asterisk users - Jun 2006 - Voicemail with NFS (working, I think)

I'm using a stand-alone VM server and exporting the VM files ro for
MWI function only.  All my registration servers mount the remote NFS
share just to check MWI, all read-write functions to the VM files
occur on the VM server only.

On the registration servers, I mounted the remote VM share with this
in my fstab.conf:

10.10.14.124:/var/spool/asterisk/voicemail      /mnt/vmserver   nfs
 soft,nolock,timeo=1,retrans=1,bg,intr

all on one line of course

[10.10.14.124:/var/spool/asterisk/voicemail] is the voicemail server
and [/mn/vmserver] is the mounted location, [nfs] is the file system
type,

options: (the important stuff)
[soft] If  an NFS file operation has a major timeout, then report an
I/O error to the calling program.  The default is to continue
retrying  NFS  file  operations indefinitely.
[nolock] does not use locking.
[timeo=1] redces the nfs share minor timeouts to 1 tenth of a second
[retrans=1] reduces the number of minor timeouts and retransmitts
needed to cause a major timeout.
[bg] background the re-mount operation
[intr] interupt the nfs file operation for the calling program when a
major timeout occurs

When mounting the nfs without these options, Asterisk became
immediately unstable when the remote nfs dropped off-line, but also
regained is operation immediately when the nfs became available again.

When mouting the nfs with these options, asterisk kept on ticking
without interruption, WMI was unavailable of course, but all other
functions worked.  The MWI came back on immediately after the nfs
share was restored.

Of course this is a hack and I'm patiently waiting for Digium to
implement the Remote MWI over IAX and incorporate into stable
releases.

Hope this helps.

JR

-- 
JR Richardson
Engineering for the Masses