NAME

venus − vice file system workstation process

SYNOPSIS

venus -h {host1,host2} -k {remote device} -f {cache dir} -c {cache size} [ -d ]
[ -i {flags} ] [ -cf {cache files}] [ -cs {cache stats}] [ -r {root volume name} ] prefix-name

DESCRIPTION

This command starts the Andrew file system cache manager on your machine. 

The -h flag is a required switch followed by a comma-separated (no spaces) list of hosts, all of which must be file servers.  These are the servers that will be used for volume location requests.  One of these servers will be chosen at random to provide time synchronization service, unless over-ridden by the -i flag.  You should generally list 2 or 3 servers, assuming you have that many, so that a file server crash or two does not prevent volume location requests from succeeding. 

The -k switch is now obsolete, and is included only for backward compatibility with the venus installed in the field.  The kernel-resident vnode-based cache manager does not use a file system intercept device. 

The -f switch is used to tell venus which directory to use for its cache directory.  The cache manager will delete all the files it does not recognize from this directory, so use this switch carefully. 

The -c switch is used to tell venus how many 1024 byte "blocks" it may use in the cache directory.  Venus will attempt to limit its disk usage to this amount, but will run over by the number of indirect blocks present in the cached files.  We recommend reserving approximately 3 % of the cache for indirect blocks.  Also, note that since most writes to the cache dir are done by non-root processes, one should not count the last 10 % space when allocating space for the venus cache. 

The prefix-name field tells venus where to mount the Andrew file system. 

The remaining switches are optional. 

The -d switch is obsolete; debugging is handled differently in the kernel-based cache manager. 

The -i switch take one argument, the logical or of a set of flags for controlling venus, specified in decimal.  Only two are of interest, the "1" flag tells venus not to try to synchronize the workstation’s clock with the file server’s clock.  The 16 flag is obsolete and should no longer be given. 

The -cf switch tells venus how many files to create in the cache.  Normally venus computes this value based on the amount of disk space reserved for the venus cache, but if you do not like its computation, you can increase or decrease this value.  Each entry costs the kernel approximately 8 - 16 bytes of physical memory, so don’t go overboard. 

The -cs switch tells venus how many status cache entries to use; the default is 300.  Each entry uses about 100 bytes of virtual memory. 

The -r switch tells venus which volume is the root volume (in Vice terms) to mount as the root of the remote file system.  By default, one of the servers in the -h list is queried for the system root volume; the server reads the file /ROOTVOLUME on the server to get this information. 

EXAMPLES

The command

/usr/vice/etc/venus2 -h vice1,vice2 -f /user/cache -c 15000 /afs

tells venus that the servers vice1 and vice2 are the servers to contact for volume location information.  Venus will use the dir /user/cache to store its cache files, and it can use up to 15 megabytes of storage in that directory.  Finally, the remote file system will be mounted on /vice. 

NOTES

Don’t forget to reserve about an extra two percent or so of storage on the cache partition to hold indirect blocks, along with the 10% that the Unix file system reserves for root processes.  This means that the -c parameter should specify about 12 percent less than is actually available on the partition. 

FILES

/usr/vice/etc/ThisCell File containing local cell name. 

DIAGNOSTICS

Venus writes diagnostic messages to /dev/console.  Fatal errors will also be accompanied by core dumps, with the core file stored in the venus cache directory.  This core file will be automatically removed by venus the next time it is started. 

BUGS

See the venus primer for a detailed description of differences between Unix and Andrew file system semantics. 

PRPQs 5799-WZQ/5799-PFF: IBM/4.3  —  Sept 1988