EXOTERIC - Information Worth Sharing: ex·o·ter·ic
-adj
1. Not confined to an inner circle of disciples or initiates.
2. Comprehensible to or suited to the public; popular.
3. Of or relating to the outside; external.

Every Sun server system has a "Stack" of software components that comprise the Operating System, Firmware, Drivers, Diagnostics, System Management, Middleware, Compilers, and so on. There are generally two types of Stack components; platform specific and common. The platform specific components are either unique to the server system, like firmware or system configuration reader add-ons, or it might be a set of required OS patches. Common software can be installed on any type of server system, like Sun Studio Compilers, Java, MySQL, StarOffice, etc.

Information about what platform specific software stack components are available for a particular Sun server is out there, but it is not easy to find. Product Notes might indicate specific OS update levels and required patches, but might not connect these to the latest firmware or virtualization technologies. A change to one software or firmware component might require changes to others in order to get the best performance and stability on your Sun server system.

To help identify the software stack components for each Sun server system, I have put together a set of Wiki pages on BigAdmin with the help of Rick Ramsey and Robert Weeks. Rick's BigAdmin blog entry last week broke the story. Currently the Sun System Stack Pages only have the SPARC systems covered, but we hope to expand this to all Sun server systems in the future.

The latest version of Logical Domains (LDoms) software has been released.

LDoms 1.2 adds the following new features:

• Support for CPU power management
• Support for jumbo frames
• Restriction of delayed reconfiguration operations to the control domain
• Support for configuring domain dependencies
• Support for autorecovery of configurations
• Support for physical-to-virtual migration tool
• Support for configuration assistant tools

The LDoms 1.2 download page is here. Need help getting LDoms set up? Download the Beginner's Guide to LDoms.

LDoms 1.2 requires running Solaris 10 05/09 or OpenSolaris 2009.06 as the control domain and is supported on the following systems:

• Sun SPARC Enterprise T5440 Servers
• Sun SPARC Enterprise T5140 and T5240 Servers
• Sun SPARC Enterprise T5120 and T5220 Servers
• Sun Blade T6300, T6320 and T6340 Server Modules
• Netra CP3060 and CP3260 Blades
• Netra T2000,T5220 and T5440 Servers
• Sun Fire or SPARC Enterprise T1000 and T2000 Servers

The latest System Firmware for these systems is also recommended. You can pick up the latest versions of the System Firmware from the BigAdmin Firmware Download and Release History page. System Firmware 6.7.4 for UltraSPARC T1 systems and 7.2.2 for UltraSPARC T2 and UltraSPARC T2 Plus systems are the latest versions available for the above systems.

An updated version of the XCP Firmware for SPARC Enterprise M3000/M4000/M5000/M8000/M9000 Servers is now available for download on the Sun Download Center.

XCP 1082 is the most recent version of a sustaining and maintenance release to XCP 1080 & 1081. It provides many enhancements and additional functionality. You can upgrade to XCP 1082 from XCP version 1080 or 1081. Please refer to the Sun SPARC Enterprise M3000/M4000/M5000/M8000/M9000 Servers XSCF User’s Guide for instructions on how to Install and Upgrade your system to a newer release of XCP. This XCP 1082 version contains fixes for the following Change Requests:

• 6714850 setupplatform should not request a platform power cycle after setting the altitude
• 6614835 Standby always shows "execute S99tmp_login -- exited(1,0)"
• 6608959 frudump utility does not recognize XSCFU_B#1 in DC system
• 6652700 prtfru -x -M xxxx' cause Segmentation fault (core dumped)
• 6749184 copynvram shall not attempt to write to top 128 byte of DIMM SPD.
• 6698356 'shownvram' shows non-existant CPUM and MEMB info on FF2 having only one system board present.
• 6772115 SNMP trap enhancement
• 6745304 inconsistency in the length of ldap bind name field in the BUI
• 6789113 Trace enhancement on Sun's module for DSCP and SCDB.
• 6623945 Community String Username on SNMP Properties BUI page can be specified only up
• 6626187 USM/VACM/VACM view/VACM view access on SNMP Security BUI page can be set the different max characters
• 6623949 User Manager BUI page stores the 9999999999 input as 2147483647 or -1 for
• 6667077 Sun brand masthead on standby XSCF does not fill out the background image
• 6589414 Audit Properties: Narrowed the Event Class at Audit Event Settings
• 6742502 Non-audit log size limit value in BUI displays only last two digits of the value.
• 6790005 Add SNMP Trap host does not give user chance to re-enter the missed required (*) field
• 6584843 Email Reporting: Some text strings are out of position in IE vs Firefox
• 6742395 SNMP trap is not issued when power failure or power recovery happens.
• 6713810 setsmtp asks for mail server name but accepts only IP addresses if a name service is not running.
• 6582835 fmadm faulty output missing uuid after powercycle chassis.
• 6801476 snapshot needs to use "showdomainmode -v" to collect showdomainmode output
• 6799922 clearfault does not work for MBU_A
• 6633118 fmtopo which is called by snapshot does not balance scdb_open and scdb_close.
• 6775857 BUI: Implement comprehensive fix for browser caches external javascript/css files
• 6793901 power management enhancements: Air Flow
• 6797557 DBS downs during domain poweron poweroff running test
• 6786707 Loss of a single PSU on a M4000 resulted in domain shutdown & system powerof
• 6812005 trap enhancement correction
• 6816465 Script error occurred on User Manager BUI page
• 6735711 setemailreport 255 input length restriction handling is inconsistent
• 6814728 fmd initialization takes longer. It result in losing error log.
• 6744013 Date indicated by email report is incorrect when DST is enabled.
• 6786770 NTP prefer setting should be configurable by customer.
• 6745289 panel_seeprom_restore always returns the return code from panel_seeprom_close
• 6734322 flashupdate -c check' needs improvement
• 6778132 DB sync time out may still happen (in XCP1072 and above) during replacefru XSCF
• 6756052 Panic Log BUI page cannot be displayed the panic message portion.
• 6765466 LSB cannot be displayed on "Domain Configuration"BUI page w/ single domain priv. account larger than DID15.
• 6767612 error log taken by PCI access error cannot be taken on the monitor log.
• 6763349 BUI inline alert message improvement.
• 6717438 showdomainmode CLI needs to be enhanced to display domain ethernet (mac) address.
• 6635040 SSH to XSCFU via DSCP
• 6801356 /scf/init/scf_initrc/10cmemready/S21daemons generates a corruptedroot crontab file
• 6805455 arp_announce should be set to 2 in sysctl.conf
• 6821960 MIB.mib has inverted order in scfModeSwitchEvent
• 6772115 SNMP enhancements to support new traps

This firmware update is recommended for all customers.

Another new version of the XCP Firmware for SPARC Enterprise M3000/M4000/M5000/M8000/M9000 Servers is now available for download on the Sun Download Center.

XCP 1081 is a sustaining maintenance release to XCP 1080. It provides enhancements and additional functionality to restoreconfig, snapshot, COD, BUI, FMA and security. It contains fixes for the following Change Requests:

• 6743842 password requires [user] argument
• 6754508 scfSystemPowerLED value on OPL-MIB is not correct.
• 6675409 If COD license was increased during DR operation, CPU might become
• 6767417 Simple Diagnostic Engine files do not include SPARC64-VII entries
• 6754071 The error message should be re-phrased when '-f' option of 'restoreconfig' used in 'normal' mode.
• 6754066 'restoreconfig' CLI usage output in Service/Escalation mode should include '-f' option.
• 6732712 fmtopo -V shows wrong information for ddc_b on FF.
• 6742457 Case insensitive string to change audit log limit to "unLImited" in BUI is failing.
• 6755986 BUI: Session Errr on Add Audit Policy and SNMP popup screens after Reset button clicked with IE6/7
• 6764855 Attempt to clone a user with already existing username results in "Internal Server Error" in BUI.
• 6747279 BUI logarchiving page's 'Recent Error Messages' should not be an editable text box
• 6749980 SNMP-Enable/Disable pop-up window doesn't give user chance to re-do if missed the required field.
• 6635059 multiple failed login attempts to the XSCF should lockout the account
• 6769868 Add fault rule for IOUA i2c failures
• 6759468 'setdumphost' doesn't succeed in service mode.
• 6759987 Running 'showdumphost' in service mode clears dumphost setting set in escalation
• 6757776 Snapshot collects only partial SunMC data due to a permission problem
• 6759532 snapshot should take a log for the iptables information along with the fix of INCF3-080711-001
• 6762110 Add "showloginlockout" to snapshot
• 6772968 snapshot should collect a 'showroute -a -n' output
• 6601940 clearfault needs better description when FRU belongs to an active domain.
• 6644971 clearfru prints incorrect message when it cannot clear a fault
• 6773750 SNMP power management
• 6711260 man pages for new CLIs (setloginlock, showloginlock) should be added
• 6635059 multiple failed login attempts to the XSCF should lockout the account
• 6716495 times() function may not be used appropriately.
• 6743183 OPL SC FMA DE fails to report expected ereport, fault-event in response to the power failure event.
• 6668290 snmpd downed due to libumem issue.
• 6644091 core.ce-warn should not subscribed by domain.
• 6775856 BUI: Implement temporary fix for browser caches
• 6744839 FJ side code fix for SSH to XSCFU via DSCP should be customer controllable
• 6635040 SSH to XSCFU via DSCP should be customer controllable
• 6776532 login failure messages are always displayed on SCF console
• 6743341 ping/telnet connection can be established to XSCF-LAN#0 I/F by using DSCP ip address
• 6788348 OPL-SP-MIB.mib contains duplicate OIDs
• 6635040 SSH to XSCFU via DSCP should be customer controllable

Detailed product notes are available for the M3000, M4000/M5000 and M8000/M9000.

This firmware update is recommended for all customers.

If you haven't checked out BigAdmin lately you should. It has a bunch of great information for System's Administrators. I've just done a massive update to the Firmware Release History page.

The big change to the page is the addition of all of the Sun X86/X64 based servers firmware information. Sun releases unique firmware and drivers for each of the Intel and AMD processor based systems. There are updated BIOS and Service Processor firmware images included, along with various other software drivers available to download from the Software Download Center.

I've also added the Patch ID information for the recently released System Firmware 6.7.x and 7.2.x minor releases. The 7.2.x release is the real news. It updates the ILOM component to a new 3.0 release. ILOM 3.0 is enhanced with many new features and functions that were not available in ILOM 2.x, including improved security, improved usability, and easier integration into your data center environment.

Here are some of the new features in ILOM 3.0:
General Functionality

• DNS support
• Timezone support
• Configuration backup and restore
• Restore to factory defaults
• Enhanced LDAP and LDAP/SSL support
• Power management capabilities
• Ability to generate new SSH keys
• ipmiTool cli access to Service Processor from domain without Ethernet connection
• Automatic firmware update from Domain

Scalability and Usability

• User-configurable filtering of hardware monitoring information in CLI and web interface
• Use host name to access other services by name, such as LDAP, Active Directory, LDAP/SSL

Security

• More granular user roles
• Predefined root and default accounts
• User SSH key authentication
• Ability to disable the network management port when you are using only the serial port
• Ability to disable individual services, such as IPMI, SSH, and KVMS, so that the port is closed

Serviceability

• Data collection utility to diagnose system problems

To learn more about ILOM 3.0 see these documents:
Sun Integrated Lights Out Manager (ILOM) 3.0 Concepts Guide
Sun Integrated Lights Out Manager (ILOM) 3.0 Getting Started Guide
You can also search on docs.sun.com for the ILOM 3.0 Supplement for your particular type of Sun server.

The latest version of SNMP 1.6 has been released. It adds support for the new Sun Enterprise T5440 server, Sun Blade T6340 Server Module and Sun Fire USRBRDT 5240 Uniboard. It also has some significant performance improvements over the previous 1.5.x releases.

This is a free download and is recommended for all applicable platforms. The Release Notes have more information.

The new Solaris 10 Applications Library is now live on BigAdmin.

This is a new one stop shop and portal to locate and download Solaris 10 applications by name or vendor.

If you're a Sun partner, you can publish your application data yourself, instead of having to wait for us to do it. And you can toss in some white papers, documentation, or other content to help your customers set up and deploy your product.

Give it a try!

I've been working with the BigAdmin web site to provide information about the various Sun Management Center platform add-on and SNMP releases. BigAdmin is a tremendous resource for Sun System Admins.

The result is a set of web pages on called the Systems Management Release Hub.

It is a complete new tab on the Patching Center page that is full of information that compliments the System Firmware Release Hub and the Solaris Patching pages.

Check it out. Hopefully this will help customers better understand how to keep their Sun systems running the latest and greatest versions of SunMC and SNMP.

The latest version of SNMP 1.5.5 has been released. It adds support for the new Sun Netra T5440 server.

This is a free download and is recommended for all applicable platforms. The Release Notes have more information.

Another new version of the XCP Firmware for SPARC Enterprise M4000/M5000/M8000/M9000 Servers is now available for download on the Sun Download Center.

XCP 1072 is a sustaining maintenance release to XCP 1071 and contains fixes for the following Change Requests:

• 6680705 Clearfault man page needs to have examples for use on the io box.
• 6723549 restoredefaults man page needs improvement
• 6693898 clearfault manpage should be updated to describe how to clearfault IO expansion unit
• 6705272 BUI Domain Operation page mistakes the operation demand for DID#08
• 6709441 XSCFs on Data Center Systems might be detected the reboot retry-out
• 6722617 Sequence process submitted the RCI event notification in incorrect timing.
• 6700185 /var/log/messages file gets filled up with ntp debug messages.
• 6700222 Configuring of SAS card failed by OS rebooting.
• 6695866 New fault rules need to be added
• 6706213 Update SCF.dict and SCF.po files for 'serious' I/O errors and overvoltage fault
• 6664134 "fmadm faulty -a" on SCF is not reporting a fault when showstatus displays the faulty comp
• 6665174 Change I/O ereports from 'fatal error' to 'serious error'
• 6709701 enable log archiving limits
• 6667692 Data Base sync time outs happened during Field Replacement Unit (FRU)
• 6699196 Create a new scf_trace region
• 6716245 XSCF should shutdown platform by exceeded temperatures rather than fan loss
• 6579253 Form Factor & Data Center System power line failure does not send SNMP notification/trap

Detailed product notes are available for the M4000/M5000 and M8000/M9000.

This firmware update is recommended for all customers.

Currently our Solaris 8 and 9 software build environments are being run on much older Sun server systems. If and when these systems fail, we will either have to find replacement parts, or find other available old servers that can run on the old versions of the Solaris OS. All of our current generation of server systems require Solaris 10 as the minimum supported OS.

We have been experimenting with using Solaris Containers in order to duplicate a Solaris 8 or Solaris 9 build server environment on the latest Sun server systems. Solaris Containers technology was previously known as Project Etude.

The idea is to set up a Solaris Container on today's faster, cheaper, multithreaded servers that can run an older version of the Solaris operating system. Then you can run your legacy applications in this virtualized container. In our case the legacy application was performing old software patch builds that require a Solaris 8 or 9 build environment (header files and libraries).

We have now put up a Wiki page on the BigAdmin site that walks you through the process of setting up the Solaris 8 and 9 containers. Credits go to Vaishak Suvarna for putting together this wiki page and doing the proof of concept work for our build server environments. Now we can eliminate multiple, large legacy Sun server systems in our production labs and replace them with a single, more efficient CoolThreads server.

Tomorrow night the San Diego OpenSolaris User Group will be meeting to discuss the recent OpenSolaris 2008.05 release. Stop by if you are in the area. Details and directions are on the web site.

I finally got around to actually taking the latest OpenSolaris 2008.05 release (aka, Project Indiana) for a test drive. I already had installed VirtualBox on my MacBookPro, so the next step was to go and download the Live CD image. The ISO image file fits on a CD, so I fired up the Mac's Disk Utility to burn this on to a CDROM. The next step is to start up VirtualBox, select New and start working through the Virtual Machine Wizard. There is already support for OpenSolaris, so just select that OS Type. I stuck with the default Base Memory, but I did shrink down the virtual disk size a bit to 8Gb. The disk will automatically grow if it needs to, so you might as well start small. I did have to enable the CD/DVD drive in the Settings in order to get the boot installer to find the OpenSolaris CD.

The installer asks a few questions about language, timezones, keyboard and user accounts. About 2 hours later it was done installing. Don't forget to eject the CD before you reboot, or else you'll be back to the installer again.

Now I'm off to play around with it and see if everything is up and running correctly. Eventually I'll download the OpenSolaris source code, Sun Studio compilers and see if it builds.

The latest version of the XCP firmware for SPARC Enterprise M4000/M5000/M8000/M9000 Servers is now available on the Sun Download Center.

XCP 1071 contains fixes for the following Change Requests:

• 6685379 XSCF changed from XCP1050 so that console logs out from Solaris
• 6661840 Description of setdscp/showdscp is unclear
• 6667626 adduser man page should change the maximum user name length to 31 characters
• 6654373 Man page should designate when sendbreak won't work
• 6668614 Undocumented platform power cycle is required before SPARC64-VII can be added.
• 6685374 Power-on failed after XCP was updated to XCP1070 and Jupiter CPU was installed
• 6681287 DBS got an error(QA-DC-0973)
• 6655686 XCP updates needed to support new FF I2C fan controller chip
• 6706348 show_scf_trace should report information about begin and end date/time of each region and trace file
• 6660264 There needs to be two types of XSCFU serial I/F ereport.
• 6571840 panel_dongle status needs to be logged
• 6664046 snapshot should collect 'getflashimage -l'
• 6666291 Snapshot needs to collect the SunMC logs for trouble shooting.
• 6677063 RFE: Add "fmstat -a -m emailprv" to snapshot
• 6545482 XSCF archiving generates a huge amount of data
• 6667088 check xscf#0-if's IP and xscf#1-if 's ip are on same subnet.
• 6683763 missing DB files results in SCF unbootable.
• 6615720 Customers are requesting ability to restore a system to factory default state
• 6566540 Executing shownvram w/ /MBU_B/FPGA" on FF system shows OBP instead of FPGA.
• 6630959 BUI changes for user name restricted to less than 32 characters
• 6677958 FMA-'showlogs error' discrepancy reg degraded component
• 6645828 "Could not write FRU-ID status" is detected
• 6546593 WANboot should not reflect packets
• 6561957 OBP bge ethernet driver needs performance improvement when loading a big file (wanboot 108 MB)
• 6634974 Incorrect Error reported on nvramrc CRC Error
• 6634980 Possible Data corruption when using NVRAMRC kill or yank
• 6675519 Problem with LSB Degradation
• 6684123 On OPL OBP can cause OBP to Display incorrect information

Detailed product notes are available for the M4000/M5000 and M8000/M9000.

This firmware update is recommended for all customers.

The new Sun System Firmware Release Hub is now available on the BigAdmin web site. On the main Firmware Release Hub page there are firmware FAQ's, information about available firmware releases and history about our firmware releases that you might find valuable.

This our first attempt at putting together new content on BigAdmin about the firmware releases that my group builds and releases. Check it out, and I hope you find it useful. I'd love to see feedback on the content. We are planning on doing a few more of these pages on areas like Systems Management in the near future.