RHBA-2011:0581 - Bug Fix Advisory

Topic

Updated tuned packages that fix several bugs and add an enhancement are now
available for Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6.

Description

The tuned packages contain a daemon that tunes system settings dynamically. It
does so by monitoring the usage of several system components periodically.

The tuned packages have been upgraded to upstream version 0.2.18, which provides
a number of bug fixes and enhancements over the previous version. (BZ#661715)

This update fixes the following bugs:

• For device mapper and multipath devices used on the system, I/O scheduler

changes in tuned were not applied on these devices. This bug affected several
tuned profiles. To fix this bug, device mapper devices have been added into the
list of tuned devices and the I/O scheduler changes are now applied on device
mapper devices as well. (BZ#636548)

• Read-ahead in tuned was not set correctly, nor was it set it for all

appropriate logical unit numbers (LUNs). As a consequence, devices mapped with
the device mapper could not be handled. Now, instead of setting static
read-ahead value for all devices, the previous value is multiplied and tuned
sets an acceptable read-ahead value for all disks including device mapper
devices. (BZ#658843)

• When the tuned script terminated unexpectedly, "service tuned status" returned

exit code 2 while it should have been 1; the presence of the pidfile was not
checked correctly. With this update, this bug has been fixed and a tuned status
check will now return correct status code when it crashes. (BZ#621122)

• When the tuned daemon was enabled on an IBM S/390 system, due to its hardware

limitations, plug-ins for CPU and disk did not work at all and the network
plug-in made very little difference to be useful. Architecture compatibility
check has been integrated into tuned; the daemon is now disabled and will not
start on IBM S/390. (BZ#624494)

• When parsing an unsupported network card link mode, tuned terminated

unexpectedly. With this update, a fix has been provided to address this bug and
the crash no longer occurs. (BZ#689715)

• Previously, the network device naming scheme in tuned assumed all Ethernet

devices were named "ethX". This was non-compliant with the naming convention for
network interfaces in Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6, which introduces new names for
network ports with respect to their usage or user-defined labels. With this
update, tuned supports different names for Ethernet cards and users of tuned
network plug-in can recognize their cards as configured in their tuned.conf
file. (BZ#682380)

• Previously, four executables (diskdevstat, netdevstat, scomes, varnetload)

were missing man pages. With this update, the man pages have been added.
(BZ#625850)

• Previously, man pages for tuned included inaccuracies in the profile

descriptions and descriptions for several plug-ins were missing. This update
corrects these inaccuracies and adds the plug-in descriptions to the tuned man
pages. (BZ#619812)

This update introduces the following enhancement:

• This update introduces new udev rules and other settings to configure non-SATA

devices separately from SATA devices. Now, when a user installs tuned, the
default configuration is optimized for non-SATA devices. (BZ#643462)

Users of tuned are advised to upgrade to these updated packages which fix these
bugs and add this enhancement.

Solution

Before applying this update, make sure that all previously-released errata
relevant to your system have been applied.

This update is available via Red Hat Network. Details on how to use the Red
Hat Network to apply this update are available at
https://access.redhat.com/kb/docs/DOC-11259

Affected Products

• Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server 6 x86_64
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server 6 i386
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server - Extended Life Cycle Support 6 x86_64
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server - Extended Life Cycle Support 6 i386
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux Workstation 6 x86_64
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux Workstation 6 i386
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux Desktop 6 x86_64
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux Desktop 6 i386
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux for IBM z Systems 6 s390x
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux for Power, big endian 6 ppc64
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux for Scientific Computing 6 x86_64
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server from RHUI 6 x86_64
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server from RHUI 6 i386
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server - Extended Life Cycle Support (for IBM z Systems) 6 s390x
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server - Extended Life Cycle Support Extension 6 x86_64
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server - Extended Life Cycle Support Extension 6 i386
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server - Extended Life Cycle Support Extension (for IBM z Systems) 6 s390x

Fixes

• BZ - 619812 - Please document all tuned profiles and provide use-cases
• BZ - 621122 - tuned init script improvement
• BZ - 625850 - Missing man pages
• BZ - 636548 - I/O scheduler changes not being made to device mapper (dm) devices on certain tuned profiles
• BZ - 643462 - tuned: ship udev rules updating scheduler params (slice_idle, quantum)
• BZ - 658843 - tuned is not setting read ahead for needed LUNs (dm-*) nor is it doing it correctly
• BZ - 682380 - assumes all ethernet devices are named ethX
• BZ - 689715 - crash when parsing unsupported network card link mode

CVEs

(none)

References

(none)