AIX Kernel Dump Analysis

1. Uncompress core dump from customer

#ulimit -f unlimited //Avoid too large file error on AIX
#ulimit -Hf unlimited

#gunzip SR_99999999_99997.7TD.000.snap.pax.Z
#pax -rvf SR_99999999_99997.7TD.000.snap.pax -x pax

#cd dump
#dmpuncompress -p dump.BZ
#uncompress unix.Z

2. Load kdb

#kdb dump unix

dump mapped from @ 700000000000000 to @ 7000001475f12c5

Preserving 1921497 bytes of symbol table [unix]
Component Names:
 1)  minidump [2 entries]
 2)  dmp_minimal [10 entries]
 3)  proc [1636 entries]
 4)  thrd [5152 entries]
 5)  mtrc [97 entries]
 6)  lfs [6 entries]
 7)  bos [6 entries]
[kdb_dump_llseek] Invalid file offset
WARNING: Version mismatch between unix file and command kdb
           START              END <name>
0000000000001000 0000000004070000 start+000FD8
F00000002FF47600 F00000002FFDF940 __ublock+000000
000000002FF22FF4 000000002FF22FF8 environ+000000
000000002FF22FF8 000000002FF22FFC errno+000000
F1000F0A00000000 F1000F0A10000000 pvproc+000000
F1000F0A10000000 F1000F0A18000000 pvthread+000000
Dump analysis on CHRP_SMP_PCI POWER_PC POWER_6 machine with 32 available CPU(s)  (64-bit registers)
Processing symbol table...
.......................done
read vscsi_scsi_ptrs OK, ptr = 0x0
[kdb_read_mem] no real storage @ F1000100120D9000

(0) status
(0) stat

3. Common used files in kernel snap
       

errpt(kernel log): general/errpt.out
LVM configuration: lvm/*.snap
Process/Memory/Drivers: kernel/kernel.snap

         
4. Refer the following post for general introduction of kdb

http://www.ibm.com/developerworks/aix/library/au-kdbsteps/index.html