This is a quick article on managing Voting Disk, the voting disk internals are explained in Voting Disk Internals post.

From 11g release 2, voting disks can be stored on either on ASM diskgroups or on cluster file systems, following are the steps to add/delete/move a voting disk:-

How to add a Voting Disk

• When voting disk is placed on Cluster file system.

crsctl add css votedisk </PATH/NAME/CFS>

• When voting disk is on an ASM diskgroup.

alter diskgroup <DISKGROUP NAME> add disk '</PATH/NAME>' force;

How to delete a Voting Disk

• When voting disk is placed on Cluster file system.

crsctl delete css votedisk </PATH/NAME/CFS>

How to Replace a Voting Disk

To replace a voting disk first add a new Voting Disk and then Delete the one you wanted to replace, using the command explained above.

How to move a Voting Disk between diskgroup & CFS

First check the status of voting disk, with following command.

crsctl query css votedisk

This would display the current status of voting disk, then follow the below command to move it to ASM diskgroup from Cluster file system or vice versa:-

crsctl replace votedisk <DISK GROUP NAME | /PATH/NAME/CFS>

And then to verify the changes, issue :-

crsctl query css votedisk

How to Backup Voting Disk

Since 11gr2, the voting disk are backed up automatically in the OCR (OCR Internals) as part of any configuration change and is restored automatically to any added disk.