[gvoden]

Guys,

I've just started using AIX 2 weeks ago, we are throwing in a bunch of p510's with AIX 5.3 on them and I was assigned to build them... I'm from a Sun Solaris background so I've got some questions mostly about AIX lingo...
what is an LPAR? is that like a virtual machine (container??) or ? I need a very generic explanation...
another thing - how do you get AIX to update the information in ODM after you've made a change to a network interface? is there a command that doesn't require SMIT?
thanks/cheers

[duke900ssd]

An LPAR is a Logical PARtition, a bit of the system used as an AIX system.
iSeries and pSeries / system i / p are much the same these days in that either can run either OS.
LPAR Overview
Do the smit thing but before you press F7 / commit, press F6 to see the command that smit is about to use.

[rydekull]

Quick and dirty explanations by me:

Container:
One host operating system, small shared "systems" running on the same kernel etc as the host operating system.

LPAR:
Seperated operating systems with their own kernel sharing the same hardware as the others on the physical machine.(CPU/Memory etc). As you can tell here, they arent able to communicate with eachother through for example a lo-interface, so in a way it makes it more secure then a container.

SMIT vs. Commands:
SMIT is infact a User Interface towards different commands and shell scripts(Hit F6 right before you try and execute something in smit to see the command).
So, in other words, you can do everything with the commands, however, the thing is. SMIT usually doesnt just do one command, it uses two or three. Plus, it edits the ODM-database in some way.

You can of course also use the same commands as SMIT and interact with the ODM(ls -la /usr/bin/odm*). But really, why? SMIT does it for you. Unless there is something that SMIT doesnt do(a few cases) there is no need.

Admittedly, I'd love to see a flag or behaviour at the route command to remove things directly from the ODM for example without having to use SMIT to ensure that the route (doesnt/)show up on reboot.

I hope that was simple enough and covered what you wanted to know.

Oh, and dont quote me on this :-)

[kongyw]

This reponse may be a little bit late. The redbook "AIX Reference for Sun Solaris Administrators" at IBM Redbooks | AIX Reference for Sun Solaris Administrators should answer most, if not all, a SUN person's questions.