[Info-vax] What is MDMS and how do I fix this error?

[Hans Bachner]

Bob,

Bob schrieb am 02.05.2019 um 21:10:
> I recently inherited an Alpha VMS 7.3-2 cluster from a former colleague.
>
> The following message has been filling the OPERATOR.LOG on all nodes:
>
> %%%%%%%%%%%  OPCOM   7-APR-2019 00:26:08.65  %%%%%%%%%%%    (from node QWERTY at  7-APR-2019 00:26:08.65)
> Message from user SYSTEM on QWERTY
> Event: Access Control Violation from: Node LOCAL:.QWERTY Session Control,
>          at: 2019-04-07-00:26:08.649-05:00Iinf
>          NSAP Address=49::00-01:AA-00-04-00-1E-04:21,
>          Source=UIC = [0,0]MDMS$SERVER,
>          Destination=name = MDMS$SERVER,
>          Destination User="",
>          Destination Account="",
>          Node Name=LOCAL:.QWERTY
>          eventUid   BD25C7C3-58CB-11E9-85E0-005056916A71
>          entityUid  8416B8C5-A625-11E8-8064-AA0004000304
>          streamUid  95300A07-A625-11E8-807A-AA0004000304
>
> These happen about every 30 minutes on each node in the cluster.
>
> I'm not sure what MDMS is, but it seems to be connected with ABS / SLS.
>
> Any suggestions on what the problem might be, or how to fix it?
> Any one know what MDMS is?

I'll start with the easy one: MDMS is the "Media, Device and Management 
Service" part of ABS (Archive Backup System).

Documentation is (still) available on
<http://h30266.www3.hpe.com/odl/axplp/sysman/abs45/abs044.htm>

Chapter 2 of the ABS Operations Guide contains some information of MDMS 
usage by ABS (starting with section 2.5).

For the source of the problem - I did not touch ABS/MDMS for ~15 years. 
The message indicates a problem with accessing MDMS over DECnet - I 
don't remember whether this is default behaviour. Have a look into 
MDMS$ROOT:[LOGFILES] (which by default is SYS$COMMON:[MDMS.LOGFILES]). 
Maybe MDMS wasn't started properly?

Hope this helps,
Hans.