Deleting the asdm image from FWSM flash

tomyjoseph17 · ‎10-06-2011

Hi ,

I am facing flash space issue with my FWSm and want to delete the asdm image from flash to free up the space. But my vendor says its not possible to delete the asdm image from fwsm.

Please if anyone have come cross this ? Let me know if any methods are there to delete the asdm image.

Regards

Tomy

Paul Wedde · ‎10-06-2011

Are you able to access the CLI?

You should be able to do it from both.

Tools - File management via the ASDM (what version of ASDM are you running?

tomyjoseph17 · ‎10-06-2011

yes..

Device Manager Version 6.2(1)F

jhclemente · ‎10-06-2011

I think deleting is not possible...

What I do, for this is to replace/overwrite the file

FWSM# copy tftp://ipaddress/asdm_file disk:/asdm

and for image

FWSM# copy tftp://ipaddress/image_file disk:/image

Greetings!

tomyjoseph17 · ‎10-09-2011

Any idea why deleting is not possible ? Ideally we should be able to delete any files from flash right ?

Regards,

Tomy

Kureli Sankar · ‎10-09-2011

You can only delete files and filder from the disk. starup, asdm and image are the three in flash when you do a "dir flash". What is taking up space? May be you need to clean out disk:

FWSM(config)# delete ?

exec mode commands/options:

/noconfirm Do not prompt for confirmation

/recursive Recursive delete

disk: File to be deleted

FWSM(config)# dir flash:

Directory of flash:/

2 -rw- 12747700 asdm

1 -rw- 6095360 image

3 -rw- 438 startup-config

-Kureli

tomyjoseph17 · ‎10-10-2011

Hi Kureli ,

Many thanks for your reply . My flash is almost full. Startup config is nearly 1.7 MB + 12 MB asdm + 6 MB image. Current running-config is 3+ MB. If I copy the running-config to text file, its size is 3+ mb. Have nearly 37000 ACEs. Firewall is in single mode with active/standby failover.

Current issue is that I am not able to save the configuration , error says insufficient space for the request. I have this problem in both primary and secondary. My vendor says flash is corrupted and needs format. But I am not convinced as flash in both primary and secondary cannot get corupted togethor. Even if I do a format I can't accomodate the 3 + Mb running configuration to flash as asdm and image itself would take 18 MB. So I checked with vendor if I can delete the asdm image , but he says we can't and its a limitation with fwsm that it cannot be deleted once loaded.

I am running fwsm v 4.1(2) with 20 MB flash. Error logs are given below. Kindly have a look at the logs and suggest.

fwsm-01# wr mem

Building configuration...

Cryptochecksum: 73002724 97e13483 025dd67e ad7fb8c8

Buffering file....Insufficient flash space available for this request:

Size info: request:3036649 current:1737411 delta:1299238 free:275456

Could not open file to write

3036649 bytes copied in 1.800 secs (3036649 bytes/sec)

[OK]

fwsm-01# dir flash:

Directory of flash:/

2 -rw- 12645692 asdm

1 -rw- 6423040 image

3 -rw- 1737411 startup-config

No space information available

-01# dir flash:

Directory of flash:/

2 -rw- 12645692 asdm

1 -rw- 6423040 image

3 -rw- 1737411 startup-config

No space information available

-01#sh flashfs

flash file system: version:3 magic:0x12345679

file 0: origin: 0 length:6423040

file 1: origin: 6423040 length:12645692

file 2: origin:19068928 length:3397

file 3: origin:19072512 length:1737411

file 4: origin:21085696 length:280 sh flashfs
flash file system: version:3 magic:0x12345679
file 0: origin: 0 length:6423040
file 1: origin: 6423040 length:12645692
file 2: origin:19068928 length:3397
file 3: origin:19072512 length:1737411
file 4: origin:21085696 length:280

Kureli Sankar · ‎10-10-2011

Your vendor is correct. Unfortunately there is no way to delete the asdm image from flash. Best option now would be to copy a small size asdm image.

Find one from here.

-Kureli

tomyjoseph17 · ‎10-10-2011

Is it a hardware/software limitation with FWSM or a bug ?

Do you think that my problem would be due to corrupted flash by any chance ? Vendor is asking me to format the flash and its quite difficult for me to get a downtime for a reload after format and image upload..

Regards

Tomy

Kureli Sankar · ‎10-10-2011

Tomy,

Is this the exact message that you are seeing?

Insufficient flash space available for this request:

The flash: and the disk: are still both physically part of the same 
flash on the FWSM. The flash memory is actually partitioned into several 
different partitions and the only way to actually format it is rom the 
Maintenance Partition(MP). When you load a new image to one of the 
partitions from the MP, it will completely format and re-write that 
partition of the flash.

You can follow the instructions for "Installing Application Software 
from the Maintenance Partition". This is the only way format the 
application partition.

http://www.cisco.com/en/US/docs/security/fwsm/fwsm32/configuration/guide/swcnfg_f.html#wp1048848

Since this is a failover pair you can easily make the other unit active and do the 
procedure on this unit.

-Kureli

tomyjoseph17 · ‎10-11-2011

Yes , this is the ecact message..I have pasted below for ref.

fwsm-01# wr mem
Building configuration...
Cryptochecksum: 051f3c8e 90092c99 e1b76866 0b27998e

Buffering file....Insufficient flash space available for this request:
Size info: request:3036765 current:1737411 delta:1299354 free:275456

Could not open file to write
3036765 bytes copied in 1.840 secs (3036765 bytes/sec)
[OK]

Can I replace the current asdm image with version 5 series asdm ? Current one is version 6 series.

Kureli Sankar · ‎10-11-2011

Yes you can use asdm 5 if you choose to. I am assuming you do not use asdm and are only finding a way to free up a few MB of space.

-Kureli

tomyjoseph17 · ‎10-11-2011

You are right, my requirement is to free up the space only , I have to avoid a format of flash and reload at any cost.

We are not using object-groups for any rules, will the use of object-group help to reduce the running-config size considerably ?

Regards

Tommy

m-ko · ‎10-19-2011

Is this possible to the following to fix Tomy's problem?

1.) copy all files from flash:/ to disk:/

2.) format flash:/

3.) copy all files back to flash: except asdm.bin

4.) while asdm.bin file is in disk, I think we can put the command asdm image image disk:/asdm.bin

Kureli Sankar · ‎10-19-2011

FWSM#

FWSM# format ?

disk: Filesystem to be formatted

The only way to actually format the application partition is from the 
Maintenance Partition(MP).

-Kureli