Using NFS to create image catalog entries

Installing cumulative PTFs can be done by using image catalogs. One of the advantages is that you are sure your CDs are OK. Sometimes an error on the CD can interrupt the installation of cumulative PTFs on your iSeries, so by transferring the contents of the CDs to an image catalog you can avoid this problem. Also, installing the PTFs from image catalogs is much faster because they are installed from the IFS. But creating the image catalogs takes time, because you must read every CD. Unfortunately it is not possible to use Management Central to distribute cumulative packages (click here for more information), so when you need to install the cumulative package on several machines, you need to add the contents of the CDs to image catalogs on every machine.

However, by using the Network File System (NFS) it's possible to add the CD contents to an image catalog on one machine (for instance the Management Central machine) and create the image catalogs on other machines by accessing the image catalog files on the Management Central machine through NFS. This avoids the need to swap the CDs several times on several machines when creating the image catalogs.

Here's how it works:

After the image catalog files are created on the Management Central machine (we call iSeries01) it is possible to use these files to create the image catalog files on the second machine (we call iSeries02) with the files from the iSeries01 as source files. On iSeries01, the image catalog files are created in /temp with the command ADDIMGCLGE

  • On the iSeries01, run the following command to start the NFS services: STRNFSSVR SERVER(*ALL)


  • On the iSeries01, export the folder that contains the image catalog files, in this example /temp:
    CHGNFSEXP DIR('/TEMP')


  • On the iSeries02, create folder /nfsmount (on the command line:
    'cd /' and then 'md nfsmount')


  • On the iSeries02, mount the exported folder from the iSeries01 with this command:
    ADDMFS TYPE(*NFS) MFS('iseries01:/temp') MNTOVRDIR('/nfsmount')


  • On the iseries02, use ADDIMGCLGE to add the image catalog entry. Use the following command (C5063354_02 is an example):
    QSYS/ADDIMGCLGE IMGCLG(CUMPTFS) FROMFILE('/nfsmount/C5063354_02')

Keep in mind that you need read authority on the /temp/ on iSeries01 to read the source image file, standard authority is public *exclude.

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This was first published in January 2005

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