--bind-address

Causes ndbd to bind to a specific network interface (host name or IP address). This option has no default value.

This option was added in MySQL 5.0.29.

--daemon, -d

Instructs ndbd to execute as a daemon process. This is the default behavior. --nodaemon can be used to prevent the process from running as a daemon.

--initial

Instructs ndbd to perform an initial start. An initial start erases any files created for recovery purposes by earlier instances of ndbd. It also re-creates recovery log files. Note that on some operating systems this process can take a substantial amount of time.

An --initial start is to be used only when starting the ndbd process under very special circumstances; this is because this option causes all files to be removed from the Cluster file system and all redo log files to be re-created. These circumstances are listed here:

Use of this option prevents the StartPartialTimeout and StartPartitionedTimeout configuration parameters from having any effect.

It is permissible to use this option when starting the cluster for the very first time (that is, before any data node files have been created); however, it is not necessary to do so.

--initial-start

This option is used when performing a partial initial start of the cluster. Each node should be started with this option, as well as --nowait-nodes.

Suppose that you have a 4-node cluster whose data nodes have the IDs 2, 3, 4, and 5, and you wish to perform a partial initial start using only nodes 2, 4, and 5—that is, omitting node 3:

shell> ndbd --ndb-nodeid=2 --nowait-nodes=3 --initial-start
shell> ndbd --ndb-nodeid=4 --nowait-nodes=3 --initial-start
shell> ndbd --ndb-nodeid=5 --nowait-nodes=3 --initial-start

This option was added in MySQL 5.0.21.

--nowait-nodes=node_id_1[, node_id_2[, ...]]

This option takes a list of data nodes which for which the cluster will not wait for before starting.

This can be used to start the cluster in a partitioned state. For example, to start the cluster with only half of the data nodes (nodes 2, 3, 4, and 5) running in a 4-node cluster, you can start each ndbd process with --nowait-nodes=3,5. In this case, the cluster starts as soon as nodes 2 and 4 connect, and does not wait StartPartitionedTimeout milliseconds for nodes 3 and 5 to connect as it would otherwise.

If you wanted to start up the same cluster as in the previous example without one ndbd—say, for example, that the host machine for node 3 has suffered a hardware failure—then start nodes 2, 4, and 5 with --nowait-nodes=3. Then the cluster will start as soon as nodes 2, 4, and 5 connect and will not wait for node 3 to start.

When using this option, you must also specify the node ID for the data node being started with the --ndb-nodeid option.

This option was added in MySQL 5.0.21.

--nodaemon

Instructs ndbd not to start as a daemon process. This is useful when ndbd is being debugged and you want output to be redirected to the screen.

--foreground

Causes ndbd to execute as a foreground process, primarily for debugging purposes. This option implies the --nodaemon option.

--nostart, -n

Instructs ndbd not to start automatically. When this option is used, ndbd connects to the management server, obtains configuration data from it, and initializes communication objects. However, it does not actually start the execution engine until specifically requested to do so by the management server. This can be accomplished by issuing the proper START command in the management client (see Section 17.5.2, “Commands in the MySQL Cluster Management Client”).

ndb_node_id_error.log is a file containing records of all crashes which the referenced ndbd process has encountered. Each record in this file contains a brief error string and a reference to a trace file for this crash. A typical entry in this file might appear as shown here:

Date/Time: Saturday 30 July 2004 - 00:20:01
Type of error: error
Message: Internal program error (failed ndbrequire)
Fault ID: 2341
Problem data: DbtupFixAlloc.cpp
Object of reference: DBTUP (Line: 173)
ProgramName: NDB Kernel
ProcessID: 14909
TraceFile: ndb_2_trace.log.2
***EOM***

Listings of possible ndbd exit codes and messages generated when a data node process shuts down prematurely can be found in ndbd Error Messages.

ndb_node_id_trace.log.trace_id is a trace file describing exactly what happened just before the error occurred. This information is useful for analysis by the MySQL Cluster development team.

It is possible to configure the number of these trace files that will be created before old files are overwritten. trace_id is a number which is incremented for each successive trace file.

ndb_node_id_trace.log.next is the file that keeps track of the next trace file number to be assigned.

ndb_node_id_out.log is a file containing any data output by the ndbd process. This file is created only if ndbd is started as a daemon, which is the default behavior.

ndb_node_id.pid is a file containing the process ID of the ndbd process when started as a daemon. It also functions as a lock file to avoid the starting of nodes with the same identifier.

ndb_node_id_signal.log is a file used only in debug versions of ndbd, where it is possible to trace all incoming, outgoing, and internal messages with their data in the ndbd process.