The Linux and Unix Menagerie: Powering Sun M4000/5000 Series Servers Down And Up From The XSCF

Hey There,

Today's post is more beginner-oriented than the last few days' posts on deleted data recovery on Linux and Unix.

Below is a little walkthrough on the very basics of powering on, and powering off, M4000/5000 Series Sun Servers from the XSCF (eXtended System Controller Facility, or something roughly approximate) command line. These instructions should also apply to the M8000/9000 Series servers as well, but, since I'm getting all my output directly from an M4000, I don't want to "assume" anything incorrect about the higher end servers.

The basic steps we're going to walk through are simply logging in, powering down a domain, powering on a domain, and jumping back and forth between the XSCF command line and the M4000 console.

For the purposes of today's post, we're going to assume that the basic XSCF setup has been completed and you have an admin login account on it. You've also set up ssh (naturally) and disabled the web-based interface (because its so insecure... ;) Your admin account is "admin" - Also, in the spirit of keeping this simple, we're going to assume that you've only set up one domain on your M4000, and you've used the default first domain: domain 0.

Connecting to the XSCF is as simple as connecting to any server, assuming you have an account ;)

host # ssh admin@host-xscf
admin@host-xscf's password:
Last login: Sat Mar 28 17:55:52 2009 from fridgehost.beernutz.com

Once you're logged on, if you want to get to the console of your M4000 server, all you need to do is use the "console" command, like so (-d denotes the domain number and I use -y so I don't have to answer the "are you sure?" question every time):

XSCF> console -d 0 -y
Connect to DomainID 0?[y|n] :y

host console login: user
Password:
-bash-3.00$ exit

To get back to the XSCF prompt from the console, just type "pound dot" (literally #.) and it will kick you back to the XSCF from the console.

host console login: #.
XSCF>

Powering off the M4000 from the XSCF prompt is even more trivial ;) It should be noted that running "poweroff" at the XSCF command line is equal to running "init 5" at the command line, as root. "poweroff" will not tell you if your command was successful or not (neither will "poweron"), but you can find out the status of your request easily, by using the "showlogs" command. Also, just running "poweroff" again will let you know the status. If your previous invocation worked, you'll get an error that the machine is already powered off:

XSCF> poweroff -d 0 -y
DomainIDs to power off:00
Continue? [y|n] :y
....
XSCF> showlogs power
Example: Jan 08 16:47:45 EST 2009 Domain Power Off Operator 00 Locked
XSCF> exit

Powering on the server from the XSCF prompt is pretty much the same rigmarole :)

XSCF> poweron -d 0 -y
DomainIDs to power on:00
Continue? [y|n] :y
....
XSCF> showlogs power
Example: Jan 08 16:47:45 EST 2009 Domain Power On Operator 00 Locked
XSCF>

And that will, eventually, bring you right back to up. You can log into the console, from the XSCF prompt, before POST begins, if you want to see everything that happens on the console when you boot:

XSCF> console -d 0 -y
Connect to DomainID 0?[y|n] :y

b0939db-s console login: user
Password:
Last login: Sun Apr 5 16:57:14 from host
-bash-3.00$ exit

host console login: #.
XSCF> exit

And that's pretty much all there is to powering on and off your M4000/5000 Series server using the XSCF :)

Enjoy, but (as always) use caution if you're not sure what you're doing. As one last hint. If you get stuck at the XSCF prompt and need to know what to type next (There are no obvious hints), just type:

XSCF> man intro

or

XSCF> [tab][tab]
do you want to see all .... entries

That's literally hitting the tab key twice, above. Then it will ask you if you want to see all the available commands listed out. If you know what you want to do and you just can't remember the command name, [tab][tab] is your friend. If you think you know the name, and you also need to know a little bit about the command, then the man page for "intro" is your best bet.

Enjoy and cheers

, Mike