Glossary

Active/Active disk arrays

This type of multipathed disk array allows you to access a disk in the disk array through all the paths to the disk simultaneously, without any performance degradation.

Active/Passive disk arrays

This type of multipathed disk array allows one path to a disk to be designated as primary and used to access the disk at any time. Using a path other than the designated active path results in severe performance degradation in some disk arrays. Also see path, primary path, and secondary path.

associate

The process of establishing a relationship between VxVM objects; for example, a subdisk that has been created and defined as having a starting point within a plex is referred to as being associated with that plex.

associated plex

A plex associated with a volume.

associated subdisk

A subdisk associated with a plex.

atomic operation

An operation that either succeeds completely or fails and leaves everything as it was before the operation was started. If the operation succeeds, all aspects of the operation take effect at once and the intermediate states of change are invisible. If any aspect of the operation fails, then the operation aborts without leaving partial changes.

In a cluster, an atomic operation takes place either on all nodes or not at all.

attached

A state in which a VxVM object is both associated with another object and enabled for use.

block

The minimum unit of data transfer to or from a disk or array.

boot disk

A disk that is used for the purpose of booting a system.

boot disk group

A private disk group that contains the disks from which the system may be booted.

bootdg

A reserved disk group name that is an alias for the name of the boot disk group.

clean node shutdown

The ability of a node to leave a cluster gracefully when all access to shared volumes has ceased.