HP e3000 MPE/iX System Software Maintenance Manual (Release C.75.00) (30216-90344)

Chapter 1

Introduction

HP Stage/iX

HP Stage/iX is an operating system facility for applying and managing MPE/iX patches on your system.

Using HP Stage/iX reduces system downtime and provides an easy and reliable method for backing out

patches. Refer to Appendix G, “HP Stage/iX Reference,” for information on HP Stage/iX commands and

staging area handling.

Use HP Stage/iX to place Reactive patches into staging areas on disk while the system is up, then choose a

staging area to use at boot time to apply the patches. After the patches are applied, they can be backed out at

any time through a reboot to the Base (the version applied by the last tape update). Once you are satisfied

with the patches on the running system, you can commit the staging area to form a new Base while the

system is running (no reboot is needed).

HP Stage/iX has the following three interfaces:

HP Patch/iX

menus allow you to stage patches to staging areas after HP Stage/iX is initialized (as well as create

CSLT/STORE tapes in the usual fashion). Refer to Appendix F, “HP Patch/iX Reference,” for

information about HP Patch/iX.

STAGEMAN utility allows you to manage your HP Stage/iX environment, and obtain information about the

environment and individual staging areas.

STAGEISL utility is an ISL utility available when the system is down. It contains a subset of the STAGEMAN

functionality, and allows you to recover from most errors or mistakes.

HP Stage/iX Concepts

Your Operating System (OS) resides in what HP Stage/iX refers to as the Base.

This is the set of files laid down by the last system installation or update (from tape). HP Stage/iX creates and

manages staging areas, which are file containers on disk that hold versions of files that are different from the

Base. A staging area is actually an HFS directory which holds all the files associated with that staging area.

More than one staging area can exist at a time. Each staging area contains the difference, or delta, between

the Base Operating System and a patched OS.

When a staging area is activated on the next boot, the files in the staging area directory are moved (renamed)

into their natural locations. For example, the staged version of the NL is moved into NL.PUB.SYS. At the same

time, the Base versions of the files are saved in an HP Stage/iX archive directory. When the staging area is

backed out (when the system is booted back to the Base), the converse takes place, and the system is restored

to its original state.

When an active staging area is committed to the Base, the staging area directory is deleted, and all archived

Base files are purged. The files that were switched into their natural locations when the staging area was

activated remain there as part of the new Base. This releases any disk space that was used by the staging

area.

HP Stage/iX (with the help of HP Patch/iX) allows new patches to be staged and applied in a cumulative

fashion. This means that if you create a new staging area while a staging area is active, the new staging area

will contain all the changes between the Base and the active staging area, plus the new patches applied to

the new staging area.