Getting "real" capacity used value on Linux

Drobo - End of Sale Drobo 5N
1

I have a Drobo 5N with firmware 3.2.3. Mounts just fine via on my Windows and Linux (Ubuntu 15.04) systems.

I don’t use my Windows system very often (low power laptop for the wife and kids), but I have the dashboard on there for when it’s necessary.

I tried getting the Dashboard working with Wine, but while it installs and opens, the UI is completely black.

So I would like to get some basic “real” capacity info from the 5N since the mounts report Use% based on 16TB when I only have like 6TB total.

I have ssh installed on the 5N but didn’t poke around tooooo much. Searched the forum and Google, but couldn’t find anything…

drobo-utils on my Linux system didn’t find the 5N, it looks like it doesn’t officially support the older Drobo Share either, so unless I’m missing something, that doesn’t seem to be an option.

Thoughts?

Thanks in advance!

2

That’s a consequence of thin provisioning - the upside is that you can add capacity without having to reformat. Hence the Linux df command gives disk usage based on the virtual capacity of 16 TB. The true workings of BeyondRAID are hidden from view even if you ssh into the device. It’s a real sealed box approach. You could write a little shell script that parses the output from df and gives you a percentage used based on a your known actual capacity, or you could check how many blue LEDs are lit.

3

I might go the script route…

You would think that there would be a command available on the drobo itself to get this data… Being that the dashboard shows it and all… But nothing that I’ve been able to find…

Thanks!

4

Well, clearly there is a call that the Dashboard makes to any attached Drobo to retrieve that information but it isn’t documented and the Drobo programmers are a secretive lot.

5

So I went the script route…

VERY basic, but so is what I was looking to do…

I left the “fs” variable in there and kept it updated in case I decided to use this to replicate the df output at any point in the future.

Ultimately I just wanted to know the real free % so I can drop it in my .conkyrc

Here’s the script:
[color=#0000CD]-----
#!/bin/sh

realTotal=5.4
targetMount="//drobo/sharename"

fs=df -h | grep $targetMount

realUsed=echo $fs | awk '{print $3}' | sed s/T//
#echo $realUsed

realFree=echo $realTotal - $realUsed | bc -l
#echo $realFree

fs=echo $fs | sed s/16/$realTotal/

avail=echo $fs | awk '{print $4}' | sed s/T//

fs=echo $fs | sed s/$avail/$realFree/

used=echo $fs | awk '{print $5}' | sed s/%//

pctUsed=echo $realUsed / $realTotal *100 | bc -l | cut -d '.' -f1
#echo $pctUsed

fs=echo $fs | sed s/$used/$pctUsed/
#echo $fs

pctFree=echo 100 - $pctUsed | bc -l
echo $pctFree
-----[/color]

And here’s the .conkeyrc entry:
color=#0000CD : ${exec /mnt/local/data/scripts/nasRealFree.sh}% ${color FFFF33} ${execbar echo 100 - /mnt/local/data/scripts/nasRealFree.sh | bc -l}$color[/color]

And what it looks like in conkey: http://imgur.com/q8yhbXtl.png

6

Good work. It’s simple and effective, exactly as it should be.

7

well done - it also reminds me a bit of that sentry turret readout in aliens :slight_smile: