PowerFlex "ERROR: Failed to fork timer" when Updating License

Summary: The customer is unable to update their PowerFlex license.

This article applies to This article does not apply to This article is not tied to any specific product. Not all product versions are identified in this article.

Symptoms

Scenario
The customer may see the following message when attempting to update their license "ERROR: Failed to fork timer" 

Symptoms
From the MDM trace log

29/09 15:19:38.957139 0x7f91e2645db8:mosEventLog_PostInternal:00608: New event added. Message: "Command set_license received, User: 'admin'. [774]". Additional info: "" Severity: Info
29/09 15:19:38.957208 (nil):mosIO_close:00137: Closing FD(299)
29/09 15:19:38.964892 (nil):mos_CreateProcessWithTimeout:00050: ERROR: Failed to fork timer
29/09 15:19:38.968880 (nil):mosIO_close:00137: Closing FD(299)
29/09 15:19:38.968906 0x7f91e2645db8:mdmObj_SetLicense:01918: Decode rc: ILLEGAL
29/09 15:19:38.968912 0x7f91e2645db8:mdmObj_SetLicense:01921: Bad license. RC: ILLEGAL
29/09 15:19:38.968946 0x7f91e2645db8:mosEventLog_PostInternal:00608: New event added. Message: "Command set_license was not successful. Error code: The license key is invalid or does not match this version. Please contact Customer Support. [774]". Additional info: "" Severity: Warning

 

Impact

 The customer is unable to update their license until their resource issue is resolved.

Cause

When the scli --set_license command is ran to apply the license, the MDM process is cloned (forked) twice. 

The first step succeeded but the command was unable to clone the MDM process. This may occur if the system has insufficient resources to clone the process. In this case, the SVM's memory overcommit configuration limited the system to only half the available memory:

grep 'vm.overcommit' ./server/sysctl.txt -H
server/sysctl.txt:vm.overcommit_kbytes = 0
server/sysctl.txt:vm.overcommit_memory = 2
server/sysctl.txt:vm.overcommit_ratio = 50

Resolution

Confirm that the system has sufficient resources available. 

Check the sysctl kernel parameters for overcommit of memory:

# sysctl -a |grep commit
vm.overcommit_memory = 2 (default is 0)
vm.overcommit_ratio = 50 (default is 50)

In this case, having "vm.overcommit_memory" set to two means do not overcommit memory. This fails any memory allocation that exceeds the overcommit limit. The total address space commit for the system is not permitted to exceed swap + a configurable amount (default is 50%) of physical RAM.

To fix this issue, add/edit one of the following in /etc/sysctl.conf:

 - Change "vm.overcommit_ratio" to 100, so the OS can commit the total address space available and reboot.

Affected Products

PowerFlex Software

Products

VxFlex Product Family, VxFlex Ready Node, Ready Node Series
Article Properties
Article Number: 000193062
Article Type: Solution
Last Modified: 31 May 2025
Version:  3
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