DM MPIO device blacklisting not honored in multipath.conf

This document (3029706) is provided subject to the disclaimer at the end of this document.

Environment

SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 10
SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 9

Situation

multipath-toolspackage version 0.4.5-0.16 or later

Multipath-tools is configured and a blacklist filter has been configured in /etc/multipath.conf in section devnode_blacklist to exclude devices from being scanned by MPIO.
None of the configured filters has the expected effect - they do not seem to work at all. The filters are ignored even when the multipath configuration is updated on the fly issuing multipath -F or when the entire machine is restarted.

Resolution

Rename the devnode_blacklist section of /etc/multipath.conf toblacklist.

Additional Information

Root cause

Starting with multipath-tools package version 0.4.5-0.16, the configuration for blacklisting has changed: the devnode_blacklist has been renamed toblacklistin later builds of multipath-tools.

Notes

If unsure what version of multipath-tools is currently installed check with

rpm -q multipath-tools

In addition the file /usr/share/doc/packages/multipath-tools/multipath.conf.annotated describes all valid statements and sections for the installed version of the package and always shows the correct syntax for the blacklist statement.

Disclaimer

This Support Knowledgebase provides a valuable tool for SUSE customers and parties interested in our products and solutions to acquire information, ideas and learn from one another. Materials are provided for informational, personal or non-commercial use within your organization and are presented "AS IS" WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND.