EMC AX-Series Navisphere

SP Agent
Version 6.20.0.3.12 for FLARE OE 02.20.yyy

Release Notes
P/N 300-003-516
REV A01
February 23, 2006

These release notes contain supplemental information about EMC®

Navisphere® SP Agent for AX-series storage systems that have been
upgraded from Navisphere Express to Navisphere Manager. Topics
include:
Š Product description ................................................................................... 2
Š New features and changes........................................................................ 2
Š Environment and system requirements.................................................. 2
Š Fixed problems ........................................................................................... 2
Š Known problems and limitations ............................................................ 3
Š Technical notes ........................................................................................... 4
Š Documentation ........................................................................................... 5
Š Software media, organization, and files ................................................. 6
Š Installation .................................................................................................. 6
Š Troubleshooting and getting help ........................................................... 7

1
Product description

Product description
The EMC Navisphere Storage Processor (SP) Agent is storage-system
software that allows a Navisphere client application (such as Navisphere
Manager or Navisphere CLI) to communicate with FLARE™ software in
an AX-series storage system. The SP Agent is an application with no
direct user interface. You configure and control the SP Agent through the
Remote Agent Configuration feature of Navisphere Manager and CLI.
Several Navisphere clients can communicate with one Navisphere SP
Agent running on one SP in a storage system.

New features and changes

This section describes any new features - enhancements to existing
functionality or added functionality - and changes for this release of the
product.
Š Support for AX150-series storage systems

Environment and system requirements

This section identifies the hardware and software requirements for
proper operation of this release of the SP Agent.

Hardware
The minimum hardware requirement is an AX150-series storage system.

FLARE software
FLARE Operating Environment (OE) version 02.20.yyy is required for
AX150-series storage systems.

Navisphere management software requirements

Navisphere Manager version 6.20.xx.xx.xx is required for the AX150-
series storage systems.

Fixed problems
Visit the EMC Powerlink™ Issue Tracker website at
http://Powerlink.EMC.com for the most recent updates and information
on previous Navisphere SP Agent releases.

2 EMC AX-Series Navisphere SP Agent Release Notes

 Known problems and limitations

Known problems and limitations

Visit the EMC Powerlink Issue Tracker website at
http://Powerlink.EMC.com for the most recent updates and information
on previous Navisphere SP Agent releases.

Problem area and description Work-around

NDU failure due to problems writing to the event log. The The primary SP for the NDU must be rebooted.
agent logs an event in the application log if it encounters
an error when trying to write to the Event Monitor Log. The
error logged in the application log is
EM_EventLog::WriteLog - Error
Writing Event. The agent then terminates and as a
result the NDU fails. [116046]
You cannot not create an incremental copy session with a Wait until the active session completes and try again.
source LUN that is currently active. [109454]
The loopback address that a client uses is equivalent to None.
the local hostname or IP address, independent of any "-a"
options used when invoking the agent.
When a hot spare is replaced with another drive of same None.
or larger capacity, the new drive's properties should be
displayed in the hot spare properties. Instead the old
drive's properties are displayed.[125157]
If you have an off-array CIMOM on the same management The user has to stop the NaviGovernor and restart it to
station as the central agent and you stop the agent to add make the CIMOM aware of the changes in the user
the user privileges into the agent.config file and restart it, privileges.
the off-array CIMOM will not know about the new user
entries you just added. [127726]
While you try to install a software update with CLI you see This is a result of a transient network condition. Try the
the following error: operation again.
Error: NDU command failed
Error returned from Agent
User connect attempt timed out.
An inspection of the logs indicates the agent logged the
following message:
Agent Closing Log File -- Too many
consecutive exception events.
To prevent an overflow of messages in the application
event logs, the logging is turned off and no further events
are logged until the socket is reset again and the agent is
communicating. The agent is still up and can be connected
to once the socket gets reset. [127776]

EMC AX-Series Navisphere SP Agent Release Notes 3

Technical notes

Technical notes
This section includes important information that does not appear
anywhere else.

Software upgrades
For an AX-series storage system, the SP Agent is an integral part of the
AX-series storage-system software – called the FLARE Integrated
Operating Environment software. An upgrade to the SP Agent is
available only as a new version of the AX-Series FLARE Integrated
Operating Environment software.

Polling of FLARE
The SP Agent is in degraded mode when a poll (a get operation) of
FLARE returns any error. When a set operation, such as binding a LUN,
returns an error, the SP Agent does not go to degraded mode. When the
AX-series SP Agent is in degraded mode, Navisphere Manager displays
an ‘F’ on the storage system icon, and the following message appears in
the Event Log:
INTERNAL: Poll failure: agent going into degraded mode:

4 EMC AX-Series Navisphere SP Agent Release Notes

 Documentation

In this situation, only the following functions are guaranteed to work:

Š Retrieval of event log messages
Š File Transfer Manager functionality of the SP Agent
Š Software installation (only if the SP software allows it)
Š Rebooting the SP (for peer or both SPs)

Documentation
The following table lists the documents with information on reinstalling
and configuring the SP Agent:

Part Number Description

069001125 EMC Navisphere Manager Administrator's Guide
069001038 EMC Navisphere Command Line Interface (CLI) Reference
300-002-827 EMC AX100-Series Integrated Management Software Version
02.19.100.5.yyy Release Notes
300-003-021 EMC AX150-Series Integrated Management Software version
02.20.150.5.yyy Release Notes

These manuals can be found on the EMC Navisphere Manager Upgrade

Documentation CD that shipped with the Navisphere Manager upgrade
kit or on the AX100-series or AX150-series support website.

EMC AX-Series Navisphere SP Agent Release Notes 5

Software media, organization, and files

Software media, organization, and files

The following table lists the applicable documentation media for this
release:

Part Number Description

For AX100-series storage systems - EMC CLARiiON Storage-System
053-001-477
Hardware and Software Documentation CD
For AX150-series storage systems - EMC Navisphere Manager Upgrade
053-001-516
Documentation CD

Installation
AX-series storage systems ship from the factory with the latest version of
the SP Agent installed on each SP. Since the SP Agent is an integral part
of the FLARE Integrated Operating Environment on an AX-series storage
system, updates to the SP Agent are integral parts of this FLARE
software. To update the FLARE Integrated Operating Environment, use
the software installation procedure in the EMC Navisphere Manager
Administrator's Guide or the EMC Navisphere Command Line Interface (CLI)
Reference.

6 EMC AX-Series Navisphere SP Agent Release Notes

 Troubleshooting and getting help

Troubleshooting and getting help

This section provides specific instructions for contacting EMC Customer
Support and obtaining additional information about EMC products.

Where to get help

EMC support, product, and licensing information can be obtained as
follows.
Product information
For documentation, release notes, software updates, or for information
about EMC products, licensing, and service, go to the EMC Powerlink
website (registration required) at:
http://Powerlink.EMC.com
Technical support
For technical support, go to EMC WebSupport on Powerlink. To open a
case on EMC WebSupport, you must be a WebSupport customer.
Information about your site configuration and the circumstances under
which the problem occurred is required.

EMC AX-Series Navisphere SP Agent Release Notes 7

Troubleshooting and getting help

Copyright © 2006 EMC Corporation. All Rights Reserved.

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is subject to change without notice.
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All other trademarks used herein are the property of their respective owners.

8 EMC AX-Series Navisphere SP Agent Release Notes