JP3399996B2 - Information processing system - Google Patents

Description

Description: BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to an information processing system, and more particularly, to preventive maintenance including devices and portable storage media in an external storage subsystem of a large-scale computer system. To apply to effective technology. 2. Description of the Related Art For example, in a large-scale computer system or a magnetic tape subsystem operating under the system, the occurrence of a failure in the system is centralized in a remote maintenance center or the like via a communication line. It is known that by monitoring and managing the data, the number of maintenance management personnel can be reduced and the speed of recovery from a failure can be increased. In the maintenance management of such a system, for example, it is conceivable to perform preventive maintenance by activating a failure support program for periodically (once / month) collecting and editing failure information. Can be [0004] As another technique, for example, a diagnostic method of an information processing system disclosed in Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 62-210549 is known. In this technology, a table indicating the dominant relationship of each device constituting the system is provided,
Diagnosis is started in order from a higher-level device to a lower-level device, and when there is no abnormality in the relevant device, diagnosis of the target device is enabled by continuing diagnosis of a lower-level device. It is. [0005] However, in the case of the former prior art, it is necessary for a more skilled technician to judge the necessity / unnecessity of maintenance work from the output results of individual devices. It was difficult to perform preventive maintenance for timely failures. Further, in the case of the latter conventional technique, although a certain effect can be obtained in the diagnosis at the equipment level, the preventive maintenance of the entire subsystem including the portable storage medium such as the magnetic tape is considered. I didn't. An object of the present invention is to provide an information processing system capable of realizing timely preventive maintenance of the entire system including not only the apparatus but also a portable storage medium. Another object of the present invention is to provide an information processing apparatus capable of performing detailed failure analysis and preventive maintenance in a short time and accurately, such as indicating a defective portable storage medium and indicating a failure point of an input / output device. It is to provide a system. The above and other objects and novel features of the present invention will become apparent from the description of the present specification and the accompanying drawings. Means for Solving the Problems Of the inventions disclosed in the present application, the outline of a representative one will be briefly described.
It is as follows. The present invention relates to an input / output control device having a built-in service processor, and a portable storage medium for information connected to the input / output control device and exchanged with a higher-level device via the input / output control device. the information processing system comprising a communication means for connecting the input and output apparatus for recording / reproducing operation and maintenance center to the service processor for met
Te, the recording / monitors error information reproducing operation, a predetermined time to the identification information and the reference to a certain time of the identification information and individual said portability storage medium of each of the input-output device in the output device, various errors and error information management means for storing in a form including a temporal change information is information doing threshold management for each, stored in the error information managing means
Based on the error information, during operation of the information processing system
In one of the input / output devices, an error exceeding a certain threshold
Exceeds a certain threshold value due to the occurrence of an error
Error of an I / O device other than the one I / O device
Determining whether this has occurred even during operation
Accordingly, and as provided either it is determined whether an error factor, and said input-output device or control logic the portability storage that identifies the media system of failure of individual said output device and the portability storage medium Things. According to the information processing system of the present invention described above,
In the error information management unit, aging information is information that is performed by the predetermined time based on the identification information and the certain time of the identification information and individual portable storage medium of the individual input and output devices, a threshold management for each various errors The error information is stored in a format that includes the following. For example, the accumulated value of the number of error bytes for each recording / reproducing operation for each input / output device and each portable storage medium is stored as time-dependent change information. By adopting this method, in a magnetic tape subsystem or the like, when an error occurs in a data check system during processing of an arbitrary magnetic tape medium in an arbitrary magnetic tape deck, for example, when a different magnetic tape medium is used in the magnetic tape deck, Whether an error has occurred consecutively or whether the magnetic tape medium has caused an error in a different magnetic tape deck The control logic executes a judgment algorithm to check for discrimination between failures caused by the magnetic tape deck, including head contamination, and failures caused by the magnetic tape medium, and further identifies the failed magnetic tape deck or magnetic tape medium. Can be performed quickly and accurately, and timely preventive maintenance of the entire system including not only the devices but also the portable storage medium can be realized. An information processing system according to an embodiment of the present invention will be described below in detail with reference to the drawings. FIG. 1 is a conceptual diagram showing an example of the configuration of a remote maintenance support system including the information processing system of the present embodiment. In this embodiment, a magnetic tape subsystem will be described as an example of an information processing system. The magnetic tape controller 1 includes a plurality of main processors 4 (MP0, MP1), a service processor 2
(SVP), a floppy disk drive 3 for storing a control program of the service processor 2 and fault information composed of various tables as described later. Under the control of the magnetic tape controller 1, a plurality of magnetic tape decks 5 (MTU) using a portable magnetic tape (VOL) as a storage medium are connected, and a host computer 9 is connected to the upper side. ing. Then, the magnetic tape controller 1 controls the operation of the magnetic tape deck 5 based on a command from the host computer 9 to record data (WR) transferred to and from the host computer 9 on the magnetic tape. ) And playback (RD) operation. The service processor 2 is connected to a maintenance center 8 via a communication line 6. Further, in the case of a configuration including a combination of a plurality of magnetic tape control devices 1 and a subordinate magnetic tape deck 5 as in the present embodiment,
The respective magnetic tape control devices 1 are mutually connected via, for example, an RS422 interface 7. The service processor 2 logs (monitors and records) fault information generated in the magnetic tape deck 5 and the magnetic tape control device 1 and the like, and further analyzes and manages thresholds by control logic as described later, and The preventive maintenance is realized by automatically notifying the maintenance center 8 of the information such as the information and the failure medium. Hereinafter, an example of the operation of the magnetic tape subsystem of this embodiment will be described in detail. FIGS. 2 and 3 are flow charts showing an example of the operation of the control logic for fault determination in this embodiment. FIGS. 4, 5, 6, 7 and 8 show various types of fault information managed and stored. And an example of a table for discriminating. FIG. 4 shows an estimated VOL failure isolation table 51, one for each magnetic tape deck 5. After a permanent data check (unrecoverable error) or recovery data check (recoverable error) count-over has occurred, the next VOL is logged for the VOL that was error-free, and the VOL for a certain period of time is logged.
The determination of L is pending (pending), and is used for discriminating whether an event during this time is due to a failure of the magnetic tape deck 5 or a VOL failure. FIG. 5 shows a judgment pending table 52, one for each magnetic tape deck 5. The VOL for which error determination is suspended is logged. FIG. 6 is an error history table 53,
It is provided commonly to all the magnetic tape decks 5 under the control of the magnetic tape controller 1. It is mainly used for VOL failure determination. FIG. 7 shows an NGVOL table 54.
It is provided commonly to all the magnetic tape decks 5 under the control of the magnetic tape controller 1. The VOL determined to be defective by the VOL defect determination is logged. FIG. 8 shows a 2 VOLNG table 55, one for each magnetic tape deck 5. Two VOLs in a specific magnetic tape deck 5
In the case where an error has occurred consecutively and the magnetic tape deck 5 is determined to be defective, the two VOLs are logged. VOL in an optional magnetic tape deck 5
At the time of unloading, for example, the service processor 2
WR byte count, WR block count, RD byte count,
Statistical information such as the RD block count and the number of occurrences of the recovery data check in the RD / WR is received (step 10), and it is determined whether the recovery data check exceeds a threshold of 1 VOL unit (step 11), and it is determined that the data is over. If so, the process proceeds to step 24 in FIG. 3 described below. On the other hand, if the threshold is not exceeded, processing 1
Execute Step 2. That is, first, it is determined whether or not there was an error in the previous VOL processing in the magnetic tape deck 5 (step 12a). If there was, the previous VOL itself is estimated to be an error. The VOL is registered from the determination pending table 52 to the estimated VOL failure isolation table 51 (step 12b).
Further, the registered VOs in the estimated VOL failure isolation table 51
It is determined whether or not the number of L exceeds the threshold (step 1).
2c) If it is over, the maintenance center 8 is notified that the magnetic tape deck 5 is defective (step 12e). If it is not over, the judgment pending table 52 is deleted (step 12d), and thereafter, the error count and the number of processing bytes are integrated, and the error occurrence rate is analyzed (step 13). In this embodiment, each error count is 1
Accumulated for one month (30 days) in day units, and whether the accumulated value exceeds the daily threshold (step 1)
4) Whether the 7th day threshold was exceeded (step 19), 3
It is monitored whether the threshold value on day 0 has been exceeded (step 21). If the respective exemption condition determinations of step 15, step 16, step 20, and step 22 are satisfied, it is determined that the magnetic tape deck 5 is defective. Then, a head cleaning instruction is displayed on the magnetic tape deck 5 (step 17), and an automatic notification for troubleshooting is sent to the maintenance center 8 (step 18).
Ends the processing when unloading (step 2
3). FIG. 3 shows an example of a discrimination process of a VOL defect or an MTU defect when a permanent data check or a recovery data check occurs in the magnetic tape deck 5 in the step 11. First, when it is determined that the threshold of the permanent data check or the recovery data check has been exceeded (step 24), the same VOL as the relevant VOL has previously been assigned to all the magnetic tape decks 5 under the control of the magnetic tape controller 1. It is checked whether or not the VOL in which the error occurred in step 24 is registered in the error history table 53 (step 28).
Since the error has occurred consecutively, the VOL is determined to be defective and registered in the NGVOL table 54 (step 29). If there is no identical VOL in the error history table 53 in step 28, it is checked whether or not there is a VOL in the determination pending table 52 of the magnetic tape deck 5 (step 30). This means that an error has occurred continuously in different VOLs in the tape deck 5, and
Is determined to be defective, and the maintenance center 8 is notified (step 31). In addition, since it is also estimated that an error caused by the defect of the VOL itself has occurred continuously, it is also registered in the 2VOLNG table 55 (step 32), which is used as a reference for the judgment of the VOL defect. When there is no VOL in the judgment pending table 52, this error is the first error that occurred in the magnetic tape deck 5, so that the VOL is registered in the error history table 53 (step 33), and the judgment pending table 52 (step 34), and is used for discrimination determination of a VOL / MTU failure at the time of the next and subsequent errors. In the case of this embodiment, whether or not to contact the maintenance center 8 every time an error occurs (irrespective of the determination result of the VOL failure and the MTU failure) 8) is provided, and the immediate report flag is ON.
Is checked (step 25) and ON
In the case of, the maintenance center 8 is notified (step 2
7). The estimated VOL failure isolation table 5
1, the determination pending table 52, the error history table 53, the NGVOL table 54, and the 2VOLNG table 55 can be referred to at any time in the maintenance center 8 and the service processor 2, and measures such as early extraction of a defective VOL can be performed. . Although the invention made by the inventor has been specifically described based on the embodiments, the present invention is not limited to the above-described embodiments, and can be variously modified without departing from the gist thereof. Needless to say. For example, the portable storage medium is not limited to a magnetic tape but can be widely applied to an information processing system using a general portable storage medium such as an optical disk. The effects obtained by the representative inventions among the inventions disclosed in the present application will be briefly described.
It is as follows. That is, according to the information processing system of the present invention, based on the error information controlled by the error information management means, an input / output device error including a temporal change factor such as head contamination, and an error due to a medium defect are detected. The control logic is capable of discriminating between the system and the system. By monitoring the system failure status at all times, timely preventive maintenance can be realized and the reliability and maintainability of the information processing system can be improved. Can be Further, since the occurrence of an unrecoverable / possible error is monitored and controlled for each input / output device and the error occurrence rate is managed as a threshold value, which part of which input / output device (for example, RD system circuit unit / WR system) Since it is possible to specify whether a failure has occurred in each circuit unit), the time required for failure analysis and preventive maintenance can be reduced. Further, by monitoring and controlling the tendency of failure for each portable storage medium, a defective portable storage medium can be immediately identified, and the time required for failure analysis and preventive maintenance can be reduced.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS FIG. 1 is a conceptual diagram showing an example of a configuration of a remote maintenance support system including an information processing system according to an embodiment of the present invention. FIG. 2 is a flowchart illustrating an example of an operation of a control logic for failure determination in the information processing system according to the embodiment of the present invention. FIG. 3 is a flowchart illustrating an example of an operation of a control logic for failure determination in the information processing system according to the embodiment of the present invention. FIG. 4 is a conceptual diagram illustrating an example of a configuration of an estimated VOL failure isolation table, which is an example of an error information management unit. FIG. 5 is a conceptual diagram illustrating an example of a configuration of a determination pending table which is an example of an error information management unit. FIG. 6 is a conceptual diagram showing an example of a configuration of an error history table which is an example of an error information management unit. FIG. 7 is a conceptual diagram illustrating an example of a configuration of an NGVOL table which is an example of an error information management unit. FIG. 8 shows 2VOLNG which is an example of an error information management unit.
FIG. 3 is a conceptual diagram illustrating an example of a table configuration. [Description of Signs] 1 Magnetic tape control device (input / output control device) 2 Service processor 3 Floppy disk drive (error information management means) 4 Main processor 5 Magnetic tape deck (input / output device) 6 Communication line (communication means) 7 RS422 Interface 8 Maintenance center 9 Host computer (upper device) 51 Estimated VOL failure isolation table (error information management means) 52 Judgment pending table (error information management means) 53 Error history table (error information management means) 54 NGVOL table (error information management) Means) 55 2VOLNG table (Error information management means)

   ────────────────────────────────────────────────── ─── Continuation of front page       (56) References JP-A-52-80754 (JP, A)                 JP-A-61-166637 (JP, A)                 JP-A-58-115560 (JP, A)                 JP-A-60-147848 (JP, A)                 JP-A-61-60156 (JP, A)

Claims (1)

(57) [Claim 1] An input / output control device having a built-in service processor, connected to the input / output control device, and exchanged with a host device via the input / output control device. An information processing system comprising: an input / output device for performing a recording / reproducing operation on a portable storage medium for storing information; and a communication means for connecting the service processor to a maintenance center. This is information for monitoring operation error information, performing threshold management for each error for a predetermined time based on identification information of each of the input / output devices, identification information of each of the portable storage media, and a certain time. and error information management means for storing in a form including a temporal change information, on the basis of the accumulated error information to the error information management unit, wherein during the operation of the information processing system Out
One of the force devices has an error that exceeds a certain threshold
As an error, the error exceeding the certain threshold
Is operated by an input / output device other than the one input / output device.
By determining whether the error occurs, it is possible to determine which of the individual input / output devices and the portable storage medium is the cause of the error , and to specify the defective input / output device or the portable storage medium. an information processing system which is characterized in that a that control logic.