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Measures reported by IBSubnetMgrTest
Subnet Manager (SM) is a centralized entity running in the InfiniBand switch. The SM discovers and configures all the InfiniBand fabric devices to enable traffic flow among those devices. The SM manages all operational characteristics of the InfiniBand network such as the following:
Discovering the network topology Assigning a local identifier (LID) to all ports connected to the network Calculating and programming switch forwarding tables Programming Partition Key (PKEY) tables at HCAs and switches Programming QoS tables (Service Level to Virtual Lane mapping tables, and Virtual Lane arbitration tables) Monitoring changes in the fabric
The subnet manager uses Subnet Manager Agent (SMA) for communication inside and outside of the target InfiniBand switch. The real test of the efficiency of the subnet manager lies in its ability to communicate information across the components in the target switch using different kind of packets, for instance, Subnet Management Packets (SMP). If, for any reason, more number of packets are queued up and made to wait or response for the transmitted packets are not returned as expected, then the whole/part of information that the subnet manager is intended to communicate with the other components will not be delivered and thus, the communication will become unreliable. To avoid such incidents, administrators will have to monitor the packet transmission regularly.
Using the IBSubnetMgrTest test, administrators can track the traffic of different packets and the . Analyzing the metrics reported by the test, administrators can easily detect whether the packet transmission over each virtual path is reliable or not.
Outputs of the test : One set of results for the InfiniBand Switch that is being monitored
The measures made by this test are as follows:
| Measurement |
Description |
Measurement Unit |
Interpretation |
| smCntSMPsOutstanding |
Indicates the number of SMP packets that are queued up per second. |
Packets/sec |
All management traffic including the communication between the SMAs and the SM is handled using subnet management packets (SMP). |
| smCntSMPsOnWire |
Indicates the number of SMP packets that are currently in transmission per second. |
Packets/sec |
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| smCntSMPsReceived |
Indicates the number of SMP packets received per second since SM was started. |
Packets/sec |
|
| smCntSMPsSent |
Indicates the number of SMP packets transmitted per second since SM was started. |
Packets/sec |
|
| smCntSMPsUnidirect |
Indicates the number of responseless SMP packets transmitted per second. |
Packets/sec |
(includes getresp(), send() and trap()). |
| smCntSMPsUnknownReceived |
Indicates the number of unknown SMP packets transmitted per second. |
Packets/sec |
The SMP packets are regarded as unknown packet when they are transmitted with unknown attribute IDs and/or methods. |
| smCntSaGMPsOutstanding |
Indicates the number of SA GMP packets that are currently queued up per second. |
Packets/sec |
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| smCntSaGMPsReceived |
Indicates the total number of SA GMP packets received per second since the SM was started. |
Packets/sec |
|
| smCntSaGMPsSent |
Indicates the total number of SA GMP packets transmitted per second since the SM was started. |
Packets/sec |
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| smCntSaGMPsUnknownRec |
Indicates the number of unknown SA GMP packets received per second. |
Packets/sec |
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| smCntSaGMPsIgnored |
Indicates the number of SA GMP packets ignored per second. |
Packets/sec |
The SA GMP packets are ignored from transmission when the SM is not a master or is not yet ready to handle SA requests. |
| smCntSMPsSMInfoReqRec |
Indicates the number of SMInfo requests received per second |
Packets/sec |
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| smCntSMPsSMInfoRespSent |
Indicates the number of SMInfo requests transmitted per second. |
Packets/sec |
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| smCntSMPsSMInfoRespRec |
Indicates the number of SMInfo responses received per second. |
Packets/sec |
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| smCntSMPsSMInfoRespSent |
Indicates the number of SMInfo responses transmitted per second. |
Packets/sec |
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