Troubleshooting Other NIS+ Problems

This section describes problems that do not fit any of the previous categories.

How to Tell if NIS+ Is Running

You may need to know whether a given host is running NIS+. A script may also need to determine whether NIS+ is running. You can check if NIS+ is running by entering:

ps -ef | grep nis_cachemgr

The host has a /var/nis/NIS_COLD_START file.

nisls succeeds.

Replica Update Failure

Symptoms

Error messages indicating that the update was not successfully complete. (Note that the message: replica_update: number updates number errors indicates a successful update.)

Possible Causes

Any of the following error messages indicate that the server was busy and that the update should be rescheduled:

• Master server busy, full dump rescheduled
• replica_update: error result was Master server busy, full dump rescheduled
• replica_update: master server busy, rescheduling the resync
• replica_update: master server busy, will try later
• replica_update: nis dump result Master server busy, full dump rescheduled
• nis_dump_svc: one replica is already resyncing

(These messages are generated by, or in conjunction with, the NIS+ error code constant: NIS_DUMPLATER.)

The following messages indicate that there was some other problem:

• replica_update: error result was ...
• replica_update: nis dump result nis_perror error string
• root_replica_update: update failed string-variable: could not fetch object from master

(If rpc.nisd is being run with the -v (open diagnostic channel) option, additional information may be entered in either the master server or replica server's system log.)

These messages indicate possible problems such as:

• The server is out of child processes that can be allocated.
• A read-only child process was requested to dump.
• Another replica is currently resynching.

Diagnosis

Check both the replica and server's system log for additional information. How much, if any, additional information is recorded in the system logs depends on your system's error reporting level, and whether or not you are running rpc.nisd with the -v option (diagnostics).

Solution

In most cases, these messages indicate minor software problems which the system is capable of correcting. If the message was the result of a command, simply wait for a while and then try the command again. If these messages appear often, you can change the threshold level in your /etc/syslog.conf file.