Re: [Networker] Networker hangs completely at times

In regard to: Re: [Networker] Networker hangs completely at times, Oscar...:

Sorry, but no, that's not the problem. The T950 is completely agnostic
about cleaning tapes.


I was thinking about your earlier post, regarding being able to see the
"needs cleaning" status from the library web management interface.  Even
if your library firmware doesn't yet support library-initiated cleaning,
having the info available from the web is all you really need to script
cleaning so that it only happens when needed (rather than on a fixed
schedule, which I believe is the case without CDI).

I'm thinking:

- turn off any automatic cleaning within NetWorker, or make the automatic
  cleaning happen on a very long period.
- write a script that:
        - uses wget or some other tool to grab the library web page that
          has the cleaning status for each of your drives.
        - parse out just the bits you need, so you can see which drives
          (if any) need cleaning.
        - use nsradmin to set the "Cleaning required:" attribute for the
          device(s) to "Yes".
- run this script periodically from a scheduler like cron.


You could insert some logic before updating the "Cleaning required"
attribute, so that it's only updated if that particular drive isn't in
use.

It requires a little scripting, but it avoids CDI and also gets your drives
cleaned only when they need it.  It should also avoid the NetWorker problem
you're seeing, especially if you have your script only update the attribute
if the drive isn't currently in use.

Tim
--
Tim Mooney                              mooney AT dogbert.cc.ndsu.NoDak DOT edu
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North Dakota State University, Fargo, ND 58105-5164

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