Creating a vFiler

About this section

This section describes how to create a vFiler in the default IP address space (IPspace). For the definition of IPspace and information about creating vFilers in nondefault IPspaces, see Chapter 3, Using vFilers in Different IPspaces.

State of the vFiler after creation

Immediately after you create the vFiler, the vFiler is running.

The vFiler is configured with a set of options with default settings. These settings are not inherited from the hosting filer. You or the vFiler administrator can modify the option settings.

The vFiler configuration information is stored in the vFiler's /etc directory. It contains a subset of files that are in the hosting filer's /etc directory:

cifsconfig.cfg
cifssec.cfg
exports
filersid.cfg
group
hosts
hosts.equiv
passwd
quotas
files related to the registry
rmtab
sm
usermap.cfg

Major steps for creating a vFiler

The following list describes the major steps for creating a vFiler:

Ensure that the network interface to be configured with a vFiler IP address is ready for vFiler creation.
If iSCSI is licensed on the hosting filer and the storage to be allocated to the vFiler contains LUNs, unmap the LUNs.
See the Block Access Management Guide for iSCSI for instructions.
Assign and configure vFiler resources.

Ensuring that the network interface is ready

To ensure that the network interface to be configured with a vFiler IP address is ready for vFiler creation, complete the following steps.

Step	Action
1	If the IP address for the vFiler is...	Then...
	A base IP address for an interface	Go to Step 3.
	An IP alias for an interface	Go to Step 2.
2	If the IP alias is currently...	Then...
	Assigned to an interface	Enter the following command to remove the alias: ifconfig interface -alias address Example The following example removes the IP alias from the e0 interface: ifconfig e0 -alias 123.123.123.123 You are done.
	Unassigned	You are done.
3	If the base IP address for the vFiler is assigned to...	Then...
	An interface in the UP state	Enter the following command to change the state of the interface for the IP address to DOWN: *ifconfig interface* down** Example The following example changes the state of the e0 interface to DOWN: ifconfig e0 down
	An interface in the DOWN state	You are done.

Assigning and configuring vFiler resources

You can assign and configure resources for a vFiler either via the command line or via FilerView. To configure the vFiler via the command line, complete the following steps.

Note
The procedure that follows assumes that you want to set up the vFiler for networking (and CIFS if necessary) immediately after creating the vFiler. If you want to defer setup, use the -n option of the vfiler create command, and then follow directions under Setting up a vFiler manually when you are ready to do the setup. For more information on the vfiler create command, see the na_vfiler man page.

Step	Action
1	Enter the following command: *vfiler create vfiler_name* -i ip_address [ -i ip_address ] ... path [ path ] ...** vfiler_name is the name of the vFiler. ip_address is an IP address. path is the complete path name to an existing volume or qtree. The first path name is the storage unit that contains the /etc directory, which contains the configuration information about the vFiler. Example The following example creates a vFiler using two IP addresses, one volume, and one qtree: vfiler create vfiler1 -i 123.123.123.123 -i 123.123.123.124 /vol/vol1 /vol/vol2/qtree2
2	Respond to prompts to set up the filer, and to set up CIFS if necessary.

Results of the setup process

The setup process does the following on the new vFiler:

Starts NFS (if NFS is licensed on the hosting filer) and configures the vFiler's root volume to be exported to the vFiler's administrative host (using an entry in the /etc/exports file)
Configures the vFiler's IP addresses and adds the appropriate entries to /etc/rc
Creates a "pseudo-root" that allows CIFS clients to see all the storage that has been assigned to the vFiler as a single tree (see The pseudo-root directory for more information)
Starts the iSCSI service (if iSCSI is licensed on the hosting filer)

What to do next

You, or the vFiler administrator, can now mount the root volume of the vFiler, edit /etc/exports to suit your needs and rerun the exportfs command. See Chapter 4, File Access Using NFS and CIFS for more information.

Creating a vFiler

About this section

State of the vFiler after creation

Major steps for creating a vFiler

Ensuring that the network interface is ready

Example

Example

Assigning and configuring vFiler resources

Example

Results of the setup process

What to do next