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cron(1M)

crontab(1)

ecclogger(1M)  —  Series 300, Model 350 only

NAME

ecclogger, eccscrub − check for or scrub out ECC memory errors

SYNOPSIS

ecclogger [logsize]
eccscrub

DESCRIPTION

ecclogger checks ECC (error-checking and correcting) memory installed in an HP 9000 Model 350 computer system for errors which have been corrected. When ecclogger finds an error, it writes a record of the error to /etc/ecclog and invokes eccscrub to ensure that all errors have been cleared (only one error per ECC memory card is logged). 

The optional parameter logsize specifies the number of log entries which are allowed.  Hewlett-Packard recommends that the default value of 100 be used for logsize. If 100 errors occur on a system the local HP Sales and Support Office should be notified so that the /etc/ecclog can be evaluated (a system with fewer than 100 ecclog entries is usually not a concern).  When the log reaches the maximum number of entries, a message is printed (mailed to root when invoked from root’s crontab) to indicate that /etc/ecclog is full. 

ecclogger should be invoked by root’s crontab by including an entry for ecclogger in the crontab file for user root.  The recommended frequency for running ecclogger is once per hour (eccscrub is automatically invoked by ecclogger whenever an error is corrected). 

eccscrub performs a read-modify-write operation on memory to correct any single-bit soft (not a ’stuck’ bit) errors that may exist in a memory cell.  It may be desirable to invoke eccscrub from cron once per day. 

In order to achieve the recommended frequencies, the following two entries need to be added to the crontab entry for root:

0 * * * *    exec /etc/ecclogger
0 0 * * *    exec /etc/eccscrub

Here is a typical entry for a failure as recorded in /etc/ecclog:

870911084132 0xFF55CF40 0x70

Note: Do not write to /etc/ecclog.  Doing so prevents ecclogger from writing to /etc/ecclog. 

The first field in the error entry is a date/time stamp [yymmddhhmmss] that indicates when the error was logged.  The second field is the memory location in hexadecimal.  The final field is the error syndrome byte.  The syndrome byte is decoded below (useful to service personell when troubleshooting ECC cards):

Syndrome Error Location Syndrome Error Location
0x01 check bit 0 0x31 data bit 14
0x02 check bit 1 0x34 data bit 15
0x04 check bit 2 0x40 check bit 6
0x08 check bit 3 0x4A data bit 1
0x0B data bit 17 0x4F data bit 0
0x0E data bit 16 0x52 data bit 2
0x10 check bit 4 0x54 data bit 3
0x13 data bit 18 0x57 data bit 4
0x15 data bit 19 0x58 data bit 5
0x16 data bit 20 0x5B data bit 6
0x19 data bit 21 0x5D data bit 7
0x1A data bit 22 0x62 data bit 24
0x1C data bit 23 0x64 data bit 25
0x20 check bit 5 0x67 data bit 26
0x23 data bit 8 0x68 data bit 27
0x25 data bit 9 0x6B data bit 28
0x26 data bit 10 0x6D data bit 29
0x29 data bit 11 0x70 data bit 30
0x2A data bit 12 0x75 data bit 31
0x2C data bit 13

FILES

/etc/ecclog

SEE ALSO

cron(1M), crontab(1)

Hewlett-Packard Company  —  HP-UX Release 9.0: August 1992

Typewritten Software • bear@typewritten.org • Edmonds, WA 98026