Request that an option added to alt_disk_mksysb to make an attempt at rebuilding the alternate disk boot image

Request an enhancement to alt_disk_mksysb (or alternatively alt_rootvg_op -St) that would force an attempt at rebuilding the alternate disk's boot image.

In the referenced PMR, the use case was to take a troubled rootvg image from a Production LPAR and load it onto a Test LPAR. The primary disk and alternate disk were at the same AIX version+TL+SP+efix level. Where this gets interesting is that the efix list contained specific changes to the kernel & libc. The libc efix was not compatible with the "vanilla" kernel deployed in the fixed boot image, so the resulting alternate disk could not complete IPL after /usr was mounted.

Currently the alt_disk_mksysb process is written to deploy a fixed "vanilla" boot image. The process does NOT bosboot (i.e. does not construct a customized bootable image) on the alternate disk. This is significant. See /usr/sbin/alt_disk_mksysb function create_mksysb_boot_image, which deploys the fixed image in /usr/lpp/bos.alt_disk_install/bin/alt_init_br_chrp. It is now understood that this was done deliberately to facilitate certain porting situations, though this is unexpected from the customers' point of view.

The proposed enhancement would give the customer an option or procedure to create a viable boot image for the alternate disk on a best efforts basis.

An alternative approach might be to include an updated fixed boot image in the efix set anytime a kernel efix is issued. However, this approach makes the limiting assumption that the primary disk always has the "highest" level of software.