I received an email this week from a colleague that worked with me on the NIM Redbook back in 2006. He was experiencing an issue with DSM and NIM. He was attempting to use the dgetmacs command to obtain the MAC address of the network adapters on an LPAR. The command was failing to return the right information.

This was the output from his attempt with dgetmacs:

# dgetmacs -n lpar1

Using an adapter type of "ent".

Could not dsh to node lpar1.

Attempting to use openfirmware method to collect MAC addresses.

Acquiring adapter information from Open Firmware for node lpar1.

dgetmacs: 2760-185 Issuing the command "/opt/ibm/sysmgt/dsm/dsmbin/lpar_netboot -M -n -t ent -J hmc1 -j hmc -F /etc/ibm/sysmgt/dsm/config/my_password_file A 4 10582FP 8202-E4B" gave a return code of 1. The routine will continue.

No adapters found for node lpar1.

Could not get mac address for this aix node "lpar1"

I experienced this very issue during the writing of the AIX 7.1 Differences Guide Redbook. And given that I was in Austin, sitting in the same building as the AIX development team, I was able to speak with the developers directly about the issue. At that time they provided me with the following workaround.

First they asked me to check the size of the /usr/lib/nls/msg/en_US/IBMhsc.netboot.cat message catalog file.

# ls l /usr/lib/nls/msg/en_US/IBMhsc.netboot.cat

-rw-r--r-- 1 bin bin 3905 Aug 08 09:54

They were surprised to find that the file appeared to be too small. They promptly sent me the catalog file from one of their development AIX 7.1 systems. I replaced the file as follows:

# cd /usr/lib/nls/msg/en_US/

# ls -ltr IBMhsc*

-rw-r--r-- 1 bin bin 3905 Aug 08 09:54 IBMhsc.netboot.cat

# cp -p IBMhsc.netboot.cat IBMhsc.netboot.cat.old

# cp /tmp/lpar1/IBMhsc.netboot.cat.new IBMhsc.netboot.cat

# ls -ltr IBMhsc*

-rw-r--r-- 1 bin bin 3905 Aug 08 09:54 IBMhsc.netboot.cat.old

-rw-r--r-- 1 bin bin 26374 Dec 23 11:24 IBMhsc.netboot.cat

This fixed the problem for me during the residency.

So I asked my friend to do the same (after I sent him the message catalog file). He ran the dgetmacs command again and this time it returned the MAC address for all the network adapters in his LPAR. Success!

# dgetmacs -n lpar1

Using an adapter type of "ent".

Could not dsh to node lpar1.

Attempting to use openfirmware method to collect MAC addresses.

Acquiring adapter information from Open Firmware for node lpar1.

# Node::adapter_type::interface_name::MAC_address::location::media_speed::adapter_duplex::UNUSED::install_gateway::ping_status::machine_type::netaddr::subnet_mask

lpar1::ent_v::::4A7009608816::U8202.E4B.10582FP-V4-C22-T1::auto::auto::::::n/a::secondary::::

lpar1::ent_v::::4A7009608818::U8202.E4B.10582FP-V4-C24-T1::auto::auto::::::n/a::secondary::::

This then allowed him to network boot his LPAR and install AIX 7.1 via NIM.

# nim -o bos_inst -a bosinst_data=noprompt -a source=rte -a installp_flags=agX -a accept_licenses=yes -a spot=spotaix7tl0sp2 -a lpp_source=aix7tl0sp2 lpar1

dnetboot Status: Invoking /opt/ibm/sysmgt/dsm/dsmbin/lpar_netboot lpar1

dnetboot Status: Was successful network booting node lpar1.

I thought this might have been resolved in the latest service pack for AIX 7.1. However, both of us have the latest service pack installed (i.e. TL0 SP2 for AIX 7.1).

# oslevel -s

7100-00-02-1041

If anyone encounters this problem, feel free to contact me (aix@gibsonnet.net).

For more information, please refer to section 5.2.7 Using DSM and NIM, in the AIX 7.1 Differences Guide Redbook:

http://www.redbooks.ibm.com/Redbooks.nsf/RedpieceAbstracts/sg247910.html?Open