NetApp - The Virtual Storage Guy

Configuring Role Based Access with the Virtual Storage Console vCenter Plug-in

We have recently published how to enable role based access (RBAC) with the VSC for customers who want to use accounts other than root as the VSC’s ‘service account’. This is the account used to communicate with the Data ONTAP APIs.

I would suggest that RBAC be implemented in environments that have separate administration teams for storage and the Virtual Infrastructure.

In today’s post I’ll cover how to implement RBAC with the VSC. This content is also being added (along with a number of updates) to the next release of TR-3749: vSphere on NetApp storage best practices. The goal of version 1.1 is to be to reduce the size of the document from its current size of 94 to around 60. We believe the release of the VSC, RCU, and NSM demonstrates the simplicity of deploying VMware on any array powered by Data ONTAP with any storage protocol. Maybe page count is a poor metric; maybe I should list the reduction in word count (as I may replace a large amounts of text with images).

VCE-101 Thin Provisioning Part 2 – Going Beyond

This is the second installment of a two-part post focusing on the thin provisioning capabilities native to vSphere. If you haven’t read Part I - The Basics, I’d suggest you do so before proceeding. We've covered a lot of content which you really should have a solid grasp of before proceeding.

In part I, I covered the basics of thin provisioning and how it operates with any storage platform. In part II we are going to expand upon a number of the points introduced in part I with a focus on how the storage virtualization functionality in Data ONTAP enhances VMware's thin provisioning and the over arching goal to reduce both the CapEX and OpEx associated with storage in the virtualization space.

Anatomy of a Virtual Disk

Let’s begin where we started in part I, by reviewing different disk formats. This time let’s consider them with the virtual disks operating at 70% storage capacity.

- The Thick Virtual Disk

Again this is the traditional virtual disk format which we all know rather well. From this image you will notice do not receive any storage savings in the datastore, yet we do receive 30% savings on the storage array.

If you're asking, "how can a thick VMDK consume less storage on the array?"
You'll need to go back and read Part I

- The Thin Virtual Disk

In this image we have the thin provisioned virtual disk and as you can see we are receiving a 30% storage savings in both the datastore and on the array.

- The Eager Zeroed Thick Virtual Disk

In this last image we have an eager zeroed thick virtual disk which provides us no savings at either the datastore or on the array.

VCE-101 Thin Provisioning Part 1 – The Basics

This week’s VMware Communities Roundtable featured one of my favorite people at VMware, Paul Manning who spoke on thin provisioning. This topic is the inspiration for today’s VCE post. Reducing storage costs is top of mind and it's gonna take some time covering thin provisioning so let’s begin!

Virtualizing a Datacenter

I am not exaggerating when I share with you that every customer I meet with has elaborate plans to virtualize most, if not all, of the Intel based servers within their data center, yet deploying this new architecture is challenged to move from a portion to a majority of the footprint due to storage costs (both CapEx and OpEx). I'd like to summarize the message from these meetings for you, which goes something like this…

“We love server virtualization! With VMware we’ve reduced our server footprint and are targeting more systems to virtualize.”

“We love converged Ethernet! With Cisco we’ve reduced our port counts and are targeting to have a single platform for voice, data, and user access.”

“Storage costs are out of control, can you help? Prior to virtualization we roughly ran 20%-30% of our servers on shared storage arrays. Virtualization is forcing every VM onto shared storage. What do we do?”

Now Available: The Virtual Storage Console vSphere Plug-in

Since VMworld 2009 one of the recurring questions posted to me on Twitter has been. “When will NetApp release the VSC?” – Wait no longer, the VSC is available for download via NOW.

For those of you unfamiliar with the VSC, it is a vCenter 4.0 plug-in that simplifies the configuration and management of NetApp, IBM, and Virtualized 3rd party arrays. The VSC supports ESX/ESX 4.0 along with monitoring and reporting only capabilities with ESX/ESXi 3.5.

The Virtual Storage Console is the next generation of the NetApp ESX Host Utilities Kit. Gone are the days on installing the EHU into the service console of ESX or cursing NetApp for the lack of support with ESXi. The VSC adds a NetApp tab into vCenter that enables one to:

• Manage ESX/ESXi storage connectivity

• Report ESX/ESXi storage details

• Accelerate resolving storage connectivity related support cases

• Optimize VM storage options for performance and availability

My I introduce you to the Virtual Storage Console version 1.0…

VMware Communities Roundtable Presents a Multivendor iSCSI Podcast

I am very pleased to share with you that on September 30th, you can join Andy Banta (VMware), Adam Carter (HP/Lefthand Networks), Eric Schott (Dell/EqualLogic), Chad Sakac (EMC), yours truly on the VMware Communities Roundtable Episode number 66 where we will be discussing our recent joint iSCSI blog post.

John Troyer has dubbed this episode ‘iSCSI Super Friends with EMC, NetApp, Dell, HP, & VMware’

A “Multivendor Post” on using iSCSI with VMware vSphere

One of the most popular posts we’ve ever done was the original ‘Multivendor Post’ to help our mutual iSCSI customers using VMware that focused on the operation of the software iSCSI initiator in ESX 3.5 with several iSCSI targets from multiple vendors. There’s been a lot of demand for a follow-up, so without further ado, here’s a multivendor collaborative effort on an update, which leverages extensively content from VMworld 2009 sessions TA2467 and TA3264. The post was authored by the following vendors and people: VMware (Andy Banta), EMC (Chad Sakac), Dell/EqualLogic (Eric Schott), HP/Lefthand Networks (Adam Carter), and NetApp.

One important note – in this post (and going forward we’ll be trying to do this consistently) all commands, configurations and features noted apply to vSphere ESX and ESXi equally. Command line formats are those used in when using the VMware vMA, which can be used with both ESX and ESXi. Alternate command line variants are possible when using the remote CLI or service console, but we’re standardizing on the vMA.

This post covers a broad spectrum of topics surrounding the main point (changes in, and configuration of the iSCSI software initiator in vSphere ESX/ESXi 4) including:

• Multipathing using NMP and the Pluggable Storage Architecture

• vmknic/vSwitch setup

• Subnet configuration

• Jumbo Frames

• Delayed Ack

• Other configuration recommendations

If this sounds interesting – or you’re a customer using (or one considering using) iSCSI and vSphere 4 read on!

Coming soon: A New Multi-Vendor Blog Post from NetApp, EMC, HP, Dell, and VMware

I’m not giving away any secrets at this time, but let’s just say you may want to stay tuned. Have a good weekend everybody!

Just like Sam and Ralph - Competitors while on the clock, friends when off!

vSphere on NetApp Book Available at VMworld

This morning the VMworld bookstore opened and for the first time NetApp customers are able purchase a NetApp technical book! Early reports state that sales have been solid, so if you’re interested in a copy I’d suggest you grab one soon. Should you miss your opportunity to grab one the books will be available for sale in the next few weeks on Amazon.com.

Meet me and the co-authors Mike, Larry, & Peter at the NetApp booth. We are all on hand to answer your most technical questions.

How Heavy is your ESX Load?

I can’t tell you how often we are asked for tips around optimizing the performance of virtualized applications. Resolving performance related issues can require investigating a number of variables ranging from the virtualized application including the GOS settings and the data layout, and all the way down to the configuration of the ESX/ESXi server itself.

vSphere on NetApp Best Practices Released

I am please to share with you that this morning our new Technical Report, TR-3749: vSphere on NetApp Storage Best Practices, has been released. I’d like to thank Mike Slisinger, Larry Touchette, and Peter Learmonth for all of their assistance in the production of this TR.

I’d like to take a few moments to share some of the core enhancements covered in the report.

VMware Co-Brands TR-3428

There's an update to our VI3 storage best practices technical report. There's no technical content updates to be concerned with, instead I would like to share that TR-3428 version 4.5.2 has been officially co-branded by VMware.

This update is basically a quality assurance seal which states that the engineering teams at VMware and NetApp have reviewed and verified the contents of this technical report and the recommendations included within are truly best practices.

This wasn't always the case as some of the content in TR-3428 were truly ground breaking not too long ago. For example the dual VMkernel network designs had on occasion lead to additional discussions and configuration validations prior to implementation.

Kudos to all involved, now I think we've come to a time to let this document rest and focus on the vSphere TR.

What’s the right LUN size for a VMFS datastore?

I can’t tell you how often we are asked this question and the answer has many variables including the amount of aggregated I/O of the servers being virtualized onto the datastore, the storage protocol used in connecting to the datastore, etc.

I/O Efficiency and Alignment – the Cloud Demands Standards

I was surprised to read in the relatively recent EMC report: VMware ESX Server Optimization with EMC® Celerra® Performance Study that when it comes to aligning the partitions inside of virtual machines EMC has diametrically opposed recommendations based on the storage protocol and storage array which one deploys with VMware. I have to say that such recommendations raise a red flag that I believe needs some additional light shed on it.

VI3 on NetApp Best Practices Update

Today we've published a minor update to our VMware on NetApp: Storage Best Practices Technical Report TR-3428. After posting the blog announcing version 4.4 I received a number of comments and emails asking to share and comment as we publish future updates, so without further adieu here's the highlights of version 4.5.1...

A “Multivendor Post” to help our mutual NFS customers using VMware

We were quite a bit surprised to see how popular our “Multivendor iSCSI” post was. The feedback was overwhelming and very supportive of industry leaders partnering to ensure customer’s success with VMware. While writing that post, we (Vaughn Stewart from NetApp and Chad Sakac from EMC) discussed following up the iSCSI post with one focused on deploying VMware over NFS. The most difficult part around creating this post is that we couldn’t do it with our iSCSI-focused colleagues.

Since the original post, we’ve been busy assisting our customers and partners. We apologize for the delay, so without further ado we present to you the followup: a “Multivendor NFS” post for our joint customers. One of the goals of this post is to dispel the FUD customers often hear around NFS. Heck, if EMC and NetApp can agree – then you KNOW this post is FUD-Free!

Join Rick Scherer on today’s TechTalk: Virtualizing SQL

Today, May 28, 2009 at 11:00am Pacific Time you have an opportunity to join Rick Scherer of VMwaretips.com and a fellow vExpert for a discussion on how the San Diego Data Processing Corporation overcame server sprawl by successfully implementing SQL Server® on VMware®.

In addition to Rick, experts from NetApp and VMware will host an interactive discussion on best practices that will help you weigh your deployment options.

Topics for today’s call include:

* What You Should Know and How to Get Started
* Gain performance advantages when virtualizing SQL
* Optimize storage utilization without impacting performance
* Implement centralized and cost-effective backup and disaster recovery

You can register for the call here

Enjoy the TechTalk. Rick really knows his stuff and has an enormous amount of valuable information to share.

vSphere Introduces the Plug-n-Play SAN

With today’s release of vSphere, VMware has introduced numerous new features and technologies all designed to advance the virtual evolution of our data centers. With this release VMware and their storage alliance partners have delivered Plug-n-Play SAN storage connectivity. As you begin downloading the final bits, refreshing your labs and planning your upgrade path to vSphere I’d like to dig into the considerations of and how one can deploy a robust, reliable, and greatly simplified P-n-P SAN architecture with vSphere and NetApp.

A “Multivendor Post” to help our mutual iSCSI customers using VMware

Today’s post is one you don’t often find in the blogosphere, see today’s post is a collaborative effort initiated by Chad Sakac (EMC), which includes contributions from Andy Banta (VMware), Vaughn Stewart (NetApp), Eric Schott (Dell/EqualLogic), and Adam Carter (HP/Lefthand), David Black (EMC) and various other folks at each of the companies. Together, our companies make up the large majority of the iSCSI market, all make great iSCSI targets, and we (as individuals and companies) all want our customers to have iSCSI success.

VMware on NetApp Best Practices Update

As one might imagine

Several of us within NetApp receive a fair amount of feedback around the content in our VMware on NetApp Best Practices Technical Report, TR-3428.  A few of the areas where we receive a large amount of inquiry are related to the frequency of the updates to the document and requests for notification of when updates are posted. I’d like to use this post as my way of saying we hear you, to follow up on these questions and ask for some feedback as we move forward with the document and begin work on our ESX 4.0 on NetApp Best Practices document.

An update has been posted

Version 4.4 went live on November 24th around midnight EDT.  As this is update closely followed version 4.3, which posted in November, I’d like to share with you some of the key updates and additions to the content that have been introduced in the past 30 days.