This issue may have also caused us to have some existing clients fail
due to exceeding our licensing restrictions... The server refused to
back up some existing clients because it thought we had exceeded our
license count, but we only had 73 clients out of 88... After opening a
case with their support, Legato supplied us with a patched nsrd.exe
(we're running 7.1.2 on WIN2000) which was apparently compiled with a
'-fno-strict-aliasing' option. They said: "The problem stemmed from the
way it looks at the ClientID as well as the Client name. Since
ClientID's are listed several times depending on how many client
instances you have, NetWorker can get confused and think there are more
clients despite the fact the licensing reports otherwise."
Either way, the patched version of nsrd.exe they had us install resolved
it for us....
I like the way the EMC backup product worked (EDM), it used the
/etc/hosts file and recommended it be maintained so as not to be
dependent on an external service like DNS for the backups to execute,
which I like.... A backup server should not depend on any external
services that may or may not be working at the time you really need to
perform a backup of your data !
-----Original Message-----
From: Legato NetWorker discussion [mailto:NETWORKER AT LISTSERV.TEMPLE DOT EDU]
On Behalf Of Tim Mooney
Sent: Saturday, August 20, 2005 9:26 PM
To: NETWORKER AT LISTSERV.TEMPLE DOT EDU
Subject: [Networker] 7.1.3 client DNS checks and multihomed clients
All-
Because of the recent security vulnerability and because there are not
patched clients (and apparently won't be) for 6.1.x, I've updated a
large number of our backup clients to the 7.1.3 Build 421 client this
weekend. In doing so, I've encountered a problem with the DNS checks in
the 7.1.3 client, and I'm not sure how to mollify the new client. I'm
hoping someone on the list has some suggestions.
There are a few bits of important background information:
- we use mixed case in our DNS domain name.
- our backup server and our largest backup clients are on two networks:
our primary network and a backup-only network. If a hostname on the
primary network is foo.NoDak.edu, then its interface on our backup
network is foo-2.NoDak.edu.
- The clients are created within NetWorker using the fully qualified
domain name of the interface on the backup network, e.g.
foo-2.nodak.edu.
In all cases, I've also added an alias in the client definition for
the fully qualified domain name of the public interface, e.g.
foo.nodak.edu.
Note, though, that the clients were all created and the aliases were
all
added without using mixed case in the name.
- The `hostname' command on each of the clients returns the fully
qualified domain name (with mixed case) of the primary interface. In
all cases, the /etc/hosts file has the correct entry for the primary
interface:
XXX.YYY.ZZZ.AAA foo.NoDak.edu foo
Many of our clients don't have an /etc/hosts entry for their
secondary
(backup) interface's hostname.
- Lastly, we have a few clients with the same "short name" in different
subdomains, e.g. foo.subnet1.NoDak.edu (which is created within
NetWorker as foo-2.subnet1.nodak.edu), foo.subnet2.NoDak.edu (in
NetWorker it's foo-2.subnet2.nodak.edu), etc. In all cases, those
clients are using their fully qualified domain name of their
primary/public interface as their hostname.
DNS resolution is set up, and is working correctly. Everything worked
perfectly with the 6.1.x client.
After upgrading the clients to the 7.1.3.421 backup client, though,
backups
now fail with the "...is not properly configured" error message. Here's
an example for one of our IMAP servers:
* imap1-2.ndsu.nodak.edu:/ save: SYSTEM error: client `imap1' is not
properly configured on the NetWorker Server
* imap1-2.ndsu.nodak.edu:/ or `imap1' is not in the aliases list for
* client `imap1-2.ndsu.nodak.edu'
The crux of the problem seems to be that NetWorker is for some reason
wanting the short name `imap1' to be in the aliases list for this
client. I don't see why; the client machine is using its fully qualified
domain
name:
$hostname
imap1.ndsu.NoDak.edu
I can't add just `imap1' to the aliases list for this client, because
then NetWorker gets this client confused with other clients in other
subdomains that also have short names of `imap1' (even though all of
those clients are also using their fully qualified domain name). For
example, we also have backup clients name
imap1-2.nodak.edu
imap1-2.sendit.nodak.edu
Those clients are also both correctly using their fully qualified domain
names as their hostname, e.g. imap1.NoDak.edu and
imap1.sendit.NoDak.edu.
I'm not sure how to proceed. It looks to me like NetWorker is doing the
wrong thing (truncating what the client returns as its hostname) and
requiring that short name to be on the aliases list. That makes it
impossible to have two clients with the same short name (even if they're
not using the short name as their hostname) in different subdomains.
Anyone have any suggestions or ideas for how to work around this?
Tim
--
Tim Mooney mooney AT dogbert.cc.ndsu.NoDak DOT edu
Information Technology Services (701) 231-1076 (Voice)
Room 242-J6, IACC Building (701) 231-8541 (Fax)
North Dakota State University, Fargo, ND 58105-5164
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