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Troubleshooting system-level problems

Generating a system dump image with sysdump(ADM)

The sysdump(ADM) command generates a system dump image of a live system without disrupting normal operation of the system. The system dump image is saved to a file for later analysis with the crash(ADM) utility. To generate a system dump of a live system into the file livedump type:

/etc/sysdump -i /dev/mem -n /unix -o livedump

To use the crash utility to analyze the file:

/etc/crash -n livedump -d livedump

The sysdump(ADM) command can also generate a smaller system dump file on larger memory systems by ignoring portions of data that are not needed for analysis. The resulting ``deflated'' dump should be small enough to transfer electronically, which is convenient in situations calling for direct support-level analysis of panic dumps. This ``deflated'' file cannot be read with the crash(ADM) command. You must restore the reduced dump image to a file that can be read by the crash(ADM) command. For example, to create a live system dump image, excluding user memory pages (-u), free memory pages (-f), multiphysical tape buffers (-m), and process page tables (-t) to the file minidump:

/etc/sysdump -i /dev/mem -n /unix -fumto minidump

This file should be small enough to transfer between machines. To inflate the system dump file so it can be read by the crash(ADM) utility, use sysdump(ADM) to inflate the file minidump to maxidump:

/etc/sysdump -i minidump -O maxidump

You can use the crash(ADM) utility to analyze the file maxidump:

/etc/crash -n maxidump -d maxidump

For more information, please see the manual page for sysdump(ADM)


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SCO OpenServer Release 5.0.7 -- 11 February 2003