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From belal@sco.com Fri Mar  5 06:06:43 2004
Newsgroups: comp.unix.sco.misc
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From: Bela Lubkin <belal@sco.com>
Subject: Re: Unable to create raw devices for sybase 11.0.3.2
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Bret Halford wrote:

> Looks like a typo in the DISK INIT command, your listing
> shows a device name of "r2disk1", the errorlog is showing
> an attempt to use "rr2disk1"

OpenServer provides parallel device nodes "/dev/devname" and
"/dev/rdevname" for block and raw access to a disk device.  The name
he's using _may_ be correct, if indeed Sybase wants raw access (not
passing through the operating system's buffer cache).  That said, it
would be reasonable for him to change the configuration and see if it
behaves any differently -- possibly better -- when pointed at the block
device /dev/r2disk1.

Meanwhile, I replied to him yesterday and mistakenly did not allow my
article to be crossposted to comp.databases.sybase.  Since that article
contained a question best answered by a Sybase expert, I am including it
here.

>Bela<

Date: Thu, 4 Mar 2004 04:38:00 -0800
From: Bela Lubkin <belal@sco.com>
Newsgroups: comp.unix.sco.misc
Subject: Re: Unable to create raw devices for sybase 11.0.3.2
Message-ID: <20040304123800.GY24746@sco.com>
References: <da519165.0403032109.619811a9@posting.google.com>

Nitin Shinde wrote:

>   I am trying to create a raw device for sybase databases thru disk
> init, it fails by saying
> 
> Msg 5115, Level 16, State 1:
> Line 1:
> I/O error during disk initialization.  PHYSNAME '/dev/rr2disk1' may be
> incorrect
> or 52004 (VSTART + SIZE) may exceed the size of the device.  Please
> consult the
> SQL Server error log for more details. 
> 
> when i check the sybase errorlog it says
> 
> 2004/03/04 09:35:10.79 kernel  Initializing virtual device 8,
> '/dev/rr2disk1'
> 00:2004/03/04 09:35:10.80 kernel  Virtual device 8 started using
> asynchronous i/
> o.
> 00:2004/03/04 09:35:10.80 kernel  sddone: write error on virtual disk
> 8 block 0:
> 00:2004/03/04 09:35:10.80 kernel  sddone: No such device or address
> 00:2004/03/04 09:35:10.80 kernel  Deactivating virtual device 8,
> '/dev/rr2disk1'
> 
> i have tried all possible solutions but have failed to create a raw
> device for sybase databases.
> 
> My disk layout is as follows, 
> ----------------------------------------------------------------
>  Name     | Type       | New FS | # | First Block | Last Block |
> ----------------------------------------------------------------
> | f1disk1 | HTFS       |  no    | 0 |            0|     1560576|
> | r1disk1 | HTFS       |  no    | 1 |      1560577|     3657729|
> | r2disk1 | NON FS     |  no    | 2 |      3657730|     5754882|
> | r3disk1 | NON FS     |  no    | 3 |      5754883|     7852034|
> | r4disk1 | NON FS     |  no    | 4 |      7852035|     8948204|
> |         | NOT USED   |  no    | 5 |            -|           -|
> |         | NOT USED   |  no    | 6 |            -|           -|
> | d1157all| WHOLE DISK |  no    | 7 |            0|     8956205
> ----------------------------------------------------------------

I've never configured Sybase, but here is a wild guess.  The division
"r2disk1" is exactly 2097152 blocks long -- 2^31 bytes (2 gibibytes).
If Sybase calculates the division's size using a signed 32-bit int, it
will see the size as 0x80000000 bytes which is _negative_ 2 GiB.

See what happens if you set the last block of r2disk1 to 5754881 (1K
smaller).  The signed-int representation of its size will then be a
large positive number.

Do you know what the block size is in the Sybase error message you
quoted, "52004 (VSTART + SIZE) may exceed the size of the device"?

>Bela<

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