Why CMS shoud be Rebooted periodically 1

[ChukiePTY]

Hi guys,

I just want to know why avaya CMS should be rebooted periodically.

Our vendor told us, that is because temps, is this rigth??

thanks

 

[4merAvaya]

There are some UNIX/Solaris files that grow over time, /etc/utmp & /etc/wtmp, to name a few. By rebooting those files are purged and rebuilt. The cron routines are restarted.

Kevin

 

[DAVIDPAYNE]

Aslo it stop the message popping up telling you to reboot.

 

[ChukiePTY]

Oh thanks

But isnt possible to create a task to do so once a month,
have any of you tried?

i ask to avaya and they just keep saying the same, for me it's just crazy that an equipment expensive as CMS, you have to do such maintenance. I mean we can restart it but let say once every 6 month instead of monthly as i have to do it. We have a lot of data but still i thing it should be a better way to do this purge

can you help me on this?

He who stand with me shall be my brother

 

[DAVIDPAYNE]

I do not know of away to automate the reboot. But I have never really looked for one. But I have left the system run for long time between reboots with no ill effects. But you are running a risk. I normal just do the reboot on the day that I do the maintenance backup. And I was thinking of the backup message you get when you are pass due.

 

[ChukiePTY]

yep

avaya told me that i have to reboot the cms (both) every month

i mean,
everytime you reboot the CMS
you have the risk of

* the cms wont start again (this is a lot of trouble)
* sync of intervals
* etc...

this schedule taks can be done in linux (which is very alike to unix)

He who stand with me shall be my brother

 

[ChukiePTY]

this website has the basics

http://216.147.98.109/support_unix.html

i a newbe in avaya, seeking for enlightenment from the CMS/AVAYA gurus in this site



He who stand with me shall be my brother

 

[Stinney]

I use the root cron jobs to do this automatically.

I created a file using vi with a single line with the reboot command:

/usr/sbin/shutdown -y -g0 -i6

To create files using vi you have to be logged in as root.

If you don't know how to use vi editor, look it up online and get familar with it first.

I used chmod to make the file executable:

chmod 775 [filename]

Then I edited the root cron jobs to execute it once a month on the 3rd Thursday of the month at 3:10am which is our scheduled window for reboots:

***AGAIN, If you don't know how to use vi editor, look it up online and get familar with it before you access and change the cron file. You DON'T want to screw this up. Good idea is to copy the file to another file name so you have a backup to replace anything you might screw up.

While logged in as root, execute command "crontab -e" go to the last line of the cron file and enter what you need, mine is:

10 3 15-21 * 4 /[file directory path]/[filename]

10 = minute
3 = hr of day (24hr format)
15-21 = day of the month (ranges are allowed)3rd Thursday will always fall between 15 and 21.
* is month, since I want this to run every month entry is a *
4 = day of the week, the week starts with 0 as Sunday so 4 is Thursday


If you want is as simple as once every month on the 1st at midnight the entry would look like:

0 0 1 * * /[file directory path]/[filename]


Or every 3rd month starting with January would look like:

0 0 * 1,4,7,10 * /[file directory path]/[filename]


The file directory path has to be the full path so if you have this in a subdirectory you need the line to include the root directory and all subdirectories. Mine is /appbin/sys_maint/[filename]

Hope this helps.

- Stinney

Quoting only proves you know how to cut and paste.

 

[BIS]

Just a note - a good safe way to working with cron is to back up teh file before editing:

crontab -l > backupfile
vi backupfile
crontab backupfile

 

[ChukiePTY]

yes! exactly that is the same thing i told avaya
but they still are saying i have to do it manually
if i dont do it that way
we are not cover by maintenance

i mean, that is just a fullish anwer from AVAYA

i thing it can be done buy schedule, if you dont want to do the reboot, that 's ok
but you can at least purge the temps files from the cms

He who stand with me shall be my brother

 

[Stinney]

So they want to force you to perform the same exact command manually that can be done the exact same way automatically.

Exactly what won't they be covering if it's done automatically and performs the exact same thing as a manual reboot?

If the reboot fails to launch, then you can deal with manually launching it. So that's covered. Knock on wood, this hasn't been an issue for me.

If the reboot fails to restart the system, you can power it down and back up again. So that's covered. Knocking again...

Performing the reboot automatically doesn't open you to any other issues that a manual reboot wouldn't, so I don't see their point.

- Stinney

Quoting only proves you know how to cut and paste.

 

[ChukiePTY]

you are so rigth
it dosent have a point eather

but how can i tell this to my boss if this is not an "avaya aproved process"

my god i dont like to be on the office at midnigth doing this!



He who stand with me shall be my brother

 

[Stinney]

I think you need them to provide documented reasoning for not covering this with full explaination as to what documented issues it is known to cause.

Rebooting the device isn't an Avaya process, it's a Solaris OS process.

I've written to our Avaya support contact and asked if they would take exception to us using this. Probably asking for trouble. I'll let you know what they say.

- Stinney

Quoting only proves you know how to cut and paste.

 

[ChukiePTY]

thanks a lot man!

He who stand with me shall be my brother

 

[PeteBull]

to expand on the method that BIS introduced:

crontab -l > backupfile
echo "10 3 15-21 * 4 /[directory]/[filename]" >> backupfile
crontab backupfile

and you don't have to worry about learning vi commands.

 

[ChukiePTY]

i'll try to open a case with avaya
with this info

He who stand with me shall be my brother

 

[europe]

montly is not needed.
find the readme file in the cms directory

that states a reboot every 90 days...
seen systems run for months without probs....
But it is wise to do a reboot with a 3 month interval

(worked on cms since R3V4)

Please let me know if the information that was provided is helpfull.
Edwin Plat
A.K.A. Europe

 

[Stinney]

You'll never guess what Avaya said.....

Not supported. If something "corrupts" during reboot it will void coverage.

Just doesn't make sense to me. If it's the same exact command, just launched from a cronjob, I don't see the harm.

They said they would send up to the Tier III level to see what they say. I'm going to have them ask, all they can say is no.

- Stinney

Quoting only proves you know how to cut and paste.

 

[Stinney]

I'd be very careful about adding something to a cronjob not understanding vi editor.

The suggestion by PeteBull is all well and good, but what if you make a mistake in your cronjob addition, or you need to remove it later? How do you change it without using vi?

- Stinney

Quoting only proves you know how to cut and paste.

 

[europe]

so what if you write a batch job on another machine, that telnets and executes the shutdown command????

Please let me know if the information that was provided is helpfull.
Edwin Plat
A.K.A. Europe