During teamcenter installation, FSC is installed under local user account, service is started and configuration files (.xml) are created by TEM. Later on, FSC service can be stopped and started to add volumes or to update its configuration files with the changes. Sometimes due to different reasons, FSC service may fail to start. The post will discuss on possible reasons of such failure and recommended steps to be taken to fix any such issue. Before this, it is important to understand how FSCs are administered and managed.

Administering FSC

While initially installing Teamcenter with TEM, single FSC (that mounts on single volume) is installed under local user account. After FMS has been installed, more volumes can be added and FMS can be customized for achieving different FMS configurations for handling huge data, frequently used data, remote client data request etc.

Managing FSC with fscadmin utility

In various situations, FSC may need to be managed. When changes are made to master configuration file, FSC will need to be restarted. When troubleshooting FSC, there may be need of redefining logging level to retrieve more information from log file. There may be situations where there is need to clear or purge cache.

So, while managing FSC there may be need to check status of server (started, offline etc.), to perform a shutdown (stop), to check if file has been previously cached (cachedetail), to clear cache (clearcache), to get the configuration details (config) of FSC , to redefine or modify logging levels (warn, info, debug, error etc.) and many others. All of these can be achieved by using the utility fscadmin with various arguments.

Understanding the commonly used arguments with fscadmin utility

Before using this utility, FSC_HOME and JAVA_HOME must be set correctly. FSC_HOME is set to the fsc directory of the Teamcenter installation. Now for example, if status (running status) of local FSC needs to checked, the utility can be used on TC command prompt from FSC_HOME directory as follows:

Where:

-s

Specifies the protocol server and the port to which FSC will communicate with.

FSCID

The command described above is intended for the FSC with given ID. Instead, (.) can be used, if connecting to local (current) FSC. E.g. fscadmin –s http://pun05:4343 ./status

FUNCTION [/SUBFUNCTION/…]

This specifies the part of the command that is run with fscadmin utility to achieve the desired information or result. E.g. fscadmin –s http://pun05:4343 FSC01/status OR

fscadmin –s http://pun05:4343 FSC01/cachesummary/read

Few of the frequently used functions (and some of its sub functions) with fscadmin utility are listed below:

Managing FSC manually (when running on windows)

FSC is installed by TEM as a Windows service. If not installed by TEM, it can also be manually installed using installfsc batch script. From the TC Command Prompt, change to the FSC_HOME directory and run:

installfsc %JAVA_HOME% %FSC_HOME% fscid

Where JAVA_HOME & FSC_HOME should be set to correct paths and fscid is the name of FSC to be installed. If JAVA_HOME or FSC_HOME contains spaces, they must be quoted on the command line. When FSC has been installed through batch script, it is important to change Log On information from System account to User account in order to get proper network connectivity.

Configuring FSC manually

Changing configuration in FSC’s master file for installed FSC

After installing the FSC with batch script, fmsmaster_fscid.xml file needs to be configured correctly, so that this FSC is included with its defined volume (with its correct id and path) in the enterprise.

This configuration can be achieved manually by executing backup_xmlinfo utility. List of current volume definitions in the database can be obtained by running this utility .The generated definitions including FMS ID tags for volumes and transient volumes are stored in output file backup.xml.

The backup_xmlinfo utility is located in the TC_BIN directory .Executing this utility from TC Command prompt will create the output file backup.xml in the directory from which this utility was run.

backup_xmlinfo -u=infodba -p=password -g=dba

An example of generated backup.xml and configuring fmsmaster_fscid.xml with it is as follows:

Please Note:

For four-tier client file access, transient volumes must be declared within the FMS Master Configuration file. They are declared with the FSCs that host the transient volumes.

The backup_xmlinfo utility generates transient volume information for the current server context (tcserver) in which the utility is being run. All other server pools with transient volumes are not identified.

Updating all FSCs master file with the changes configured for installed FSC

When there are multiple FSCs, FMS Master Configuration file is initially downloaded for all the other FSCs from master FSC in FMS network. These copies of the master configuration file should be in synchronization in the network. So, changes made to any of FSC’s master configuration file (fmsmaster_fscid.xml), needs to be updated to all the other FSCs master configuration file in FMS Network

To achieve this, FSC configuration can be reloaded by stopping and restarting all the FSCs .This updates their respective master configuration file. The other way, to reload the configuration is through fscadmin utility. The configuration will be reloaded across entire FMS network by running the command:

fscadmin -s http://fschost:fscport ./config/reload/all

Troubleshooting FSC Failure-to-Start

There can be several reasons, FSC service will not start. Based on the errors displayed, there can be different reasons for the failure. Few of the possible solutions are illustrated below with the cause of failure:

Other suggestions:

• Alternatively to start FSC or to check issues with FSC service start, following command can be directly run from TC Command Prompt (changing to fsc directory):

startfsc –Dfsc.config=%FSC_ID%.xml –Dfms.config=fmsmaster_%FSC_ID%.xml

• There can be FSC FCC connectivity issue due to firewalls. It’s difficult to get clue for such issues. E.g. Error – error code (say, Error-2550)

Also Read:

Understanding FSC & FCC

FMS Configuration for Multiple FSCs & Cache Server

FMS Configuration for Remote Clients

Teamcenter Architecture & Communication Between Tiers

 

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