VOS_STATUS(1)

📦
version 1.8.16.1 · 10 versions
, in ubuntu stonking

💖 VOS_STATUS(1) 💖

okay bestie, welcome to the AFS Command Reference — this is the manual page for vos_status, and honestly? it's giving "checking in on your server like a worried mom". let's get into it 🫶

✨ NAME ✨

vos_status — reports a Volume Server's status 👀

🌸 SYNOPSIS 🌸

vos status -server <machine name>
    [-cell <cell name>]
    [-noauth] [-localauth]
    [-verbose] [-encrypt] [-noresolve]
    [-config <config directory>]
    [-help]

vos st -s <machine name>
    [-c <cell name>]
    [-noa] [-l] [-v] [-e] [-nor]
    [-co <config directory>]
    [-h]

🦋 DESCRIPTION 🦋

so vos status reports on what the Volume Server on a certain file server machine is doing at the exact moment the command is issued. like, snapping a pic of the server mid-activity, no filter. 📸

and if there's literally nothing going on? you get this message:

No active transactions on <machine_name>

this command is useful mainly if you're lowkey worried that the Volume Server is not performing requested actions. vibe check for your fileserver, basically. 💅

✨ OPTIONS ✨

  • -server <server name> — identifies the file server machine running the Volume Server whose status you wanna see. you can hand it the machine's IP address or its host name (fully qualified, or just an unambiguous abbreviation, we're flexible ✨). for details, go peek at vos(1).
  • -cell <cell name> — names the cell where you wanna run the command. 🚫 do not combine this argument with the -localauth flag, that's a no-no. more deets in vos(1).
  • -noauth — assigns the unprivileged identity "anonymous" to whoever's issuing the command 🙈. 🚫 do not combine this flag with -localauth. more deets in vos(1).
  • -localauth — constructs a server ticket using a key from the local /etc/openafs/server/KeyFile file 🔑. the vos command interpreter presents it to the Volume Server and Volume Location Server during mutual authentication. 🚫 do not combine this flag with the -cell argument or the -noauth flag. more deets in vos(1).
  • -verbose — spits out a detailed trace of the command's execution on the standard output stream 🗣️. if you leave this argument out, you only get warnings and error messages. squeaky clean.
  • -encrypt — encrypts the command so the operation's results are not transmitted across the network in clear text 🔐. this option is available in OpenAFS versions 1.4.11 or later and 1.5.60 or later.
  • -noresolve — shows all servers as IP addresses instead of the DNS name 🌐. super useful when the server address is registered as 127.0.0.1 or when you're dealing with multi-homed servers. this option is available in OpenAFS versions 1.4.8 or later and 1.5.35 or later.
  • -config <configuration directory> — set the location of the configuration directory to be used 🗂️. this defaults to /etc/openafs, except if -localauth is specified, in which case the default is /etc/openafs/server. this option lets you use alternative configuration locations for testing purposes, iykyk.
  • -help — prints the online help for this command 📖. all other valid options are ignored. periodt.

👑 OUTPUT 👑

there are two possible types of output.

the following message means the Volume Server is not currently performing any actions 😴:

No active transactions on I<machine name>

the other possible output is a set of information that's honestly probably more useful to programmers than to system administrators 🤓. fully understanding all the fields requires familiarity with the code for the Volume Server, because a lot of these fields report ID numbers and flag values that the Volume Server sets for internal use. so don't stress if some of it looks like alphabet soup.

among the fields that might actually be of interest to an administrator:

  • "created" on the first line — tells you the time this transaction started ⏰
  • in OpenAFS 1.5.75 and later, "lastActiveTime" on the second line — tells you the last time an RPC interacted with this transaction 👋
  • "attachFlags" on the third line — a value of "offline" means the volume is not available for other read or write operations during this transaction 🚧
  • "volume" on the fourth line — the ID number of the affected volume 🔢
  • "partition" on the fourth line — where the affected volume resides (at the beginning of the transaction if this is a move) 📦
  • "procedure" on the fourth line — the internal subprocedure being executed ⚙️

a fifth line can show up during certain transactions, and it includes these fields:

  • "packetRead" — tracks whether information is being read into the volume 📥. its absolute value isn't informative, but the way it changes shows whether the vos restore command is executing properly. as you issue the vos status command repeatedly during a restore, "readNext" increases monotonically to indicate that information is being read into the volume 📈
  • "packetSend" — tracks whether information is being sent out of the volume 📤. its absolute value isn't informative, but the way it changes shows whether the vos dump command is executing properly. as you issue the vos status command repeatedly during a dump, "transmitNext" increases monotonically to indicate that information is being transferred from the volume into the dump file 📈

and the "lastReceiveTime" and "lastSendTime" fields? those are for internal use 🫥.

🎀 EXAMPLES 🎀

this example shows the kind of output that sometimes appears when the Volume Server on "fs1.example.com" is executing a dump right when you issue this command:

% vos status fs1.example.com
--------------------------------------------
transaction: 575  created: Tue Jan 2 8:34:56 1990
attachFlags: offline
volume: 536871080 partition: /vicepb procedure: Dump
packetRead: 2 lastReceiveTime: 113313 packetSend: 24588
    lastSendTime: 113317
--------------------------------------------

slay, look at those little dashes framing it like a lil scrapbook page ✨

💜 PRIVILEGE REQUIRED 💜

None 💅 nobody gatekeeping this one.

🌈 SEE ALSO 🌈

vos(1)

IBM Corporation 2000. <http://www.ibm.com/> All Rights Reserved.

This documentation is covered by the IBM Public License Version 1.0. It was converted from HTML to POD by software written by Chas Williams and Russ Allbery, based on work by Alf Wachsmann and Elizabeth Cassell. 💖

okay that's the whole thing, bestie!! this page came to you courtesy of OpenAFS, dated 2026-07-27, and it lives in section 1 of the manual — go forth and status your volumes, love u, bye 💅✨🦋

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