Testing was designed to demonstrate how EMC ProSphere intuitively provides end-to-end resource management for storage environments. Also of interest were ease of use and implementation as well as agent-less host, SAN, and array data collection.

Please click here to read the full report.

Background

Organizations need to be able to respond to rapidly changing market dynamics, customer requirements, and competitive threats. Many are building out private cloud infrastructures in order to achieve the requisite level of agility. One of the foundational technologies of a private cloud is server virtualization, so it shouldn’t be a surprise to learn that increasing the use of server virtualization technology has been the top IT priority for the last two years in a row according to ESG research.[1] This, in turn, is driving increased growth in networked storage environments, which are critical to enabling virtualized deployments to be highly mobile and available. In fact, ESG research indicates that the increased use of SANs was the number one impact server virtualization has on storage environments.

This rapid growth in server virtualization and SAN deployment is affecting the management of these increasingly complex and abstracted environments. In most cases, organizations end up changing management tools and processes. And this goes beyond just the server environment to include storage and network environments (see Figure 1).[2]

As organizations continue to evolve their environments and deploy highly virtualized cloud infrastructures in production, easy to deploy, simple to use management tools that provide end-to-end configuration and performance visibility will become increasingly critical.

EMC ProSphere

EMC ProSphere is an end-to-end storage resource management application designed for quick, easy, and cost-effective deployment to enable a rapid return on investment. With ProSphere, storage professionals can create a detailed view of their storage infrastructure from the host, through the SAN, to the backend storage environment.

ProSphere is designed to be deployed in a VMware environment as a virtual appliance or vApp. For ease of deployment, it’s packaged as an OVF template the can be downloaded from the EMC support website. To further simplify and reduce the management burden, it leverages an agent-less discovery and data ingest paradigm.  ProSphere gets its performance data, alerts, and end-to-end visibility using standard protocols like SNMP and SMI- S for switches and arrays and WMI, SSH, or vCenter for physical and virtual hosts.

• ProSphere is designed to be easily deployed as a virtual appliance in a VMware environment.
• The discovery and data ingest processes are agent-less, leveraging SMI-S, SNMP and manufacturer APIs.
• ProSphere can be integrated with Microsoft AD and the LDAP protocol.
• Customers with active EMC ControlCenter support contracts can use ProSphere at no cost.
• EMC ControlCenter performance data can be imported into ProSphere.
• Administrators can manage multiple ProSphere instances without logging into each site separately.

ESG Lab Validation

ESG Lab performed hands-on evaluation and testing of ProSphere at an EMC facility in Hopkinton, MA. Testing was designed to demonstrate how EMC ProSphere intuitively provides end-to-end resource management for storage environments. Also of interest were ease of use and implementation as well as agent-less host, SAN, and array data collection.

The configuration used for ESG Lab testing is shown in Figure 3. On the left side of the figure are the three VMware virtual machines that made up the EMC ProSphere operating environment. These VMs consist of the Historical Database, Discovery Appliance, and the Storage Resource Manager. On the right side of the figure are the test bed objects that were discovered and monitored during the ESG Lab testing. EMC VMAX and CLARiiON arrays were discovered, as were Cisco and Brocade SAN switches. The host environment consisted of physical and virtual Windows servers as well as Solaris 9 and Solaris 10 servers. A LAN with multiple VLANs provided connectivity between the ProSphere environment and the objects being monitored.

Getting Started

Getting started with EMC ProSphere begins with obtaining and installing the OVF template packaged code to bring the environment to the initial login screen. This was accomplished by downloading the ProSphere application software from the EMC web support portal[3] and installing the application into an existing VMware environment.

ESG Lab Testing

ESG Lab began testing ProSphere by copying the downloaded OVF formatted application code to the test VMware vSphere environment. ESG Lab used the “Deploy OVF Template” option to select and install the ProSphere application. Figure 4 shows the summary of entries including hostnames, networks, and other common system configuration settings that were selected as part of the template-driven install process. The settings were confirmed and the “Finish Install” tab was selected. The ProSphere installation process completed in approximately 30 minutes and resulted in the creation of a virtual application with three virtual machines.

ESG Lab used the vSphere client to verify the creation of the application. Figure 5 shows the ProSphere application (ESG-ProSphere) and the three associated virtual machines (Discovery Appliance, Historical Database, and Storage Resource Manager). “Power on” was selected at the virtual application level to start the three virtual machines in the correct order.

Next, ESG Lab performed an upgrade of the ProSphere application using VMware Studio as shown in Figure 6.

In preparation for the ProSphere vApp upgrade, ESG Lab configured a CD/DVD drive to the VMs. This enabled access to the ISO formatted upgrade image. VMware Studio was then launched from a browser for each VM to conduct the upgrade.

Finally, ESG Lab connected to the ProSphere vApp using the browser-based GUI to validate login access and confirm proper operation. Figure 7 shows the Administration view from the ProSphere user interface. From this view, user account and security certificates can be added and managed. The Administration view also enables integration configuration for LDAP and Microsoft Active Directory.

Configuration and Discovery

Configuration is the process of setting up ProSphere to ingest data for performance analysis and storage environment alerting. Discovery is the process of identifying and ingesting performance and operating metrics as well as configuration data for the storage environment components or objects including hosts, switches, and storage arrays. With ProSphere, this process does not require an agent on each discrete object. It enables the administrator to create custom end-to-end views of the storage environment.

ESG Lab Testing

ESG Lab launched the ProSphere user interface and selected the Discovery icon to start the discovery configuration process. The first step in setting up each discovery job was defining its access credentials. Access credentials are a set of properties that define how ProSphere will connect to an object on the network.  These property sets contain permission settings for security and define the connection type used for data discovery.  Any access credential can be designated as global. Standard global access credentials can be defined and used for similar object types to streamline the discovery process by allowing a discovery job to automatically find and pick an appropriate, previously defined global credential.  This process separates the creation and management of access credentials from that of discovery jobs.  Server administrators can manage their credentials within the ProSphere environment while storage teams can then use those credentials to manage discovery jobs and meet security requirements for access management.

As shown in Figure 8, the Access Credentials tab was selected from within the discovery view. ESG Lab leveraged this configuration tab to set up discovery permission for a number of objects in the environment. Discovery access was defined for EMC storage arrays; Brocade and Cisco SAN switches; and Windows, UNIX, and VMware hosts.

Next, ESG Lab configured a number of different discovery jobs. As shown in Figure 9, ESG Lab configured a job to discover an EMC storage array. First, the scope of the job was set by selecting the object type and where on the network to look. In this case, the hostname of the server running the EMC Array SMI-S was selected, along with the object type of array.  Then the previously-defined access credentials were selected for the new discovery job. The last step was defining the discovery schedule.

It should be noted that a range of IP addresses can also be used for discovery to help simplify the process in large dynamic infrastructures such as rapidly growing virtual environments. This option also allows for excludes to be set for objects that a user does not want to include in discovery.

Figure 10 shows the results of a successful discovery job for host type objects. Here, ESG Lab selected the “Discovered Host” tab from the objects list view. Also available are switches, arrays, and fabric level object views.

Finally, ESG Lab configured groups of objects. As shown on the left of Figure 11, ESG Lab configured three groups (ESG Lab Windows Servers, ESG Lab ESX, and ESG Lab Physical Hosts). The groups were used to create more manageable views. Large environments could have hundreds or thousands of servers, making the objects list view difficult to use when searching for a specific object of interest. Groups can also be used to view objects with inter-dependencies such as a group of servers or the server, switch, and storage that support a specific application.

Three group classifications are available in ProSphere. The three groups are defined as system groups, simple groups, and smart groups. System groups are automatically created by the application to group objects by type. Simple groups can be created and used for a collection of objects that rarely change.  Objects must be manually added to simple groups.  Smart groups can be used to dynamically scan and group objects based on user-defined parameters. With smart groups, objects can be properly grouped for analysis based on business requirements such as mission-critical application or utilization for bill back purposes.

Monitoring, Alerting, Troubleshooting, and Analysis

Performance monitoring is the ability to select, view, and analyze detailed information for objects in the storage infrastructure. ProSphere can create end-to-end topology views and detailed performance charts. Alerting is the ability to monitor SAN and storage objects in the infrastructure by setting thresholds and notification. Combined, performance monitoring and alerting help accelerate the identification and remediation of performance bottlenecks and component failures.

ESG Lab Testing

ESG Lab explored the performance capabilities of ProSphere by selecting a virtual machine in the storage environment and analyzing the supporting components from the host through the storage. Figure 12 shows a topology view from the virtual machine on the left side of the figure all the way through the SAN in the middle to the storage hosting the VM datastore on the far right. The high level overview was created by selecting specific objects of interest from the host object list. ESG Lab used a drill-down process from this view to analyze detailed information of each component. Hosts, switches, and arrays in the topology view can be expanded into a detailed view by clicking on the desired icon.

In addition to simply selecting items from the object lists, ProSphere has sophisticated search capabilities. ESG Lab used the intelligent filtering feature of the search functionality to quickly and easily set views into different objects without having to scroll through the entire list to find a specific object.

Intelligent search functionality becomes more important as the environment grows organically or through the federation of multiple ProSphere sites. Geographically separated ProSphere implementations can be federated through synchronization, a process that creates a synchronized data set between sites. The search feature can retrieve data in a federated environment eliminating the need to log in to each site and enabling users in different locations to perform analysis and troubleshooting of remote environments.

Next, ESG Lab reviewed the performance metrics of the VM selected in the topology view. As shown in Figure 13, ESG was able to analyze and review resource utilization, response times, and performance characteristics for the virtual machine. Similar views are provided for physical hosts as well.

As shown in Figure 14, ESG Lab also monitored performance data on the EMC array containing the datastore for the selected VM. ESG Lab noted a number of storage performance metrics (e.g., response time, IO, and throughput) that can be used to quickly analyze the health of the supporting array.

Lastly, ESG Lab used the alerts tab to configure thresholds and then monitor storage and switch metrics in the test environment. As shown in Figure 15, utilization levels were set to flag warnings and critical conditions when a defined percent was exceeded. Alert levels can be set for the following metrics:

• Switch port link utilization
• Symmetrix port utilization
• Symmetrix host director utilization
• CLARiiON SP utilization
• CLARiiON SP % dirty pages

Setting up and monitoring thresholds allows for easy, at-a-glance identification of performance issues in the storage environment. A quick review of the alerts page will show if a switch or array component in the environments has exceeded defined parameters. ProShpere can then be used to view storage component mapping and identify and analyze physical hosts or virtual machines that might be impacted by changes in SAN performance.

ESG Lab Validation Highlights

• The installation process for ProSphere was quick, easy, and intuitive. ESG Lab downloaded the application images from EMC’s website, moved them to the VMware environment, and easily navigated through the OVF template install process, which took about 30 minutes.
• ESG Lab validated the efficiency of the agent-less discovery process driven by ProSphere. Without installing a single agent, ESG Lab was able to easily set up and discover over 100 physical and virtual hosts, four storage area networks, and six storage arrays. This was accomplished by leveraging SMI-S and SNMP for storage and switch objects and WMI, SSH, and vCenter connectivity for physical and virtual hosts.
• With ProSphere, ESG Lab confirmed that EMC can offer a comprehensive topology view from the host to the LUN on the supporting array, enabling end-to-end visibility of resources for the storage or system administrator.
• ESG Lab confirmed the ability to set up alerting for switch and storage components in the monitored environment. Thresholds can be set that notify the administrator when critical or warning conditions occur in the environment, allowing corrective action to be quickly taken to remediate the condition.

Issues to Consider

• It should be noted that currently, the historical database cannot be pruned. Best practice should dictate monitoring disk capacity for this application component. Also, to avoid corruption, the historical database requires an orderly shutdown. EMC recommends that ProSphere be started and stopped from the vApp level to maintain database consistency.
• Special attention should be paid to best practice recommendations when using VMware snapshots in federated ProSphere environments. If one site in a synchronized environment is rolled back to a snapshot, an error will be returned when users try to access discovered object detail. To avoid this, each site must be rolled back to a corresponding snapshot.
• Since EMC ProSphere was in its first GA release at the time of the validation, ESG expects the application to gain new features over time and hopes to see mixed object group views at the dashboard level.

The Bigger Truth

In an effort to respond more quickly to changing business needs, IT is transitioning to highly virtualized and cloud environments. To ensure a successful transition, storage administrators need to leverage management software that was specifically built for these new data center paradigms. This software should include comprehensive management of the networked storage environment and provide visibility into the virtual server environment, as these previously siloed technology domains are now more tightly integrated and interdependent.

ESG Lab validated that EMC ProSphere’s efficient architecture enables it to be deployed easily, accelerating the time to deliver value for organizations transitioning to cloud environments. It is able to provide end-to-end views and the performance information required to ensure applications will run in an optimized environment while meeting demanding SLAs.

ESG Lab believes EMC has made it easy for clients currently running ControlCenter to test and then migrate to ProSphere thanks to its ability to ingest ControlCenter performance data. EMC has also allowed ControlCenter clients with active maintenance contracts to deploy ProSphere at no cost.

As organizations evolve their highly virtualized infrastructures into scalable cloud solutions, they will need management solutions that can adapt to these dynamic and agile environments. By designing and architecting management software for the Cloud Computing Era, EMC enabled ProSphere to effectively manage and optimize cloud storage environments.

Appendix

[2] Source: ESG Research Report, The Evolution of Server Virtualization, November 2010.

[3] https://powerlink.emc.com

• “Single-click” end-to-end provisioning for the Vblock. EMC claims this is five times faster and 80% more efficient than other methods. Ideally, this provisioning capability will be integrated with a self-service provisioning portal and service catalog.
• An operations module that will provide rapid problem identification and resolution across the entire Vblock (compute, network, and storage). As organizations deploy mission critical applications on these converged infrastructures, it will be critical to have the ability to quickly find and isolate faults. The operations module will provide that capability.
• Expanded support for unified storage arrays. UIM 2.1 will support the Vblock Series 300. The ability to provide options of scale, performance, and automation will be important as organizations of all sizes look to deploy solutions on the Vblock.

EMC Ionix UIM/Provisioning 2.1 is now generally available and UIM/Operations 2.1 is available as of May 13^th. Support for Vblock Series 300 will be available in June 2011.

UIM provides tremendous value in conjunction with Vblock for simplified management and provisioning of infrastructure services. But organizations also need to consider the implications of deploying converged infrastructure with unified management. Specifically organizations should also think about:

• The impact on people and process. With the UIM’s single-click provisioning, organizations will not require separate teams and processes for compute, network, and storage environments. At a high level, this should be viewed as a good thing. As these environments continue to grow at an astronomical pace, it will be difficult to scale teams; while technology specialists will still be required for some time to come, IT generalists who understand the business and all aspects of the environment will become more prevalent. Organizations should consider cross-training its IT staff for maximum efficiency.
• Cost vs. business process improvement and agility. Although IT is under constant pressure to reduce costs, there may come a time when improving business processes and delivering more responsive and flexible services will trump financial concerns. ESG research has shown that over the last three years, reducing operational expenses is still the number one justification for IT investments; however, the gap between it and the number two justification, business process improvement, is closing. In fact, we could see business process improvement claiming the top spot next year.

For more on ESG’s analysis of UIM 2.1, check out the full ESG Brief on this topic.

You can read Bob’s other blog entries at Data Center Continuum.

So the acquisition helps to fill some of the gaps they had in the portfolio regarding performance and provides them with a solid solution to help organizations mature their virtualized environments. Combined with SANscreen, this will deliver the information required to drive up VM consolidation ratios. The ESG report indicates that today the majority of organizations have a consolidation ratio of 10:1 or less, but over the next two years the majority will shift to more than 11:1 with 31% stating that they will have consolidation ratios of 25:1 VMs per physical machine. In order to maintain performance and ensure that mission critical production apps that are moving to virtualized environments maintain acceptable levels of performance, they will require solid end-to-end visibility and performance management, something that NetApp will now be able to deliver with its SANscreen and BalancePoint products.

You can read Bob’s other blog entries at Data Center Continuum.

We looked across Servers, Storage, Networking, Security, and the Application organizations within IT.  Guess what? The answers differ based on who you talk to! (Surprise surprise!)

We segmented the market into (3) categories, based on (4) primary metrics:

1. Scope of Deployment – the % of servers that have been virtualized.
2. Virtual Production Ration – % of VMs in production.
3. Efficiency – consolidation ration of VMs per physical machine.
4. Workload Penetration – deployments across multiple workloads (by types).

I could go on all day about the results, but since I titled this blog in the “management” area, I’ll make a few summary points and then (hopefully) give you management food for thought.

Takeaways:

• Server virtualization is becoming ubiquitous.  Duh.  BUT, and this is a big but….58% of organization have virtualized less than 1/3 of their servers.
• Thus far IT owned applications dominate what’s being virtualized.  File/Print, etc.  59% haven’t virtualized ANY “mission-critical” applications.
• Those who do virtualize are able to document increased return on investment as they become more advanced.
• “Dynamic IT” is still an illusion.  Very few are truly engaged in utilizing the advanced capabilities of virtualization yet.
• There will be an avalanche of growth over the next 24 months–but it IS NOT going to come from the “leaders” (so stop marketing to them, you silly people.)

I can’t tell you what all this means for your business–but an ESG analyst can.  (Bug them, not me!  If you don’t, you are a dope.  You will learn things.)

Anyhow, as I promised long ago in the title, there is an interesting parallel to all of this when it comes to “Managing” stuff–or management products/technologies.

When speaking with ESG’s management guru, Bob Laliberte, it became clear to me.  Bob called it perfectly, he said:

“A laggard IT operation ‘monitors.’  A follower ‘manages.’  A leader ‘automates.’”

Brilliant in its simplicity, it is completely accurate.  Whether we’re talking about managing a virtual environment or a backup process, it’s all true.  For an advanced society, we sure do spend a ton of time “monitoring,” don’t we?  How do you monitor something that isn’t real?  And why bother?

If our management techniques are stuck in medieval times, how do we expect to ever truly reap the rewards of “dynamic IT?”  It’s bullshit.  We never will.  We can put all the VMware in the world all over our environment and without the ability to AUTONOMOUSLY manage it, it will always suck.  Why? Because it will always come down to the lowest common denominator–the ultimate point of failure–a person’s ability to make the right decision at the exact right time and execute it perfectly.  It’s unreasonable.

This IT stuff was brutally hard to manage when it was one stovepipe with one app running to one department.  It’s simply not possible to manage any longer if “monitoring” is even in the conversation.  I contend that you are a liar (mostly to yourself) if you think you are actually “managing” anything.

If you want to really manage–constantly optimize your environment in a never-ending sea of changing requirements and workloads–then your job is to set policy and best practice and let some tool way smarter than you or I can ever be automate it.

Management is NOT knob turning anymore.  Knob turning is how you marginalize yourself out of a job.  Remember those assembly line workers who built cars?  They turned knobs.  Robots do that now.  Robots that are smarter, cheaper, and better at turning those knobs.  Know where the strategic “management” is now? It’s in designing what you want to have happen, and programming the robots to execute on it.

This holds true wherever a knob is twisted.  Storage has TONS of knob turners.  Networking still has knob turners. Servers and Apps and Databases all have lots and lots of knobs–but guess what? The knobs are becoming virtual. Currently, the server virtualization layer is consuming more and more of those infrastructure functions into itself.  I’m not saying it’s right, but it IS happening.  Your knob expertise will be consumed or at least controlled at a different layer–above the device.  You need to become the architect of the OUTCOME, not the guy who fixes the leak.

You architect.  Tools monitor.  Tools manage.  Tools automate your plan.

Then you are truly valuable.

You can read Steve’s other blog entries at The Bigger Truth.

This move is the latest in a long series of acquisitions of SRM and other infrastructure management companies over the last couple of years (Quest acq. Monosphere, NetApp acq. Onaro,  EMC acq. nlayers, configuresoft etc., IBM acq. Novus, HP acq. Opsware, AppIQ,  etc.) to enable companies to deliver end-to-end management solutions.

Tek-Tools has a solid product and a loyal customer base, so this acquisition will also provide a receptive install base to up sell SolarWinds products. Ultimately though, the degree of success (or failure) of this acquisition will be judged by SolarWinds’ ability to tightly integrate the two companies’ offerings together to deliver a single pane of glass to monitor an end-to-end application to storage environment.

Read Bob’s other blog entries at Data Center Continuum.

via Veritas Storage Foundation upgraded for better solid-state drive management — SearchStorage.com.au.

Overview

As more organizations embark on the journey to create a more dynamic and efficient data center, management solutions that ensure optimization and availability will be critical. In the storage domain, Symantec has been working diligently to deliver improvements to its Veritas Storage Foundation Family and Veritas Cluster File System products. The enhancements include:

• The addition of SSD visibility to Storage Foundation HA 5.1 Dynamic Storage Tiering (DST). Leveraging a policy-based engine that will place files based on by type, size, and owner, DST will also automatically redistribute files to a more appropriate storage tier based on averages of IOs, access characteristics, and even changes over time. This is accomplished using single or multiple heterogeneous storage arrays and can be combined with SSDs located in the host, JBOD, or in any of the arrays. Symantec’s Storage Foundation automatically discovers SSDs and presents them to storage administrators for rapid identification of existing assets. DST can be configured to scan the file system as often or as little as the user would like—ranging from hourly to daily, weekly, or longer—and will automatically and non-disruptively redistribute files.
  • Symantec also has a DST analyzer. This utility allows users to conduct “what if” analyses for future planning or even varying write and read frequencies. This utility will work with Symantec and other file systems.
• Greater thin provisioning awareness and adoption, specifically with SmartMove and the Veritas Thin Reclamation API.
  • Symantec’s SmartMove, a feature of Storage Foundation, enables organizations to migrate data from thick storage environments to thin or even thick to thick, but only copies the blocks that need to be moved—not all of them. SmartMove now migrates data non-disruptively between multiple arrays either locally or across a campus environment with Veritas Volume Replicator.
  • The Thin Reclamation API is gaining traction, with IBM’s XIV and 3PAR arrays now supporting Symantec’s API. The Thin Reclamation API enables storage administrators to automatically and non-disruptively reclaim storage in a thinly provisioned environment. By enabling this API in the storage array, storage administrators will have greater visibility into an environment and can even distinguish between thick and thin as well as which thin pools can be reclaimed and which ones can’t. ESG expects EMC, HDS, NetApp, and Fujitsu to follow suit shortly with full support of the Thin Reclamation API. The Symantec Thin Reclamation API is currently being approved by the T-10 committee to become an ANSI standard.
• Higher levels of availability leveraging Veritas Cluster File System. Symantec claims that it can dramatically accelerate the time required to fail over a mission critical application or database by taking advantage of its clustered file system to mount the storage more rapidly and achieve sub-minute failover times. It will work with a variety of software solutions including SAP, DB2, and Oracle (does not require RAC, only a single instance). With the Cluster File System, all nodes in the cluster have read/write access to the storage, so the application simply needs to be restarted on the alternate node—dramatically reducing application failover times.

The capabilities listed above are all part of SFHA 5.1. Dynamic Storage Tiering is available for Linux and Unix environments. SmartMove and Thin Reclamation are available for Linux, Unix, and Windows environments. Thin Reclamation is generally available for IBM XIV and 3PAR arrays. Veritas Cluster File System 5.1 is also generally available through Symantec distribution channels.

Analysis

Symantec’s announcements are well timed with developments in the data center market. 2009 has been a very difficult year for IT, with many organizations being forced to reduce or keep their budgets flat, so any opportunity to drive greater efficiency and reduce costs by extracting greater value out of existing solutions will be well received. These new enhancements should help Symantec end the year strong and be well positioned for 2010 because:

• In order to justify IT purchases, ESG determined that users need to be able to demonstrate reduced operational expenses, reduced capital expenses, and improved business processes (see Figure 1). [1] The new enhancements to Symantec’s SFHA 5.1 and Clustered File System will meet those requirements.

For example, by using the Clustered File System and a single instance of Oracle instead of RAC, Symantec claims users can save as much as 50-70% of the cost and still ensure sub-minute failover times. Thin Reclamation enables storage administrators to optimize existing storage and reduce the capital budget for additional storage. Dynamic Storage Tiering will ensure that SSD investments are being leveraged correctly and that mission critical applications are guaranteed the performance required. Because it can be used across heterogeneous arrays, organizations are not locked in with a single vendor and competitive bids will drive prices down.

• Organizations realize the value SSDs could provide across a wide range of applications. In fact, ESG asked which business applications would require the improved performance of SSDs. [2] The results, shown in Figure 2,highlight the need for SSD in more than just high performance computing (HPC) environments, including database, e-mail, and business intelligence applications.

To ensure that the SSDs are being leveraged effectively, storage administrators need visibility into the environment and they need to know which volumes are SSD and which are FC or SATA disk. Even more importantly, not all data needs to reside on SSDs; typically 60 to 90 days after data is created, it will become relatively stagnant and will not need to reside on expensive Flash drives. It may not even need FC drives; SATA drives would be the best choice and they could reside on an entirely different array. By utilizing Symantec’s Dynamic Storage Tiering, organizations can enable a wide variety of applications to take advantage of SSDs and other tiers of storage at a file level without disruption, change to the end-user experience, or a modification to existing data protection solutions.

• Organizations are actively transforming data centers to be more dynamic and efficient. A big part of this transformation is the ability to migrate data in a timely and non-disruptive manner. In many instances, data migration causes time and budget overruns. In addition, as organizations look to optimize the new environment and, in particular, the storage environment, technologies like thin provisioning are added. The problem is that most data movement solutions don’t allow for thick to thin data migrations and copy data over exactly as it is in the old array—which is very inefficient. Symantec’s SmartMove technology enables thick to thin migrations and only copies the blocks that are used, enabling maximum utilization in the new system. Additionally, deploying arrays with support for the Thin Reclamation API will enable organizations to guarantee an optimized environment not only on day one, but also on day 10, day 100, day 1000, and so on. Symantec’s reclamation technologies represent a significant improvement over other existing techniques, like zero page reclaim, as they do not require additional IOs to write zeros across the space being reclaimed. As a result, Symantec thin reclamation can reclaim unused space inband, making storage reclamation fully automated and fully transparent to the host configuration and the applications.

What Else Needs to be Done

Symantec understands storage management and these enhancements will certainly help organizations along the data center transformation process by enabling them to better automate and optimize the storage environment. In order to accelerate adoption, Symantec needs to:

• Continue to increase awareness and its list of supported vendors for the Thin Reclamation API. Symantec is off to a good start with IBM and 3PAR, but it needs to expand support. Equally critical will be its ability to educate the market about its benefits, specifically the speed with which it can reclaim data and restore it to the pool.
• Better educate its channel partners and customers on its Dynamic Storage Tiering capabilities and how it will enable organizations to take better advantage of SSDs. With the ability to tier an application’s data across multiple storage media efficiently, organizations should begin to adopt SSDs in greater volume. Symantec needs to emphasis the fact that it doesn’t matter where you place the drive; be it host or array, DST can recognize and take advantage of it to enhance performance.
• Continue to build out utilities, like the Dynamic Storage Tiering Analyzer, that will work without other Symantec products installed. One that would assess a Thin Provisioned environment or demonstrate the savings associated with performing a thick to thin migration would also be very useful to an organization trying to transform its data center. Distributing these tools to channel partners, systems integrators, and professional services organizations would expose Symantec products to a wider range of organizations.

The Bigger Truth

As organizations continue to transform their data centers into more dynamic infrastructures to better support the business, they are going to need new management solutions that can deliver higher levels of efficiency and availability. The enhancements offered by Symantec will enable organizations to not only accelerate the adoption of new technology, but also ensure that it will remain optimized and available in the future. If your organization already has Storage Foundation High Availability deployed, it should be very easy to decide to start taking advantage of these additional capabilities. If your organization doesn’t currently use Veritas Storage Foundation, Veritas Cluster Server, or Veritas Cluster File System, these announcements should make a strong argument for evaluating them.

[2] Source: ESG Research Report, 2008 Enterprise Storage System Survey, November 2008.