Category: IT Support Knowledgebase

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Useful Isilon Commands for Troubleshooting

Here are some some useful Isilon commands to assist you in troubleshooting Isilon storage array issues.

 

Grep the log for stalled drives on the isilon cluster

     cat /var/log/messages |grep -o 'stalled: [0-9,*:]*'|sort |uniq -c

(Stalled drives are bad, and can cause cluster problems. you could also run this command on the individual nodes /var/log/restripe.log )

Grep the log for stalled drives on the isilon cluster for month of Sept

grep 'Nov ' /var/log/messages |grep -o 'stalled: [0-9,*:]*'|sort |uniq -c

Use this on the restripe.log

  grep 'Nov ' /var/log/restripe.log |grep -o 'Stalled drives are \[[0-9,*:]*\]'|sort |uniq -c

When reviewing the results of the stalled drives it is important to note that the drive numbers listed is the logical drive number and not the bay number.  You need to run the command “isi devices” on the node with the suspect drive to determine what bay the drive is actually in.

Display the SMART error log of all the drives on a given isilon node:

isi_radish -a|less

Display the current isilon Flexprotect Policy

isi get /ifs

Display the current isilon node hardware status:

isi_hw_status

Display the status of the isilon node network config

isi config

then while in the config utility

 status 

Display this list of alerts in wide format

 isi alerts -w

Start/Stop/Resume/Pause Restriper jobs

 isi restripe pause 
isi restripe start 
isi restripe stop 
 isi restripe resume -i

Display the drive status of a given isilon node

     #for node 3
     isi devices -d 3  

Display the SAS drives Physical Monitoring stats for errors

     less /var/log/isi_sasphymon.acc

Test Active Directory connections from all isilon nodes

     isi_for_array wbinfo -t

To find an open file on Isilon Windows share

     isi_for_array -q -s smbstatus | grep
  then find the PID from the results and  then run this to get the user
     isi_for_array -q -s smbstatus -u| grep    to get the user

Note: The isi_for_array command runs the command on all of the nodes. This command will ask for the user’s password so that it can login to the other nodes and complete the command. When passing the results of a “isi_for_array” command to another command such as grep (like the example above) will require the user password so that it can be passed to the other nodes. There is no prompt for the password so you must enter it on the next line and press enter to get the results of the command.

 

How to Mass Export All Exchange 2010 Mailboxes to PST

I recently ran into a situation where I needed to mass export all the Exchange 2010 Mailboxes out to PST files.

Use this quick powershell code snippet to accomplish the task:

$mailboxes = get-mailbox
foreach ($mailbox in $mailboxes) {
new-mailboxexportrequest -mailbox $mailbox -FilePath \\server\c$\$mailbox.pst
}

Note that the file path must be a UNC path and not a drive letter!

To monitor the status of the exports use the following command:

Get-MailboxExportRequest | Get-MailboxExportRequestStatistics

Situations where you may need to use this:

  • Migrate mailboxes completely out of your exchange 2010 environment
  • Backup all mailboxes in their current state for legal discovery
  • Backup all mailboxes for import into a email archive application
  • Historical archive of mailbox out of exchange 2010 for legal or compliance purposes

You may need to add the “Mailbox Import Export” role to your administrator account.  If so use this command:

New-Managementroleassignment –Role “Mailbox Import Export” –User “Administrator”

 

Free Tool to Detect and Resolve VMware VM Partition Alignment Issues

I recently discovered a free tool that will assist VMware admins in detecting and resolving VMware VM partition alignment issues.  VM partition alignment is critical in reducing i/o at the storage array level for VMware infrastructure.  Essentially poorly aligned VM partitions can double or triple the i/o cycles to the storage array.  If VM admins ignore this problem or are unaware of the issue, this problem can snowball and consume excessive storage i/o limiting the number of VM’s that can be supported on a VM infrastructure.

The free tool is called UberAlign.  UberAlign will scan your VM infrastructure for misaligned VM’s and optionally re-align the VM to the correct offset.

More information about UberAlign can be found here.

More detailed information about VMware VM alignment issues can be found here.

Microsoft Word 2007/2010 Spell Check does not work – How to resolve this issue

I recently ran into an issue that took awhile to fix. A colleague’s office computer just would not spell check in Microsoft Word 2007 or Outlook. I tried several steps to repair the issue including un-installing and re-installing office. The final fix was to delete a registry key. If you run into this problem, here are few tips on what items to check.

  1. Check that to see if Spell Checking has been disabled.
    • In Microsoft Word 2007, click the Office Button, then click “Word Options” (For Microsoft Word 2010 Click the File Tab then “Options”)
    • On the left Click “Add-ins”
    • At the bottom of the menu next to “Manage” choose “Disabled Items” then click “Go”.
    • Verify that “Spell Check” is NOT in the list of disabled items. If it is, enable it and test to see if spell check works. Otherwise proceed to step #2.
  2. Check to see if the language is set correctly.
    • In Word, click the Review Tab
    • On the ribbon, click Language
    • In the Language Dialog, ensure your correct language is checked, verify that “Detect language automatically” is checked, and that “Do not check spelling or grammar” is UNCHECKED. Click OK
    • Test to see if spell check is working now. If not, proceed to step #3.
  3. With all your office applications closed, delete the following registry key (you may want to back up the key before deleting it just in case…) KEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Office\12.0\Word Restarting Word will recreate the registry key. Check to see if spell check works for you. If not, proceed to step #4.
  4. With all your office applications closed, delete the following registry key (you may want to back up the key before deleting it just in case…) HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Shared Tools\Proofing Tools\1.0 Restarting Word will recreate the registry key. Check to see if spell check works for you.

In my colleague’s case, step # 4 resolved the issue.

 

I hope this posting will assist someone in resolving a similar issue.