Xsan

Xsan: Ghost SymLink Killah

An Xsan issue that had disappeared for awhile but that I’ve seen a few times recently. Symptom is that you have one client that won’t mount your Xsan volume. Other clients can mount but not that one. In the logs you see errors similar to the following:

(Error) Store: {channel:0x202b18fa0 localPath:’/Volumes/36Chambers’} bring up failed — will retry

If all of these things are true then you likely, even without having the volume mounted will have a file in the /Volumes/ folder with the name of the SAN. If that’s the case then you have a pretty quick and easy resolution. Rename the file and see if fsm mounts the volume. To rename you will likely not be able to use the Finder, so you may have to use the mv command from the command line. For example (assuming a volume name of 36Chambers ya’ll):

mv /Volumes/36Chambers /Volumes/36ChambersOLD

If not, reboot and it should. Otherwise, grab your Shaolin Wu-tang sword and go to town on the /Library/FileSystems/Xsan/config directory of the client, removing and readding the contents. Once you’re done and all is tested don’t forget to clean up after yourself and trash the OLD temporary file you created…

The original Ghost SymLink Killah

BTW, I’m gonna’ be the lame author real quick: “bring up failed” is just a dumb error code. Maybe I can recommend “Volume could not mount” to any developers who happen to come across this in the future. Or better yet, “Volume could not mount ’cause there’s some crap in the URI I’m attempting to create in the process of mounting”… See, I’m not saying all man pages and error codes need conform to the Elements of Style, nor am I saying they need to be somewhat informative, but not sounding like kindergardeners might help… Keep in mind that error codes are sometimes a developers way to Bring Da’ Ruckus (guess what I’m listening too today)…