I've historically seen errpt errors (AIX 5 and 6) with the Atape driver and
multiple generations of both 3590 and 3592 tape drives in both 3494 and 3584
libraries where the library managed the cleaning.  There is a "drive needs
cleaning" message and two SIM/MIM messages, one indicating the cleaning is
needed and one indicating the drive has been cleaned (after decoding the
detail data).  With the 3592 drives, sometimes I now only see two of the
three messages (though I forget which is sometimes missing).

Typically, I'll also see the "drive cleaned" SIM message when the drive has
been manually cleaned, e.g. by our IBM CE.

If you see the "drive needs cleaning" (E507DCF9 for my current drives)
without a corresponding SIM/MIM message or two (A7AB4C8F), I would worry that
the drives aren't being cleaned.  As Rick notes, a drive that needs cleaning
should display a message on the drive display and in the web interface, too.

=Dave

On 09/13/2013 10:42 AM, Rick Saylor wrote:

Nick

My 3584 libraries are set to autoclean and I see these messages in
the AIX error log and the act log also. Have you checked the display
on the drives(either physically looked or with the web client)? If
the drive needs cleaning it will display a message. Also, check the
cleaning cartridge(s). You should see the number of cleanings
increase over time. So, I just keep an eye on the number of cleanings
and replace when the limit is reached (usually 50 cleans is the limit).

Rick

At 10:08 AM 9/13/2013, you wrote:

After three years in a data center in which actual physical tapes were
forbidden, I'm now doing penance in a smaller data center using a
honest-to-god 3584 with ALMS.

To my surprise, I'm seeing entries in an AIX 6.1 error report that some of
my tape drives need cleaning, and I'm finding corresponding ANR8914I
messages in my activity log. This makes me fear that the ALMS automated
cleaning isn't happening. (The first alternate proposal is that I'm
expecting too much.)

If it matters, we're using 3592 drives, not LTO drives. Also, TSM 6.2 on
AIX 6.1.

Is this a sign that we need to update our 3584 microcode? Is there some
interaction between the 3584 and AIX that prompts the 3584 to notify AIX
instead of just quietly cleaning the drive?

(I'm so happy that DataDomain's 3584 emulation didn't strive to match these
nuances....)

Nick

--
Hello World.                                David Bronder - Systems Architect
Segmentation Fault                                      ITS-EI, Univ. of Iowa
Core dumped, disk trashed, quota filled, soda warm.   david-bronder AT uiowa 
DOT edu