Automatically setting scsi timeout with open-vm-tools installed.

This document (7016016) is provided subject to the disclaimer at the end of this document.

Environment

SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 12
VMware

Situation

With open-vm-tools installed the scsi timeout for virtual block devices are not automatically increased anymore.

Resolution

Manually create an extra udev rule that increases the scsi timeout for all virtual block devices if this behaviour is still desired.

Cause

With VMware tools the following file is included;

"/etc/udev/rules.d/99-vmware-scsi-udev.rules"

This rule is responsible for increasing the scsi timeout however with open-vm-tools this is not automatically done anymore and no extra udev rule file is present.

Additional Information

If it is desired to have the same behaviour with open-vm-tools installed, it is needed to manually create a extra udev rule. Create a custom udev rule file in "/etc/udev/rules.d/" that contains something similar to the following example;

ACTION=="add", SUBSYSTEM=="block", ATTRS{vendor}=="VMware", RUN+="/bin/sh -c 'echo 180 >/sys/$DEVPATH/device/timeout'"

It is then needed to also recreate the initrd to include the added udev rule by running "mkinitrd".

To quickly verify the current timeout for all disks execute the following command;

find /sys/class/scsi_disk/*/device/timeout -exec grep -H . '{}' \;

As an additional side note, with SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 12 the default included rules for udev are now located in "/usr/lib//udev/rules.d/"

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.