Ontape not starting - IDS9.4TC4 on Win2K

Everyone, We have a problem with an IDS server running ontape from the command line: it executes but immediately returns to the command prompt. It doesn't matter what parameters are used, ontape -s, ontape, ontape -- all perform the same. There are two instances installed on this machine and the problem is identical whether or not INFORMIXSERVER points to either instance. However... strangely if ontape is started via a batch file that runs as an Arcserve pre-job ontape executes fine! Running the batch file manually however fails in the same way as running ontape directly. The arcserve job is running as informix, and I'm logged in as informix on the console attempting to run ontape manually. Has anyone come across this before? Any input would be gratefully received... Many thanks Simon

Simon Gosney wrote: > Everyone, > > We have a problem with an IDS server running ontape from the command > line: it executes but immediately returns to the command prompt. Is ontape the only IDS command with a problem? If so can you run 'dir %informixdir%\\bin\\ontape.exe' to verify the executable looks good? Can you run 'set' to show what your PATH and other environment variables are set to when you run this? From the command line you use to run this can you run the diagnostic utility onregcheck.exe to verify the IDS registry settings? onregcheck is downloadable from the IIUG website as part of ntutils.zip (www.iiug.org/software/index_MISC.html) - though the website appears to be down at the moment... Regards Guy Simon Gosney wrote: > Everyone, > > We have a problem with an IDS server running ontape from the command > line: it executes but immediately returns to the command prompt. > > It doesn't matter what parameters are used, ontape -s, ontape, ontape > -- all perform the same. > > There are two instances installed on this machine and the problem is > identical whether or not INFORMIXSERVER points to either instance. > > However... strangely if ontape is started via a batch file that runs as > an Arcserve pre-job ontape executes fine! Running the batch file > manually however fails in the same way as running ontape directly. The > arcserve job is running as informix, and I'm logged in as informix on > the console attempting to run ontape manually. > > Has anyone come across this before? Any input would be gratefully > received... > > Many thanks > > Simon >

Guy All other IDS commands work fine, and if you map a drive to %INFORMIXDIR% from another server you can run the physical ontape.exe program from this machine to backup the instance on another server, so I don't think it can be a problem with the physical executable. Think you're right, sounds like a permissions or registry problem. I'll download the utility and give that a go. Thanks for the input! Regards Simon

Simon Gosney wrote: > Guy > > All other IDS commands work fine, and if you map a drive to > %INFORMIXDIR% from another server you can run the physical ontape.exe > program from this machine to backup the instance on another server, so > I don't think it can be a problem with the physical executable. > > Think you're right, sounds like a permissions or registry problem. > I'll download the utility and give that a go. If that doesn't help, post your %PATH%, %INFORMIXDIR%, %INFORMIXSERVER%, %ONCONFIG%, %INFORMIXSQLHOSTS% (if set) and the TAPE settings from your onconfig file.. Another diagnostic utility from ntutils you could try is proctoken.exe - this will show which user rights and permissions the cmd process that is trying to run ontape has - posting the output from that might help. Regards Guy > > Thanks for the input! > > Regards > > Simon >

Simon Gosney wrote: > Everyone, What is TAPEDEV set to in the ONCONFIG file? Sounds suspiciously like the behavior you get when it's set to /dev/null in UNIX. Art S. Kagel > We have a problem with an IDS server running ontape from the command > line: it executes but immediately returns to the command prompt. > > It doesn't matter what parameters are used, ontape -s, ontape, ontape > -- all perform the same. > > There are two instances installed on this machine and the problem is > identical whether or not INFORMIXSERVER points to either instance. > > However... strangely if ontape is started via a batch file that runs as > an Arcserve pre-job ontape executes fine! Running the batch file > manually however fails in the same way as running ontape directly. The > arcserve job is running as informix, and I'm logged in as informix on > the console attempting to run ontape manually. > > Has anyone come across this before? Any input would be gratefully > received... > > Many thanks > > Simon >

Art, Guy Thanks for the input. Below are relevant onconfig / environment settings: INFORMIXDIR=d:\\informix INFORMIXSERVER=ol_artiionPath=d:\\informix\\bin;C:\\WINNT\\system32;C:\\WINNT;C:\\WINNT\\System32\\Wbem;d:\\informix\\bin;C:\\Program Files\\Symantec\\pcAnywhere\\;C:\\PROGRA~1\\COMMON~1\\CA\\SCANEN~1;C:\\PROGRA~1\\CA\\ETRUST~1 ONCONFIG=ONCONFIG.ol_artiion TAPEDEV E:\\IFMXDATA\\ARTIION.BKP # Tape device path TAPEBLK 16 # Tape block size (Kbytes) TAPESIZE 40000000 # Maximum amount of data to put on tape (Kbytes) I don't think it's an onconfig issue as ontape works fine when the backup is launched via a batch file as an ARCServe pre-job. However... if you run the batch file from the command prompt ontape doesn't execute! Will try the proctoken util, onregcheck didn't seem to show anything strange :-( thanks! Simon