Resolving connectivity issues between NetWorker client and server
Many of the problems that Backup administrators report when they set up and configure new clients are actually problems with the communications in their networks. This post contains a list of options for testing the communications between the NetWorker server and the client.
This document outlines the following steps:
- Use the ping command to establish basic connectivity.
- Use the rpcinfo command to verify that sessions can be established and that portmapping is correct.
Using PING to verify network connections
On the Backup client:
- ping the server short name from the client
- ping the server FQDN from the client
- ping the server IP address from the client
The following example shows pinging the NetWorker server (smurf) using it's short name, long name and IP address from the backup client called schlumpf in the churchill domain:
% ping smurf % ping smurf.lab % ping 140.162.1.29
On the NetWorker server:
- ping the client short name from the server
- ping the client FQDN from the server
- ping the client IP address from the server
The following example shows pinging the backup client (schlumpf) using it's short name, long name and IP address from the NetWorker server called smurf in the churchill domain:
% ping schlumpf % ping schlumpf.lab % ping 140.162.1.11
Using RPCINFO to verify that sessions can be established
If ping is successful and backup problems still exist, you can also test with rpcinfo. Because NetWorker relies heavily on mapping of ports, use rpcinfo to test the operation of the portmapper. Using ping tests the connection up to the network layer in the OSI model; rpcinfo checks for communication up to the session layer.
For rpcinfo to be used successfully, the machine whose hostname you enter on the command line must have a portmapper running. In most cases, SunSoft portmappers are compatible with fully functional portmappers from other vendors (this is called a third-party portmapper). If you are using a product that provides its own portmapper, we recommend not loading the third-party portmapper until you have verified that Backup works with the rest of your environment. This process lets you test portmapper compatibility without adding other unknowns.
On Solaris, the rpcbind daemon must be running. The rpcinfo utility is part of the operating system.
The syntax for using rpcinfo to display ports using TCP is:
# rpcinfo -p hostname
You can view other rpcinfo command line options by typing rpcinfo at the command line. Notes on the rpcinfo command and its error messages are available in the UNIX man page for rpcinfo. Repeat rpcinfo using all the locations and all the iterations listed in this document for ping.
When rpcinfo runs successfully, the output is a list of port numbers and names. For troubleshooting, we are only interested in the exact text of any error messages. Typical successful responses have the following format:
# rpcinfo -p schlumpf rpcinfo for schlumpf program vers proto port 100000 2 tcp 111 portmapper 100000 2 udp 111 portmapper 390103 2 tcp 760 390109 2 tcp 760 390110 1 tcp 760 390103 2 udp 764 390109 2 udp 764 390110 1 udp 764 390113 1 tcp 7937 390105 5 tcp 821 390107 4 tcp 819 390107 5 tcp 819 390104 105 tcp 822