Amanda log files/Amdump Logs
Intro
amdump(8) puts a trace of its actions and those of the programs it invokes in a file named amdump in the logdir directory which was specified in amanda.conf(8). amflush(8) outputs the trace of actions in a file name amflush in the same directory. This file is essentially the stderr of each of these programs.
When the dump or flush is finished, the file is renamed to amdump.1 or amflush.1. The name of the older files is also rotated: the previous file amdump.1 is then found under amdump.2 etc. so that the most recent file has the lowest number. Amanda keeps roughly the last tapecycle worth of them.
These log files can be used for debugging an amdump or amflush run, although the debug logs are usually more helpful.
The most recent of the four files amdump, amflush, amdump.1 amflush.1 is read by the amstatus(8) command. These files can also be analyzed by amplot(8) to visualize the behavior of Amanda.
File Format
The format is completely free-form, but amstatus and amplot both look for lines matching certain patterns. What follows is a partial list, given from the perspective of amstatus. Consult the source of those two applications for more detail.
amstatus's perspective
Amstatus splits lines into quoted words, so "blah" in the below indicates a word that amstatus ignores. Note that amstatus gleans most of its interesting information from driver's logs of its protocol conversations with the taper, dumpers, chunkers, and so on.
setup_estimate: host partition ..
initialize tracking of this particular DLE (amstatus calls disks "partitions")
driver: tape size tapesize
gives the tape size
driver: send-cmd time blah blah taper: START-TAPER datestamp
adds datestamp to the list of interesting datestamps
driver: send-cmd time blah blah taper: FILE-WRITE handle holding-file hostname partition level datestamp splitsize
notes that the taper has started this particular DLE
driver: send-cmd time blah blah taper: PORT-WRITE handle hostname partition level datestamp splitsize diskbuffer fallback-splitsize
notes that the taper has started this particular DLE
driver: result time blah blah taper: DONE handle blah blah stats driver: result time blah blah taper: PARTIAL handle blah blah errstr
(where errstr contains not an error string, but stats starting with sec secs kb kb; also note that amstatus expects one of the blah to be $label, but it's not) notes that this DLE is finished or partially finished
driver: result time blah blah taper: PARTDONE handle blah blah kb
counts the completed part toward the total amount of taped data
driver: result time blah blah taper: REQUEST-NEW-TAPE handle
marks this DLE as waiting for a new tape
driver: result time blah blah taper: NEW-TAPE handle
marks this DLE as no longer waiting for a new tape
driver: result time blah blah taper: TRY-AGAIN handle errstr driver: result time blah blah taper: TAPE-ERROR handle errstr
marks the current DLE as done and records the taper error for later display
driver: result time blah blah taper: FAILED handle inputok tapeok inputerr taperror
marks the current DLE as done and records the relevant error message
driver: tape failed: handle blah blah errmsg
marks the current DLE as having totally failed to be taped due to repeated retries
driver: state time time free kps: kps space: sp taper: tstat idle-dumpers: id qlen tapeq: len runq: len roomq: len wakeup: len driver-idle: reason
gives a snapshot of the driver's state, including its notion of what the taper is up to (tstat)
taper slot slot wrote label label taper wrote label label
(note that label and datestamp are quoted with a backquote-frontquote pair e.g., `foo') indicates an additional tape to which the taper is writing.