RHBA-2015:2132 - Bug Fix Advisory

Topic

Updated device-mapper-multipath packages that fix several bugs and add various enhancements are now available for Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7.

Description

The device-mapper-multipath packages provide tools that use the device-mapper multipath kernel module to manage multipath devices.

The following enhancements are described in more detail in Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7.2 Release Notes, linked to from the References section:

• New "config_dir" option in the multipath.conf file. (BZ#1194917)
• New "delay_watch_checks" and "delay_wait_checks" options in the multipath.conf file. (BZ#1196394)

Notably, this update fixes the following bugs:

• Previously, the multipath utility marked paths in the "quiesce" and "transport-offline" states as offline in its output. In certain situations, marking the paths as offline was confusing. This update modifies multipath to no longer mark the paths in the "quiesce" and "transport-offline" states as offline. (BZ#1166072)
• Previously, the mpathconf utility generated default configuration templates with incorrect or deprecated entries. The templates generated by mpathconf have been fixed to include correct entries. (BZ#1194794)
• On systems where the /var/ directory was on a separate file system that was not mounted when the multipathd service started, the multipath pid file was sometimes written to a location other than /var/multipathd/multipath.pid. Consequently, systemd was unable to detect that multipathd started. Now, multipathd writes the pid file to /run/multipathd/multipathd.pid, which is located on a tmpfs file system that is always mounted before multipathd starts. As a result, systemd can successfully detect that multipathd is running. (BZ#1212590)

In addition, this update adds the following enhancements:

• The "deferred_remove" option has been added to the multipath.conf file. When set to "yes", the multipathd service performs a deferred remove operation when deleting the last path device; the last device is removed after the user closes the device. The default "deferred_remove" value is "no". (BZ#631009)
• The multipath utility now has the ability to save data between prioritizer calls, which reduces multipath's workload. This feature has been implemented in the asymmetric logical unit access (ALUA) prioritizer. (BZ#1081397)
• This update adds configuration for the Dell MD36xxf storage array to the default multipath configuration in Red Hat Enterprise Virtualization Hypervisor. (BZ#1188179)
• The multipath utility now automatically detects whether an EMC CLARiiON array is set up in the asymmetric logical unit access (ALUA) or passenger name record (PNR) mode and correctly configures itself to match. As a result, the default multipath configuration handles either ALUA or PNR configured EMC CLARiiON arrays. (BZ#1198424)
• The multipathd service is now able to retrigger uevents on devices that were not properly set up by the udev service. Additionally, this update adds two configuration parameters to control the retriggering: "retrigger_tries" and "retrigger_delay". With this update, even if udev times out before it can set the environment variable that multipath uses for the world wide identifier (WWID), multipath is still able to use the device. (BZ#1209275)
• The mpathconf utility now uses the "--allow" and "--outfile" options to create specialized configuration files that deny access to all devices except those allowed on the command line. As a result, systems with a large number of multipath devices only have the necessary devices configured in kdump mode, which reduces memory pressure. (BZ#1222123)

Users of device-mapper-multipath are advised to upgrade to these updated packages, which fix these bugs and add these enhancements.

Solution

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

For details on how to apply this update, refer to:

https://access.redhat.com/articles/11258

Affected Products

• Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server 7 x86_64
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux for x86_64 - Extended Update Support 7.7 x86_64
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux for x86_64 - Extended Update Support 7.6 x86_64
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux for x86_64 - Extended Update Support 7.5 x86_64
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux for x86_64 - Extended Update Support 7.4 x86_64
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux for x86_64 - Extended Update Support 7.3 x86_64
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server - AUS 7.7 x86_64
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server - AUS 7.6 x86_64
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server - AUS 7.4 x86_64
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server - AUS 7.3 x86_64
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server - Extended Life Cycle Support 7 x86_64
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux Workstation 7 x86_64
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux Desktop 7 x86_64
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux for IBM z Systems 7 s390x
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux for IBM z Systems - Extended Update Support 7.7 s390x
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux for IBM z Systems - Extended Update Support 7.6 s390x
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux for IBM z Systems - Extended Update Support 7.5 s390x
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux for IBM z Systems - Extended Update Support 7.4 s390x
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux for IBM z Systems - Extended Update Support 7.3 s390x
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux for Power, big endian 7 ppc64
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux for Power, big endian - Extended Update Support 7.7 ppc64
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux for Power, big endian - Extended Update Support 7.6 ppc64
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux for Power, big endian - Extended Update Support 7.5 ppc64
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux for Power, big endian - Extended Update Support 7.4 ppc64
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux for Power, big endian - Extended Update Support 7.3 ppc64
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux for Scientific Computing 7 x86_64
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server from RHUI 7 x86_64
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux for Power, little endian 7 ppc64le
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux for Power, little endian - Extended Update Support 7.7 ppc64le
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux for Power, little endian - Extended Update Support 7.6 ppc64le
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux for Power, little endian - Extended Update Support 7.5 ppc64le
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux for Power, little endian - Extended Update Support 7.4 ppc64le
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux for Power, little endian - Extended Update Support 7.3 ppc64le
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux for Power, little endian - Extended Update Support 7.2 ppc64le
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server - TUS 7.7 x86_64
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server - TUS 7.6 x86_64
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server - TUS 7.3 x86_64
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server - Extended Life Cycle Support (for IBM z Systems) 7 s390x
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux EUS Compute Node 7.7 x86_64
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux EUS Compute Node 7.6 x86_64
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux EUS Compute Node 7.5 x86_64
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux EUS Compute Node 7.4 x86_64
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux EUS Compute Node 7.3 x86_64
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server for Power LE - Update Services for SAP Solutions 7.7 ppc64le
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server for Power LE - Update Services for SAP Solutions 7.6 ppc64le
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server for Power LE - Update Services for SAP Solutions 7.4 ppc64le
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server for Power LE - Update Services for SAP Solutions 7.3 ppc64le
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux for x86_64 - Update Services for SAP Solutions 7.7 x86_64
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux for x86_64 - Update Services for SAP Solutions 7.6 x86_64
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux for x86_64 - Update Services for SAP Solutions 7.4 x86_64
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux for x86_64 - Update Services for SAP Solutions 7.3 x86_64
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server - Extended Life Cycle Support for IBM Power, big endian 7 ppc64
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server - Extended Life Cycle Support for IBM Power, little endian 7 ppc64le

Fixes

• BZ - 631009 - removal of all SCSI devices related to an unmapped LUN doesn't remove the multipath device mapping
• BZ - 1043093 - Multipath doesn't check realloc calls for null return pointers.
• BZ - 1169935 - Inconsistent behaviour between multipath and multipathd
• BZ - 1198418 - multipathd crash and prevent daemon restart "multipathd: mpathdx: error getting map status string"
• BZ - 1254292 - Multipath is not correctly identifying iscsi devices, and misconfiguring them.
• BZ - 1259523 - "*** buffer overflow detected ***: multipath terminated" when logged to many iSCSI LUNs
• BZ - 1260728 - multipathd is inactive (dead) after boot

CVEs

(none)

References

• http://www.redhat.com/security/updates/classification/#normal