NFS under Solaris 2.5

[Athol Kemball]

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NFS v.3 and AIPS

 Some AIPS errors have recently been reported using NFS v.3 on AIPS
NFS data servers running SunOS 5.5 (Solaris 2.5). The form of the
error is that tables attached to AIPS files on NFS-mounted data areas
are not always sorted correctly. This affects tasks such as CLCAL and
TASRT, although no explicit AIPS error is triggered and no error
message is reported. In this case CLCAL will produce an incomplete and
mis-sorted calibration table which will result in missing data. This
problem does not affect locally mounted disks.

 The problem was investigated in consultation with the site where it
occurred and was found to be corrected by installing SunOS 5.5
(Solaris 2.5) patch 103226-07, which fixes several NFS errors. Users
are advised to be aware of this potential problem, and to install the
necessary Sun patch if this problem is present on their system. The
error is repeatable and can easily be verified by testing CL table
sorting using task TASRT.  In conducting this test the CL table needs
to be located on the NFS-mounted disk and adverb BADDISK should be set
such that all scratch files are written to the NFS disk also.

 For further information please contact A. Kemball (NRAO-Socorro)
at akemball at nrao.edu.

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