I think I answered the question myself. The data is streaming in from other replicas even though the node's data dir was emptied out (system dir was left alone).
I'm not sure if this is the "kosher" way to rebuild the sstable data, but it seemed to work. /var/lib/cassandra/data # /opt/cassandra/bin/nodetool -h $HOSTNAME -p 35014 netstats Mode: Normal Not sending any streams. Streaming from: /10.46.108.100 DFS: /var/lib/cassandra/data/DFS/main-f-85-Data.db/(101772144,192460041),(192460041,267088244) progress=0/165316100 - 0% DFS: /var/lib/cassandra/data/DFS/main-f-86-Data.db/(118410757,194489915),(194489915,247653739) progress=0/129242982 - 0% DFS: /var/lib/cassandra/data/DFS/main-f-40-Data.db/(4823893695,4850323665),(4850323665,7818579650) progress=0/2994685955 - 0% DFS: /var/lib/cassandra/data/DFS/main-f-89-Data.db/(0,707948),(707948,2011040) progress=0/2011040 - 0% DFS: /var/lib/cassandra/data/DFS/main-f-70-Data.db/(778069440,1015544852),(1015544852,1200443249) progress=0/422373809 - 0% DFS: /var/lib/cassandra/data/DFS/main-f-71-Data.db/(119366025,132069485),(132069485,156787816) progress=0/37421791 - 0% Streaming from: /10.47.108.100 DFS: /var/lib/cassandra/data/DFS/main-f-365-Data.db/(0,24748050),(126473995,170409694) progress=0/68683749 - 0% DFS: /var/lib/cassandra/data/DFS/main-f-367-Data.db/(0,935041),(935041,2238133) progress=0/2238133 - 0% DFS: /var/lib/cassandra/data/DFS/main-f-366-Data.db/(0,4608808),(37713613,46884920) progress=0/13780115 - 0% DFS: /var/lib/cassandra/data/DFS/main-f-242-Data.db/(0,1057203157),(3307900143,4339490352) progress=0/2088793366 - 0% DFS: /var/lib/cassandra/data/DFS/main-f-352-Data.db/(0,19422069),(81246761,122537002) progress=0/60712310 - 0% DFS: /var/lib/cassandra/data/DFS/main-f-225-Data.db/(0,1580865981),(4540941750,6024843721) progress=0/3064767952 - 0% DFS: /var/lib/cassandra/data/DFS/main-f-349-Data.db/(0,21720053),(54115405,71716716) progress=0/39321364 - 0% DFS: /var/lib/cassandra/data/DFS/main-f-364-Data.db/(0,72606213),(175419693,238159626) progress=0/135346146 - 0% DFS: /var/lib/cassandra/data/DFS/main-f-363-Data.db/(0,1184983783),(3458591846,4556646617) progress=0/2283038554 - 0% DFS: /var/lib/cassandra/data/DFS/main-f-368-Data.db/(0,756228),(756228,1626647) progress=0/1626647 - 0% DFS: /var/lib/cassandra/data/DFS/main-f-361-Data.db/(48074007,78009236) progress=0/29935229 - 0% DFS: /var/lib/cassandra/data/DFS/main-f-226-Data.db/(0,3111952321),(8592898278,11484622800) progress=0/6003676843 - 0% Pool Name Active Pending Completed Commands n/a 0 5765 Responses n/a 0 9811 On Apr 12, 2011, at 4:59 PM, Jonathan Colby wrote: > does a repair just compare the existing data from sstables on the node being > repaired, or will it "figure out" which data this node should have and copy > it in? > > I'm trying to refresh all the data for a given node (without reassigning the > token) starting with an emptied out data directory. > > I tried nodetool move, but if I give the same token it previously was > assigned it doesn't seem to trigger a decommission/bootstrap. > > Thanks.