Starting, stopping, and testing boards

Applications use NMS OAM service functions to start, stop, and test boards.

Starting boards

A board must exist as a managed object before you can start it using NMS OAM.

Use oamStartBoard to start a board. Pass the context handle of the host managing the board and the name of the board to start. To start all boards in a resource host at once, pass NULL as the name. To start boards on multiple resource hosts, invoke this function at least once per host.

oamStartBoard is an asynchronous function that sends a return code to the application indicating if it was successfully initiated. If the return value is SUCCESS, the actual results of the board-starting attempt arrive later as events. As the Supervisor attempts to start each board, it returns OAMEVN_STARTBOARD_DONE to the application. The value field returned with the event indicates if the board started successfully:

Further information is available in the OAM_MSG message buffer (in its text portion), as well as in other alert notifications generated during the start process.

Stopping boards

A board must exist as a managed object before you can stop it using NMS OAM.

Use oamStopBoard to stop one or more boards on a resource host. Pass the context handle of the host managing the board and the name of the board to stop. To stop all boards in a resource host at once, pass NULL as the name. To stop boards on multiple resource hosts, invoke this function at least once per host.

oamStopBoard is an asynchronous function that sends a return code to the application indicating if it was successfully initiated. If the return value is SUCCESS, the results of the board stop attempt arrive later as events. When a request to stop a board is made, the Supervisor generates OAMEVN_STOPBOARD_REQ to inform all registered clients that the board will be stopped in 150 ms. This event allows applications to perform clean up before the board is stopped. As the Supervisor attempts to stop each board, it returns OAMEVN_STOPBOARD_DONE to the application. The value field returned with the event indicates if the board stopped successfully:

Further information is available in the OAM_MSG message buffer (text portion), as well as in other alert notifications generated during the board stop attempt.

Note: oamStopBoard stops boards regardless of any tasks they are currently performing. To avoid problems, ensure that a board is idle before stopping it.

Testing boards

Once a CG board is started, a client application can test it and report results. Three levels of tests can be performed on a board:

A client application can use oamTestBoard to test one or more CG boards. Pass this function the following information:

To test boards on multiple resource hosts, invoke oamTestBoard at least once per host.

Note: Testing can interrupt current board activities. For this reason, do not use a board for any other operations during testing.

Test level bit mask

For CG boards, the bits in the test level bit mask are interpreted as follows:

Here are some examples:

dwOptions setting

Test performed

0x103

Test level 3 of PCI bridges only.

0x301

Test level 1 of PCI bridges, on-board CPU chip, and DSP chips.

0x80000301

Test level 1 of PCI bridges, on-board CPU, and DSPs. Displays status information and test information for each component tested.


oamTestBoard is an asynchronous function that sends a return code to the application. A return value of SUCCESS indicates if the function was successfully initiated. As the Supervisor attempts to test each board, it returns OAMEVN_TESTBOARD_DONE to the application. The value field returned with the event indicates if the board tested successfully:

Further information is available in the OAM_MSG message buffer (in its text portion), as well as in other alert notifications generated during the test attempt if bit 31 is set in the test bit mask.