Resolving Merge Failures In Mixed Fabric - Cisco 9134 - MDS Multilayer Fabric Switch Troubleshooting Manual

Chapter 15 Troubleshooting Distributed Device Alias Services
S e n d d o c u m e n t a t i o n c o m m e n t s t o m d s f e e d b a c k - d o c @ c i s c o . c o m
Verify the device alias mode for each of the fabrics by using the show device-alias status command. In
Step 3
this example, switch-1 is running in enhanced mode, while switch-2 is running in basic mode.
switch-1# show device-alias status
switch-2# show device-alias status
Make the appropriate change to the device alias mode for one of the fabrics. Try doing a blank commit
Step 4
to change the mode. A blank commit occurs when you lock the fabric, but do not make any database
definition changes, and then perform a commit. This results in the distribution of the effective database
of the local switch to all other switches in the fabric. In this case, change the device alias mode only, and
then commit that change.
Note

Resolving Merge Failures in Mixed Fabric

A mixed fabric is a fabric consisting of switches running different software versions. Prior to SAN-OS
Release 3.1(x), the limit for device aliases in a merged fabric was 8K. In Release 3.1(1) and later, this
limit has been expanded to 20K. If you attempt to merge a fabric that includes switches running Release
3.0(x) or earlier with a fabric that includes switches running Release 3.1(x) or later, and the merged
device alias database would exceed 8K, the merge will fail.
To verify that the mixed fabric merge is failing because of database size, follow these steps:
Review the CFS or device alias merge failure syslogs to confirm that the merge failed, or issue the show
Step 1
cfs merge status name device-alias command to view the status of the merge.
Verify that the reason for the merge failure is incompatible capabilities or configurations by using the
Step 2
show device-alias merge status command.
switch-1# show device-alias merge status
Upgrade all switches in the problem fabric to SAN-OS Release 3.1(x) or later, and then attempt the
Step 3
merge again. Otherwise, if you must merge the fabrics, you will have to reduce the number of entries in
the combined device alias database.
OL-9285-05
Fabric Distribution: Enabled
Database:- Device Aliases 2 Mode: Enhanced
Fabric Distribution: Enabled
Database:- Device Aliases 2 Mode: Basic
If you need to change the device alias mode from enhanced to basic, and any application contains
a device alias configuration in native format, the device alias mode cannot be changed until you
explicitly remove all the native device alias configurations or replace all the device alias
members with the corresponding pWWNs. Refer to the Cisco MDS 9000 Family CLI
Configuration Guide for details.
Result: Failure
Reason: The merging fabrics have incompatible capabilities or configurations.
Cisco MDS 9000 Family Troubleshooting Guide, Release 3.x
Merge Failure Issues
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