Section 4 : Storage Security and

Management

Managing the Storage Infrastructure

Chapter 16
EMC Proven
Professional
The #1 Certification Program in the information
storage and management industry
2009 EMC Corporation. All rights reserved.

Storage Infrastructure Management

o Managing storage infrastructure is a key to ensure
continuity of business
o Establishing management processes and
implementing appropriate tools is essential to
meeting service levels proactively
o Management activities include availability,
capacity, performance, and security management
o Monitoring is the most important aspects that
forms the basis for storage management
o Continuous monitoring enables availability and
scalability by taking proactive measures
2009 EMC Corporation. All rights reserved.

Lesson: Monitoring the Storage

Infrastructure

Upon completion of this lesson, you will be able to:

o Discuss the major storage infrastructure
components that should be monitored
o Describe what is to be monitored for the various
storage infrastructure components
o Discuss alerting of events

2009 EMC Corporation. All rights reserved.

Monitoring Storage Infrastructure

Client

Cluster

Port
HBA

IP
Network

Keep Alive

HBA

SAN

Port
Storage Arrays

Accessibility
Capacity
Performance

Hosts/Servers with Applications

2009 EMC Corporation. All rights reserved.

Security

Parameters Monitored Accessibility

o Accessibility refers to the availability of a
component to perform a desired operation
o Why monitor accessibility of different
components?
o Failure of any hardware/software component can lead to
outage of a number of different components
o Example: HBA failure could cause degraded access to a number
of devices in multi-path environment or loss of data access in
single path environment

o Monitoring accessibility involves

o Checking availability status of the hardware or software
components through predefined alerts
2009 EMC Corporation. All rights reserved.

Parameters Monitored Capacity

o Capacity refers to the amount of storage
infrastructure resources available
o Why monitor capacity?
o Capacity monitoring prevents outages before they can occur
o Inadequate capacity may lead to degraded performance or
affect application/service availability

o More preventive and predictive in nature

o Report indicates 90% of all the ports have been utilized in SAN,
a new switch must be added if more arrays/servers are to be
added

2009 EMC Corporation. All rights reserved.

Parameters Monitored Performance

o Performance monitoring evaluates how efficiently
different components are performing
o Why monitor Performance metrics?
o Want all data center components to work efficiently/optimally
o Helps to identify performance bottlenecks
o Measures and analyzes the ability to perform at a certain
predefined level

o Examples
o Number of I/Os to disks
o Application response time
o Network utilization
o Server CPU utilization
2009 EMC Corporation. All rights reserved.

Parameters Monitored Security

o Monitoring security helps to track and prevent
unauthorized access
o Why monitor security?
o Need to be protected for confidentiality, integrity and
availability
o To meet regulatory compliance

o Examples
o Tracking and reporting changes made to zoning
configurations
o Physical
Monitoring
Environmental
security
throughparameters
badge readers, scanners and
cameras
Temperature, humidity, airflow, hazards (water, smoke, etc.)

Voltage power supply

2009 EMC Corporation. All rights reserved.

Monitoring Hosts
o Accessibility
o Hardware components: HBA, NIC, graphic card, internal disk
o Status of various processes/applications

o Capacity
o File system utilization
o Database: Table space/log space utilization
o User quota

HBA

o Performance

HBA

o CPU and memory utilization

o Transaction response times

o Security
o Login and authorization
o Physical security (Data center access)
2009 EMC Corporation. All rights reserved.

Host

Monitoring the SAN

o Accessibility
o Fabric errors, zoning errors, GBIC failure
o Device status/attribute change
o Processor cards, fans, power supplies

o Capacity
o ISL (inter-switch link) and port utilization

o Performance
o Connectivity ports
o Link failures, loss of signal, link utilization

o Connectivity devices
o Port statistics

o Security
o Zoning and LUN Masking
o Administrative tasks and physical security
o Authorized access, strict passwords
2009 EMC Corporation. All rights reserved.

SAN

Monitoring Storage Arrays

o Accessibility
o All Hardware components
o Array Operating Environment
o RAID processes
o Environmental sensors
o Replication processes

o Capacity
o Configured/un-configured capacity
o Allocated/unallocated storage
o Fan-in/fan-out ratios

o Performance

Storage
o FE (front-end) and BE (back-end) utilization/throughput
o I/O profile, response time, cache metrics

o Security
o Physical and administrative security
2009 EMC Corporation. All rights reserved.

Array

Accessibility Monitoring Example: Array

Port Failure
H1

Degraded
HBA
HBA

SW1
H2

Degraded

Port

HBA

HBA

SW2
H3

Degraded
HBA
HBA

Hosts/Servers with
Applications
2009 EMC Corporation. All rights reserved.

Port

Storage Arrays

Accessibility Monitoring Example: HBA

Failure
Degraded

H1

HBA
HBA

SW1
H2

Port

HBA
HBA

SW2
H3

HBA
HBA

Hosts/Servers with
Applications

2009 EMC Corporation. All rights reserved.

Port

Storage Arrays

Accessibility Monitoring Example: Switch

Failure
SW1
All Hosts

Port

Degraded
Port

SW2

Hosts/Servers with
Applications

2009 EMC Corporation. All rights reserved.

Storage Arrays

Capacity Monitoring Example: Storage

Array
New Server
HBA
HBA

SW1

SW2
Can the Array provide the required
storage to the new server?

Hosts/Servers with
Applications
2009 EMC Corporation. All rights reserved.

Capacity Monitoring Example: File System

Space
No Monitoring

FS Monitoring
File System

File System

Extend FS
Warning: FS is 66% Full
Critical: FS is 80% Full

2009 EMC Corporation. All rights reserved.

HBA

H4
H1

HBA

HBA
HBA

H2

H1 + H2 + H3

HBA
HBA

H3

SW1

Port Util. %

Performance Monitoring Example: Array Port

Utilization
New Server
100%

SW2

HBA
HBA

Hosts/Servers with
Applications

2009 EMC Corporation. All rights reserved.

Storage Arrays

Performance Monitoring Example: Servers CPU

Utilization
Critical: CPU Usage above 90% for
the last 90 minutes

2009 EMC Corporation. All rights reserved.

Security Monitoring Example: Storage

Array
Storage Array
SW1
WG2

Workgroup 2 (WG2)
Replication
Command

Workgroup 1 (WG1)

2009 EMC Corporation. All rights reserved.

SW2
WG1

Warning: Attempted replication

of WG2 devices by WG1 user
Access denied

Alerting of Events
o Alerting is an integral part of monitoring
o Monitoring tools enables administrators to assign
different severity levels for different events
o Level of alerts based on severity
o Information alert: Provide useful information and may not
require administrator intervention
o Creation of zone or LUN

o Warning alerts: Require administrative attention

o File systems becoming full/Soft media errors

o Fatal alert: Require immediate administrative attention

o Power failures/Disk failures/Memory failures/Switch failures

2009 EMC Corporation. All rights reserved.

Lesson Summary
Key concepts covered in this module are:
o Storage infrastructure components that should be
monitored
o Parameters of monitoring:
o Accessibility
o Capacity
o Performance
o Security

o Monitoring examples
Additional Task
Research on key requirements of a
data center

2009 EMC Corporation. All rights reserved.

Storage Management Activities

o All the management tasks in a storage
infrastructure can be broadly categorized into:
o Availability management
o Capacity management
o Performance management
o Security management
o Reporting

2009 EMC Corporation. All rights reserved.

Availability Management
o Establishing a proper guideline for all configurations
to ensure availability based on service levels.
o Example: When a server is deployed to support a
critical business function, the highest availability
standard is required. This involved deploying the
following components:
o Two or more HBAs
o Multipathing software
o Server clustering
o Two independent fibre channel switches
o RAID protection
o Backup
o Local and remove replication
2009 EMC Corporation. All rights reserved.

Capacity Management
o Ensure adequate availability of resources for all
services based on their service level requirements
o Capacity management provides:
o Capacity analysis compare allocated storage to forecasted
storage on a regular basis
o Trend analysis actual utilization of allocated storage and rate
of consumption

o Example 1: Storage provisioning

o Device configuration and LUN masking on storage arrays
o Zoning configuration on SAN and HBA components

o Example 2: Estimating future needs of resources

o Gather and analyze related information to come up with
estimates
2009 EMC Corporation. All rights reserved.

Performance Management
o Ensures the optimal operational efficiencies of all
components
o Performance analysis is performed on existing storage
infrastructure components
o Provides information whether a component is meeting expected
performance levels

o When a new application or server is to be deployed,

every components involved must be validated for
adequate performance capabilities as defined by the
service levels.
o Server: volume configuration, database design, application layout
on multiple HBAs, multipathing software
o SAN: designing sufficient ISLs in a multi-switch fabric with
adequate bandwidth
o Storage arrays: selecting appropriate RAID type and LUN layout,
front-end and back-end ports, LUN masking
2009 EMC Corporation. All rights reserved.

Security Management
o Prevents unauthorized access and configuration of
storage infrastructure components
o Example: When deploying a new application or
server
o Managing user accounts and access policies
o Zoning configuration in the SAN
o LUN masking

2009 EMC Corporation. All rights reserved.

Reporting
o Keeping track and gathering information from
various components / processes
o This information is compiled to generate reports for:
o Trend analysis and capacity planning current and historic
information about utilization of storage, file system, database
tablespace, ports
o Configuration or asset management device allocation, local
and remote replicas, fabric configuration, list of equipment with
details such as their value, purchase date, lease status and
maintenance record
o Chargeback allocation and utilization of storage infrastructure
components by various departments / user groups.
o Performance performance of various storage infrastructure
components
2009 EMC Corporation. All rights reserved.

Storage Infrastructure Management

Challenges
o Large number and variety of storage arrays, networks,
servers, databases and applications
o Variety of storage devices varying in capacity,
performance and protection methodologies
o Deployment of both SAN and IP networks for storage
devices
o Servers with different operating systems: UNIX, LINUX,
Windows, mainframe
o Interoperability issues between devices from multiple
vendors
o Multiple vendor-specific tools to monitor devices from
different vendors
2009 EMC Corporation. All rights reserved.

#1 IT
company

For more information visit

2009 EMC Corporation. All rights reserved.

http://education.EMC.com