System crashing.. HELP!

[George Robbins]

In article <2080 at kiwi.mpr.ca> parker at zaphod.Berkeley.EDU (Ross Parker) writes:
> 
> Symptom: One user on a PC can try to bring up a particular
>          file under WordPerfect (version 5.0 or 5.1) on the
>          PC, and, without fail, cause the Microvax to
>          instantly crash. This problem just started happening.
>          No system changes, either hardware or software, have
>          taken place for a number of months. The user does
>          not have a problem with any other files, nor does
>          any other user cause the system to die. The system
>          is also used for NFS operations from other Vaxen, and
>          from some Sun systems, and no problems occur. The crash
>          symptoms are (on the console):

Well, from your description there isn't enough info to make a good guess,
but I'd suggest two avenues to pursue...

1) look a the crash dump information on the console and a nm -n /vmunix
   and see what kind of code the pc is in, nfs, ufs or something else.

2) fsck the disk and make sure there are no organizational problems
   associated with the file.

3) try to read the file/files in question with tar or other utility to
   make sure that the problem is (perhaps) NFS and not basic filesystem
   stuff.

4) try to correlate the errors with the UERF output.  Is there exactly
   one of the "controller errors" per crash?  Do all the crashes have
   the same PC value?

5) try the uerf -o full option to see if you get more information on the
   "controller error" that might give a clue...

6) talk to the support center about known 3.0 NFS problems (I think there
   are quite few) and either apply the 3.0 NFS / networking patch tape
   or upgrade to 3.1 and do any appropriate patches there...

-- 
George Robbins - now working for,     uucp:   {uunet|pyramid|rutgers}!cbmvax!grr
but no way officially representing:   domain: grr at cbmvax.commodore.com
Commodore, Engineering Department     phone:  215-431-9349 (only by moonlite)