Volume Names

Volume Name Requirements

There are a few rules that you must follow when assigning names for volumes:

• Volume names must begin with the letter “d” followed by a number (for example, d0).

• Instead of specifying the full volume name, such as /dev/md/dsk/d1, you can often use an abbreviated volume name, such as d1, with any meta* command.

• Like physical slices, volumes have logical names that appear in the file system. Logical volume names have entries in the /dev/md/dsk directory for block devices and the /dev/md/rdsk directory for raw devices.

• You can generally rename a volume, as long as the volume is not currently being used and the new name is not being used by another volume. For more information, see Exchanging Volume Names.

• Solaris Volume Manager has 128 default volume names from 0–127. The following table shows some example volume names.

Volume Name Guidelines

The use of a standard for your volume names can simplify administration, and enable you at a glance to identify the volume type. Here are a few suggestions:

• Use ranges for each particular type of volume. For example, assign numbers 0–20 for RAID 1 volumes, 21–40 for RAID 0 volumes, and so on.

• Use a naming relationship for mirrors. For example, name mirrors with a number that ends in zero (0), and submirrors that end in one (1) and two (2). For example, you might name mirrors as follows: mirror d10, submirrors d11 and d12; mirror d20, submirrors d21 and d22, and so on.

• Use a naming method that maps the slice number and disk number to volume numbers.