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Ab-end Updating NDS

Articles and Tips: qna

01 Sep 2001


Q.

Dear Ab-end: I have installed a new NetWare 5.1 server. In an effort to update Novell Directory Services (NDS), I uninstalled the default NDS and was about to reinstall the latest version of NDS when the following Ab-end appeared on my server:

Abend: Page Fault abend in UNICODE.NLM.

Stack information includes UNICODE.NLM and UNICODE.NLM. Why is my server Abending at this time? -- Abending in Alaska

A.

Dear Abending: Lucky for you, the Ab-end Guru has seen this behavior before on my own server. This Ab-end is caused because of a timing error between NDS (version 8.0 or higher) and the NICI version prior to 1.5.7. Granted, I have only seen this Ab-end on non-English servers, but I have noticed that the Ab-end can also occur if NICI (any version) is not able to initialize for some reason (for example, corruption). On English servers, the main symptom is that DS.NLM will fail to load. The reason the server was Ab-ending in UNICODE, is because of the following chain of events during the server boot process:

  1. Volume SYS mounts and DS.NLM attempts to load.

  2. NICI is sometimes not completely initialized (timing or corruption) and DS fails to load.

  3. As NDS backs out of its load process, it unloads UNICODE Rule tables.

  4. SLP attempts to translate a string using UNICODE and when it accesses an entry that was zeroed out by DS unloading, the server page fault Abends.

NICI 1.5.7 or later prevents the timing problem. Make sure to install the same encryption level (56 bit or 128 bit) that is already on the server.

The way to determine if you are dealing with a timing error or corruption is quite simple. If the server abends every time you bring it up, there is a problem with NICI, and you will need to call Novell Technical Support to resolve it. If the server only Ab-ends sometimes as it comes up, you are experiencing the timing issue and just need to upgrade NICI to 1.5.7 or later.

A solution to your Ab-end would include updating the version of NICI to 1.5.7 (or later). If NICI version 1.5.7 is already installed and your server Ab-ends every time it attempts to come up, call Novell Support to resolve the NICI corruption. Be sure to NOT down-grade the encryption level of NICI installed on the server.

If you cannot obtain NICI version1.5.7, a work-around can be implemented by creating a text file in C:\NWSERVER called INSTAUTO.NCF. It should contain the following statements:

load c:\nwserver\dsloader load c:\nwserver\ccs.xlm set Command Line Prompt Time Out = 10 ?set Command Line Prompt Default Choice=ON

These statements move the loading of DSLOADER and CCS from the beginning of load stage 3 to the end of load stage 2 and cause a delay of 10 seconds before load stage 3 continues. In all of my testing, this delay has been sufficient to allow NICI to fully initialize before DS begins to load. You can increase the delay by changing the 10 to 15 (or any number of seconds). The ? at the beginning of the fourth statement is necessary to implement the delay.

* Originally published in Novell AppNotes

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