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GCU Tour  



The GCU can perform three types of operations:

Most GCU operations are organized around the main observation window and its hierarchical display of Galaxy components. The observation window provides a porthole into a very large space. The observation window can be panned and zoomed as needed to observe part of or all of the entire Galaxy configuration. The main toolbar contains a set of buttons that control workspace zoom operations. Workspace panning is controlled by the horizontal and vertical scrollbars; workspace sliding is achieved by holding down the middle mouse button as you drag the workspace around. This assumes you have a three-button mouse.

The various GCU operations are invoked from pull-down or pop-up menu functions. General operations such as opening and closing files, and invoking external tools, are accomplished using the main menu bar entries. Operations specific to individual Galaxy components are accomplished using pop-up menus that appear whenever you click the right mouse button on a component displayed in the observation window.

In response to many operations, the GCU displays additional dialog boxes containing information, forms, editors, or prompts. Error and information responses are displayed in pop-up dialog boxes or inside the status bar along the bottom of the window, depending on the severity of the error and importance of the message.

Creating Galaxy Configuration Models  

You can use the GCU to create Galaxy configuration models and a single-instance Galaxy on an Alpha system.

When viewing the active Galaxy configuration model, direct manipulation of display objects (components) may alter the running configuration. For example, dragging a CPU from its current location and dropping it on top of a different instance component invokes a management action procedure that reassigns the selected CPU to the new instance. At certain times this may be a desirable operation; however, in other situations you might want to reconfigure your Galaxy all at once rather than by individual component. To accomplish this, you must create an offline Galaxy configuration model.

To create a Galaxy configuration model, you must start with an existing model, typically the active one, alter it in some manner, and save it in a file.

Starting from the active Galaxy Configuration Model:

  1. Press the ENGAGE button so that the model becomes DISENGAGED. The button should turn from red to white, and its appearance should be popped outward. When disengaged, all CPU components in the display turn red as an indication that they are no longer engaged. Do not panic, they have not been shut down.
  2. Alter the CPU assignments by dragging and dropping individual CPUs onto the instances on which you want to assign them.
  3. When finished, you can either reengage the model or save the model in a file for later use. Whenever you reengage a model, regardless of whether the model was derived from the active model or from a file-based model, the GCU compares the active system configuration with the configuration proposed by the model. It then provides a summary of management actions that would need to be performed to reassign the system to the new model. If the user approves of the actions, the GCU commences with execution of the required management actions and the resulting model is displayed as the active and engaged model.

The reason for creating offline models is to allow significant configuration changes to be automated. For example, you can create models representing the desired Galaxy configuration at different times and then engage the models interactively by following this procedure.

Observation  

The GCU can display the single active Galaxy configuration model, or any number of offline Galaxy configuration models. Each loaded model appears as an item in the Model menu on the toolbar. You can switch between models by clicking the desired menu item.

The active model is always named GLX$ACTIVE.GCM. When the active model is first loaded, a file by this name exists briefly as the system verifies the model with the system hardware.

When a model is visible, you can zoom, pan, or slide the display as needed to view Galaxy components. Use the buttons on the left side of the toolbar to control the zoom functions.

The zoom functions include:

Function Description
Galactic zoom
Zoom to fit the entire component hierarchy into observation window.
Zoom 1:1
Zoom to the component normal scale.
Zoom to region
Zoom to a selected region of the display.
Zoom in
Zoom in by 10 percent.
Zoom out
Zoom out by 10 percent.

Panning is accomplished by using the vertical and horizontal scrollbars. Sliding is done by pressing and holding the middle mouse button and dragging (sliding) the cursor and the image.

Layout Management  

The Automatic Layout feature manages the component layout. If you ever need to refresh the layout while in Automatic Layout mode, select the root (topmost) component.

To alter the current layout, select Manual Layout from the Windows menu. In Manual Layout Mode, you can drag and drop components however you like to generate a pleasing structure. Because each component is free from automatic layout constraints, you may need to invest some time in positioning each component, possibly on each of the charts. To make things simpler, you can click the right mouse button on any component and select Layout Subtree to provide automatic layout assistance below that point in the hierarchy.

When you are satisfied with the layout, you must save the current model in a file to retain the manual layout information. The custom layout is used when the model is open. Note that if you select Auto Layout mode, your manual layout is lost for the in-memory model. Also, in order for CPU components to reassign in a visually effective manner, they must perform subtree layout operations below the instance level. For this reason, it is best to limit any manual layout operations to the instance and community levels of the component hierarchy.

OpenVMS Galaxy Charts  

The GCU provides six distinct subsets of the model, known as charts. The six charts include:

Chart Name Shows
Logical Structure
Dynamic resource assignments
Physical Structure
Nonvolatile hardware relationships
CPU Assignment
Simplified view of CPU assignments
Memory Assignment
Memory subsystem components
IOP Assignment
I/O module relationships
Failover Targets
Processor failover assignments

These charts result from enabling or disabling the display of various component types to provide views of sensible subsets of components.

Specific charts may offer functionality that can be provided only for that chart type. For example, reassignment of CPUs requires that the instance components be visible. Because instances are not visible in the Physical Structure or Memory Assignment charts, you can reassign CPUs only in the Logical Structure and CPU Assignment charts.

For more information about charts, see Using the GCU Charts.

Interaction  

When viewing the active Galaxy configuration model, you can interact directly with the system components. For example, to reassign a CPU from one instance to another, you can drag and drop a CPU onto the desired instance. The GCU validates the operation and execute an external command action to make the configuration change. Interacting with a model that is not engaged is simply a drawing operation on the offline model, and it has no impact on the running system.

While interacting with Galaxy components, the GCU applies built-in and user-defined rules that prevent misconfiguration and improper management actions. For example, you cannot reassign primary CPUs, and you cannot reassign a CPU to any component other than a Galaxy instance. Either operation will result in an error message on the status bar, and the model will return to its proper configuration. If the attempted operation violates one of the configuration rules, the error message, displayed in red on the status bar, describes the rule that failed.

You can view details for any selected component by clicking the right mouse button and either selecting the Parameters item from the pop-up menu or by selecting Parameters from the Components menu on the main toolbar.

The GCU can shut down or reboot one or more Galaxy instances using the Shutdown or Reboot items on the Galaxy menu. You can enter the various shutdown or reboot parameters can be entered in the Shutdown dialog box. Be sure to specify the CLUSTER_SHUTDOWN option to fully shut down clustered Galaxy instances. The Shutdown dialog box allows you to select any combination of instances, or all instances. The GCU is smart enough to shut down its owner instance last.


 
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