DSEE6 SMF Fun...

I was recently asked how to configure the Solaris 10 Service Management Facility (SMF) to NOT restart directory server, should directory be stopped by dsadm, by kill or if DS quit on its own. In my pursuit of this configuration, I realized that there isn't a single resource that details some of my favorite uses of SMF relative to directory server. Toward that end, I decided to throw this blog entry for your benefit.

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Great SMF Resources
If you are just getting started on learning SMF, here are some great resources to get you going.

• Solaris Service Management Facility - Quickstart Guide
• SMF in a day
• SMF Deep Dive
  

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Where To Find SMF Templates For DS
Directory Server Sample SMF Template:

  /dsee6-install-dir/ds6/install/tmpl_smf.manifest

Directory Proxy Server Sample SMF Template:

  /dsee6-install-dir/dps6/install/tmpl_smf.manifest

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How To Disable SMF Auto-restart
1. Save frmi into variable
# fmri="svc:/application/sun/ds:default"

2. Dump the fmri xml to a file
# svccfg export ${fmri} > /ds-fmri.xml

3. Modify /ds-fmri.xml adding the following after the <stability... property.

<property_group name='startd' type='framework'>
   <propval name='duration' type='astring' value='transient'/>
</property_group>

4. Delete the current entry with sccfg
# svccfg delete ${fmri}

5. Import the updated fmri xml file...
# svccfg import /ds-fmri.xml

6. Enable the fmri...
# svccfg enable ${fmri}

Note that if you stop or kill ds outside of svcadm (e.g. smf) the state will not change from 'online'. Here is sample output from my system.

# svcs ds
STATE STIME FMRI
online 13:35:04 svc:/application/sun/ds:default

Reference:
Service Management Facility master restarter

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How To Partially Disable Auto Restart
If you installed from native packages with the Java Enterprise System distribution, enable the server to restart when the operating system reboots.

# dsadm enable-service --type SMF /ds_instance

Note that that with this feature, "dsadm stop /ds_instance" will stop DS and disable the service so that the restarter won't try to re-start ds. However, if DS is killed or dies, the restarter will attempt to re-start DS.

Reference:
Creating and deleting a directory server instance

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How To Start DS Using libumem
If for troubleshooting purposes, you want to switch to the object-caching memory allocation library (libumem), use the following to make the change in SMF:
# svccfg -s svc:/application/sun/ds:default setenv LD_PRELOAD_32 libumem.so
# svccfg -s svc:/application/sun/ds:default setenv LD_PRELOAD_64 /usr/lib/64/libumem.so

Then, refresh and restart the DS instance in order for this change to take effect.
# svcadm refresh svc:/application/sun/ds:default
# svcadm restart svc:/application/sun/ds:default

Use the following to see the changes:

# svcprop ds| grep LD_
start/environment astring LD_PRELOAD_32=libumem.so LD_PRELOAD_64=/usr/lib/64/libumem.so

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How To Start DS On Fixed Priority Scheduler
If you would like to start DS with the fixed priority scheduler instead of the default fare share scheduler, simply insert the appropriate priocntl command into the exec_method string of the start method. Here is the excerpt of our working fmri example.

<exec_method
  type="method"
  name="start"
  exec="/opt/SUNWdsee/ds6/bin/dsadm start --exec /dsAtt"
  timeout_seconds="600">

Here is what it looks like after we have added priocntl:

<exec_method
  type="method"
  name="start"
  exec="priocntl -e -c FX /opt/SUNWdsee/ds6/bin/dsadm start --exec /ds"
  timeout_seconds="600">

To actually make the change, use the method described above in "How To Disable SMF Auto-restart"

Now, you can see from the process listing that the schedule used is the FX scheduler.

# ps -c -p 6033
   PID  CLS PRI TTY         TIME CMD
  6033   FX   0 ?           0:00 ns-slapd

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Set NDD Settings On System Boot
After installing DS, one of the first things that you need to do is optimize the system wide TCP/IP settings for directory server. You can determine the settings that make the most sense for your system by running idsktune. Take those settings and plug them into a script that will be called on system boot once by SMF. Details on this procedure are well documented in the Deployment Planning Guide.

I hope that you find this information useful.

Blessings to you and yours.

Brad