The ODM is the Object Data Manager which AIX uses instead of flat files that you find in other Unix varients, such as Solaris, BSD, Linux, etc.
This describes the files in the ODM:
PdDv Predefined Devices
Contains entries for all device types currently on the system. It can also contain additional device types if the user has specifically installed certain packages that contain device support for devices that are not on the system. The term devices is used generally to mean both intermediate devices (e.g., adapters) and terminal devices (e.g., disks, printers, display terminals, and keyboards). Pseudo-devices (e.g., pseudo terminals, logical volumes, and TCP/IP) are also included there. Pseudo-devices can either be intermediate or terminal devices.
PdCn Predefined Connection
Contains connection information for intermediate devices; also includes predefined dependency information. For each connection location, there are one or more objects describing the subclasses of devices that can be connected. This information is useful, for example, in verifying whether a device instance to be defined and configured can be connected to a given device.
PdAt Predefined Attribute
Contains an entry for each existing attribute for each device represented in the Predefined Devices (PdDv) object class. An attribute, in this sense, is any device-dependent information not represented in the PdDv object class. This includes information such as interrupt levels, bus I/O address ranges, baud rates, parity settings, block sizes, and microcode file names.
Config_Rules Configuration Rules
Contains the configuration rules used by the Configuration Manager. The Configuration Manager runs in two phases during system boot. The first phase is responsible for configuring the base devices so that the real root device can be configured and made ready for operation. The second phase configures the rest of the devices in the system after the root file system is up and running. The Configuration Manager can also be invoked at run time. The Configuration Manager routine is driven by the rules in the Config_Rules object class.
CuDv Customized Devices
Contains entries for all device instances defined in the system. As the name implies, a defined device object is an object that a Define method has created in the CuDv object class. A defined device instance may or may not have a corresponding actual device attached to the system.
A CuDv object contains attributes and connections specific to the device instance. Each device instance, distinguished by a unique logical name, is represented by an object in the CuDv object class. The Customized database is updated twice, during system boot and at run time, to define new devices, remove undefined devices, or update the information for a device whose attributes have been changed.
CuDep Customized Dependency
Describes device instances that depend on other device instances. Dependency does not imply a physical connection. This object class describes the dependence links between logical devices and physical devices as well as dependence links between logical devices, exclusively. Physical dependencies of one device on another device are recorded in the Customized Device (CuDev) object class.
CuAt Customized Attribute
Device instances represented in the Customized Devices (CuDv) object class have attributes found in either the Predefined Attribute (PdAt) object class or the CuAt object class. There is an entry in the CuAt object class for attributes that take nondefault values. Attributes taking the default value are found in the PdAt object class. Each entry describes the current value of the attribute.
CuDvDr Customized Device Driver
Stores information about critical resources that need concurrence management through the use of the Device Configuration Library subroutines. You should only access this object class through these five Device Configuration Library subroutines: the genmajor, genminor, relmajor, reldevno, and getminor subroutines.
These subroutines exclusively lock this class so that accesses to it are serialized. The genmajor and genminor routines return the major and minor number, respectively, to the calling method. Similarly, the reldevno and relmajor routines release the major or minor number, respectively, from this object class.
CuVPD Customized Vital Product Data
Contains the Vital Product Data (VPD) for customized devices. VPD can be either machine-readable VPD or manually entered user VPD information.
