Modifying IPMP Configurations

Use the IPMP configuration file /etc/default/mpathd to configure the following system-wide parameters for IPMP groups.

• FAILURE_DETECTION_TIME

• TRACK_INTERFACES_ONLY_WITH_GROUPS

• FAILBACK

How to Configure the /etc/default/mpathd File

1. On the system with the IPMP group configuration, assume the Primary Administrator role or become superuser.

   The Primary Administrator role includes the Primary Administrator profile. To create the role and assign the role to a user, see Chapter 2, Working With the Solaris Management Console (Tasks), in System Administration Guide: Basic Administration.

2. Edit the /etc/default/mpathd file.

   Change the default value of one or more of the three parameters.

   1. Type the new value for the FAILURE_DETECTION_TIME parameter.

      FAILURE_DETECTION_TIME=n

      where n is the amount of time in seconds for ICMP probes to detect whether an interface failure has occurred. The default is 10 seconds.

   2. Type the new value for the FAILBACK parameter.

      FAILBACK=[yes | no]

      • yes- The yes value is the default failback behavior of IPMP. When the repair of a failed interface is detected, network access fails back to the repaired interface, as described in IPMP Failure Detection and Recovery Features.

      • no - The no indicates that data traffic does not move back to a repaired interface. When a failed interfaces is detected as repaired, the INACTIVE flag is set for that interface. This flag indicates that the interface is currently not to be used for data traffic. The interface can still be used for probe traffic.

        For example, suppose an IPMP group consists of two interfaces, ce0 and ce1. Then assume that the value FAILBACK=no is set in /etc/default/mpathd. If ce0 fails, its traffic fails over to ce1, as is the expected behavior of IPMP. However, when IPMP detects that ce0 is repaired, traffic does not fail back from ce1, due to the FAILBACK=no parameter in /etc/default/mpathd. The ce0 interface retains its INACTIVE status and is not used for traffic unless the ce1 interface fails. If the ce1 interface fails, the addresses on ce1 are migrated back to ce0, whose INACTIVE flag is then cleared. This migration occurs provided that ce0 is the only INACTIVE interface in the group. If other INACTIVE interfaces exist in the group, the addresses might be migrated to an INACTIVE interface other than ce0.

   3. Type the new value for the TRACK_INTERFACES_ONLY_WITH_GROUPS parameter.

      TRACK_INTERFACES_ONLY_WITH_GROUPS=[yes | no]

      • yes- The yes value is the default behavior of IPMP. This parameter causes IPMP to ignore network interfaces that are not configured into an IPMP group.

      • no - The no value sets failure and repair detection for all network interfaces, regardless of whether they are configured into an IPMP group. However, when a failure or repair is detected on an interface that is not configured into an IPMP group, no failover or failback occurs. Therefore, theno value is only useful for reporting failures and does not directly improve network availability.

3. Restart the in.mpathd daemon.

   # pkill -HUP in.mpathd