Articles on David Whiteside

Setting the InfiniBand (IB) Node Description on Solaris

Sun, 07 Oct 2012 12:00:00 +0000

In Solaris, configuring the InfiniBand (IB) node description can make your network easier to manage by assigning meaningful names to nodes. This guide explains how to set the IB node description.

View the current IB node description

$ set_nodedesc.sh

You can set the IB node description to whatever you want using the -N option with set_nodedesc.sh.

$ set_nodedesc.sh -N 'something'

You can reference the man page for the set_nodedesc.sh command to see the full command reference.

Solaris Shutdown, Reboot, Init, and Halt Command Differences

Mon, 07 May 2012 12:00:00 +0000

The init and shutdown commands cleanly shutdown the system by running the shutdown rc scripts.

The advantage of shutdown is that you can set a shutdown delay and warning message.

halt and reboot are not as clean, no shutdown rc scripts are run so applications will not be brought down clean, I generally do not use these commands unless its a last resort.

$ init   # runs the shutdown scripts in /etc/rc*
$ init 0 # shutdown (on sparc it takes it to the ok prompt)
$ init s # single user mode
$ init 5 # shutdown
$ init 6 # reboot

$ shutdown # runs the shutdown scripts in /etc/rc*, prints message warning users
$ shutdown -y -g 0
$ shutdown -y -i 0 # shutdown to ok prompt
$ shutdown -y -i S # single user mode
$ shutdown -y -i 5 # shutdown
$ shutdown -y -i 6 # reboot

$ sync; sync; halt # (ungraceful shutdown, use sync;sync;halt)

$ sync; sync; reboot # (ungraceful reboot. Always run sync;sync;reboot. The prefered method is using init.)
$ sync; sync; reboot -- -r  # reconfiguration reboot
$ sync; sync; reboot -- -s # reboot into single usermode

SPARC OK Prompt Command Reference

Sun, 07 Aug 2011 12:00:00 +0000

Maybe you don’t care about the forth programming language, but if you work on Sparc systems long enough you are going to have to work from the ok prompt.

Here are the essentials commands you must know.

Boot the system normally

ok> boot

Boot the system and allow for discovery of new devices (reconfiguration boot)

ok> boot -r

Boot into Single-User Mode

ok> boot -s

Boot into a ROM, useful if your system isn’t bootable