autofs to establish the mount?

>>
>> I'll look into trying nolock and v2.  SHould I try TCP?
>

Hm.  IRIX doesn't seem to have a nolock option.

Re: NFS - IRIX client issues

[Orion Poplawski]

Samuel Flory wrote:

> Orion Poplawski wrote:
>
>>>
>> The mount comes up fine and works for quite a while and then crashes. 
>> This is under relatively heavy load (tar files being unpacked, data 
>> files manipulated, etc.).  No iptables/chains.
>>
>> The mount is automounted,  the resulting mtab entry on IRIX is:
>
>
>
>  Are you using amd or autofs?  Does it occur when you manually mount 
> the share? "mount lego:/export/turb3 /data/turb3"
>
Followup: We changed the nfs mount options to mount with NFSv2 and have 
not been able to reproduce the problem, yet.

Re: NFS - IRIX client issues

[Barry K. Nathan]

On Wed, Dec 04, 2002 at 04:47:49PM -0700, Orion Poplawski wrote:
> The mount comes up fine and works for quite a while and then crashes. 
> This is under relatively heavy load (tar files being unpacked, data 
> files manipulated, etc.).  No iptables/chains.

I'm having the same problem, with Solaris 8 on SPARC for the NFS server
(as opposed to Linux), on one of my machines. For some reason it only
happens when it's plugged into a 100MBps Netgear non-switching (i.e, "old
fashioned" in a sense -- half-duplex) hub. If I plug it straight into
the wall at work (this is connected directly to a 10MBps (I know),
full-duplex (I think) port on some kind of switch whose other details I
have no idea about), the problem instantly disappears.

At least, I think it's the same problem. When your connection collapses,
does IRIX complain about timeouts trying to contact the NFS server,
almost as if the NFS server fell off the face of the planet?

I just noticed this patch (4808: "NFS3 hangs with delayed writes, panics
with imon") for IRIX 6.5.17m. The following page has more detail
(although just reading the following page, as well as downloading the
actual patch, requires an SGI support contract or warranty -- and I can't
look at it and summarize it because TPTB at work have canceled the SGI
support contracts with the intent of eventually replacing all the SGI
boxes with Linux-based x86's or the like):
http://support.sgi.com/colls/patches/docs/browse/support/pinfo/pinfo4808.html

So, that patch might help, if you have access to it. I also found
another document, "Pipeline: [Oct-Dec 2002] IRIX 6.5.17 NFS Changes and
Tuning", which also cannot be accessed without a support contract or
warranty:
http://support.sgi.com/search/?cmd=getdoc&db=pipeline&locale=C&coll=0650&highlight=type,pipeline,PipelineYear,2002,PipelineIssue,OctoberDecember&fname=content/pipeline/html/20020402NFS.html

Finally, I have no idea if IRIX 6.5.18m fixes any NFS bugs. If it does,
it can be obtained with an M Series Access contract that costs $500 per
workstation per year (servers not eligible, that is, they can only get
6.5.18m through support contracts AFAIK). A tiny bit more info on that
here:
http://support.sgi.com/news/support/IRIX_M_Stream_Implementation.html
http://support.sgi.com/news/support/IRIX_M_Stream_Implementation1.html

I hope this helps. It might not help as much as other suggestions (such
as trying NFSv2), but it might be better than nothing (especially if the
machine is still covered by an SGI support contract or warranty).

-Barry K. Nathan <barryn@pobox.com>

Re: NFS - IRIX client issues

[Orion Poplawski]

Barry K. Nathan wrote:

>I'm having the same problem, with Solaris 8 on SPARC for the NFS server
>(as opposed to Linux), on one of my machines. For some reason it only
>happens when it's plugged into a 100MBps Netgear non-switching (i.e, "old
>fashioned" in a sense -- half-duplex) hub. If I plug it straight into
>the wall at work (this is connected directly to a 10MBps (I know),
>full-duplex (I think) port on some kind of switch whose other details I
>have no idea about), the problem instantly disappears.
>
>At least, I think it's the same problem. When your connection collapses,
>does IRIX complain about timeouts trying to contact the NFS server,
>almost as if the NFS server fell off the face of the planet?
>  
>
Actually, I get exactly zero in the logs and aparently zero NFS traffic 
arriving at the server, so we may have different problems.

Thanks for the support links, but unfortunately I'm basically in the 
same situation - support cancelled in the belief we will eventually move 
completely to linux (though for now the SGI is our only large memory 
64-bit platform).

- Orion