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We already shared a post about Unisphere , how to use Unisphere . Here i want to share more  , how you can start working with EMC Unisphere.

Launch Unisphere

As I mentioned in my previous post, easiest way to launch is to fire up and Internet Browser and type the IP address of Control Station.

When you see login screen just login with your credentials. If you log in for the first one you can probably login with the standard credentials:

VNX

* login: sysadmin
* password: sysadmin

VNXe

* login: admin
* password: Password123#

First Login you will see an dashboard like below image .

I have added some comments mentioned in red. First thing you have to notice is that you see a Dashboard. If you have more then one VNX in the domain you are actually not yet login to the specific VNX, but for the overall dashbord (of course it depends on the Scope of your credentials, but I assume you login as a sysadmin).

If you would like to work / manage single storage system you have to choose it, either from drop-down list in top left corner, or click on the hostname below the menu.

Storage Array

Once you have selected a desired VNX Array your Dashbord should change a little on the same window . You have more specific information about your Array. First you see all important (recent) system alerts. On the right top window you should see basic information, hint: here you will find serial number which is required often to work with EMC .

Menu options

Each menu have several options. You can either click on the top menu choise (System,Storage,Host,Data Protection etc.) or just hover over it and wait to more options to pop up. System have three choices:

•  Hardware – here you can find all hardware information, from single harddrive information to FAN status.
•  Monitoring and Alerts – all alerts are here, you can gather SP Event Logs, Notifications, Statistics and more, even schedule sending e-mail with statistics.
•  Reports – place where you can generate reports

Storage

The number of options available here may vary depends on version, licenses etc. For example if you have VNX for file, you would see here much more .In this section you can actually provision Storage, create LUN’s or Storage Pools, etc.

Hosts

In this tab the important section is Storage Groups where you can define new, delete old or modify already existing Storage Groups. To use/ create a Storage Group you should  have a Host, list of hosts you can find in Host List. To add a Host you need to have Initator on the host side .

VNX Snapshots is a feature introduced in VNX for Block OE Release 32. It was created to improve on the existing SnapView Snapshot functionality by better integrating with pools. In fact, VNX Snapshots can only be used with pool LUNs.LUNs that are created on physical RAID groups, also called Classic LUNs,support only SnapView Snapshots. This restriction exists because VNX Snapshots require pool space as part of the technology.

Note: SnapView Snapshots are compatible with pool LUNs. VNX Snapshots and SnapView Snapshots can coexist on the same pool LUN.

VNX Snapshots support 256 writeable snaps per pool LUN. It supports Branching, also called Snap of a Snap. A Snap of a Snap hierarchy cannot exceed 10 levels. There are no restrictions to the number of branches, as long as the total number of snapshots for a given primary LUN is within 256, which is the hard limit.

Consistency Groups are also supported with this feature. Several pool LUNs can be combined into a Consistency Group and snapped concurrently.

How Snapshots works

How Snapshots work VNX Snapshots use redirect on write (ROW) technology. ROW redirects new writes destined for the primary LUN to a new location in the storage pool. Such an implementation is different from copy on first write (COFW) used in SnapView, where the writes to the primary LUN are held until the original data is copied to the reserved LUN pool to preserve a snapshot.

Here we illustrates the main difference between SnapView Snapshots and VNX Snapshots. VNX Snapshot technology writes the new data to a new area within a pool, without the need to read/write to the old data block. This improves the overall performance compared to SnapView.

SnapView write vs. VNX Snapshot write

Similarly, during a read from a snapshot, the snapshot’s data is not constructed from two different places as shown below

SnapView read vs. VNX Snapshot read

Snapshot granularity

Every VNX Snapshot has 8 KB block granularity. This means that every write occupies at least 8 KB on the pool. The distribution of the 8 KB blocks within a 256 MB slice (1GB in VNX OE for Block R32) is congruent with the normal thin write algorithm.

Check below example  , A LUN is snapped with a few blocks of data. The new snapshot points at those blocks, just like the primary LUN.

VNX Snapshot pointing at the same blocks with the LUN at creation time

After a few moments, the primary LUN may receive an I/O that overwrites block A. The first snapshot continues pointing to the original set of blocks A, B, C, and D. After Snap2 is taken, it points to A`, B, C and D.The next primary LUN I/O overwrites block D, and it now points to A`, B,C, and D`.

VNX Snapshots point at unchanged blocks, Primary LUN is using new blocks

Snapshots and Thick LUN

When a VNX Snapshot is created on a Thick LUN, portions of its address space are changed to indirect mode. In other words, when writes come in to the Snapped Thick LUN, the LUN starts converting address mapping from direct to 8 KB blocks for each portion of the Thick LUN being written.

Note: Thick LUN remains to be classified as Thick in the CLI and GUI.

The Thick LUN remains in an indirect mode while it has VNX Snapshots.When the last snapshot of the Thick LUN is removed, the mode automatically reverts to direct. The process of reverting to direct mode is not instantaneous, and is performed in the background. The process can be aborted by creating a new VNX Snapshot on the LUN.

VNX Snapshots are a part of the storage pool. A snapshot does not consume space from the pool, until the new data is written to the primary LUN or to the snapshot itself.Snapshot Mount Point Snapshot Mount Point (SMP) is a LUN-like container. It is used to emulate a typical LUN, but provides the ability for the host to write to snapshots and to change snapshots without the need to rescan the SCSI bus on the client.

Snapshot Mount Point

Snapshot Mount Point (SMP) is a LUN-like container. It is used to emulate a typical LUN, but provides the ability for the host to write to snapshots and to change snapshots without the need to rescan the SCSI bus on the client.

A SMP is created for snapshots of a specific LUN. This means that each SMP can be used only for snapshots of a single primary LUN.To enable access to hosts, SMPs must be provisioned to storage groups just like any typical LUN .

See How to Create a Snapshot

Creating a snapshot does not consume any pool space. The space starts being used when new writes to the primary LUN or to the snapshot itself arrive. Snapshots have a granularity of 8 KB, and their blocks are tracked just like the blocks in thin LUNs. Every snapshot must have a primary LUN, and that property never changes.A primary LUN cannot be deleted while it has snapshots. In Unisphere,You can delete a LUN that has snapshots by selecting an optional setting that deletes the snapshots first.

A pair of VNX Snapshots

Before creating a snapshot, use the SnapCLI utility to flush the host buffers.

:: Windows
SnapCLI flush -o G:

Create a snapshot

• In Unisphere, select Storage > LUNs

Create VNX Snapshots in Unisphere

• Click Create Snapshot or right-click the primary LUN

# To create snapshot in the CLI

naviseccli snap -create -res 1 -name “cli_snap” -descr “snap created via CLI”
# ^^^
# LUN ID

Note: When a snapshot is first created, it is write-protected

Unisphere view of the VNX Snapshot write protection

When you try to attach a snapshot that has the Allow Read/Write option disabled, Unisphere automatically enables it and displays a warning.

Unisphere VNX Snapshot Attach warning

If a Snapshot is attached from the CLI, then the -allowReadWrite property must be set to “Yes”. Therefore, you must manually modify it prior to an attach command.

# To modify a snap in the CLI

naviseccli snap -modify -id “cli_snap” -allowReadWrite yes

See How to create Snapshot Mount Point

To Create a Storage Group simply go to Host > Storage Group section. Click Create and all you have to give is a name:

I have created the Storage Group called new_SG. Once you hit OK you will be prompted with question to confirm the creation of group .

As you can see, the job status is success and we can actually straight away say “Yes, I want to add LUNs and/or connect host”. Let’s do it. next sreen you can see is:

Now you will have the option to Add LUN(s). Check for the LUN you have created and  click on it, and click ‘Add’ on the right side . See Post – Create LUN if you need help on that

Next is  an important thing  ,Choosing Host LUN ID. As you can see I didn’t put any value, the storage system will auto assign the Host LUN ID with the next available (in this case it will be 0, since there is no LUN present in this Storage Group). To learn more about HLU/ALU again, take a look at post LUN masking and Storage Groups.

You can click OK, or Apply. If you plan to attach some hosts as well, just click Apply, which will add the selected LUN and will not close the window. Connecting Host is just another tab on the same window.

Now you have to do is select from hosts available in left field and move it to the right. Note that you can filter for Host Already connected, but if you choose from hosts that are already connected you will remove the host from the current Storage Group and move it to the new one . (if you are not aware of that , Please don’t try in Production ).

Create a LUN

First you have to log in to EMC Unisphere and choose the VNX array you wish to work with. Once it’s done, go to the top menu and select a Storage section, choose LUN

Once you choose the option you should see list of all your LUNs already created and at the bottom of the screen you will find ‘Create’ button

If need you can  personalize the view of the table or export it for example to CSV and more.

Click Create button you will see new pop-up window like below image:

Your view won’t be identical,it all depends on your configuration. In that example there is a pool created from RAID6 groups called ‘Pool-Bronze’.

The basic things you should fill and understand is :

• Do you want Pool LUN or RAID Group LUN?
• Should the LUN be thin provisioned, should it be deduplicated?
• what should be the capacity, and what should be the LUN ID

Here  we are going to create a Pool LUN, with size of 100 GB. For that I will use already defined and already created Storage Pool called  Pool-Silver. I will make the pool Thin (which in few words means that the LUN will not take 100GB of my available capacity but more or less the size that is actually used by a host, so at the beginning it will be very small). I will choose the LUN ID to 43023 (just an example, not any particular reason for that – but you have to remember that LUN ID is unique for a storage system. And I will call the lun testlun_1. Again the LUN Name is unique as well.

After you click ‘Apply’ you will be promped for confirmation, and once given, the LUN should be created in couple of seconds, with information ‘success’.

Next You have connect the host to Storage array for mapping the LUN we created , You can Visit Page Conenct Host to EMC VNX for this .

Next You have to Create Storage Group and add the Host and LUN to this , To Learn how to d that Visit Create a Storage Group

In this post i will share you the procedure to configure or modify the NTP setting of a data domain from CLI .This procedure is very helpful for below scenarios

• While Initial Configuration updated wrong time zone
• Any NTP sync error on the Data Domain
• Modify the NTP server

First we have to verify the NTP  configuration on the data domain .

Login to the data domain with admin privileges and check the NTP configuration by running below commands

# ntp show config                          –   To check the NTP Configuration .

# ntp status                                      –   To check the NTP Daemon status .

There might be Chance to show out put like below so we have to reconfigure / modify  the NTP services

Error 1

Status                                                  Enabled
Current Clock Time                         MM DD HH:MM:SS YYYY
Clock Last Synchronized                Unknown
Clock Last Synchronized With Time Server   Unknown
 Error 2

**** NTP daemon is not running.

# system show date                                          – To Check the current time in DD

# config show timezone                                 –  To check the current Timezone name 

How to Reset Time Zone

# config set timezone “Time Zone “

example  # config set timezone Asia/Dubai

Yo Check the Details of The time Zone Download Data Domain Admin Guide and View Page 41 49

How to Add NTP Server to Data Domain

# ntp disable

# ntp add timeserver <time server list>

For example: # ntp add timeserver 192.168.1.10

# ntp enable

How to Set Time Manually if  there is a Mismatch between NTP server and Data Domain

# ntp disable

# system set date <MMDDhhmmYYYY>               – Change DD time as of the NTP server:

Example to set system date/time to 0930 on 25th March 2018  the following command would be used:

# system set date 032509302018

** System date will be adjusted by xxxxxx seconds. This change can
potentially cause issues for applications running on this system.
Are you sure? (yes|no|?) [no]: yes
ok, proceeding.
Sun Mar 25 09:30:00 GMT 2018

# ntp enable

Note :- Incase the nEw Time is not  showing you may have to reboot the Data Domain  to apply the new timer

# system reboot

In case after following all the above steps the issue is not resolved or reboot is not possible at the time please contact your support provider

Data Domain is an inline deduplication storage system, which has revolutionized disk-based backup, archiving, and disaster recovery that utilizes high-speed processing. Data Domain easily integrates with existing infrastructure and third-party backup solutions . Most Commonly Data Domain will be configured with Dell EMC Networker backup environment, also you can configure data domain with other solutions like Commvault, Veeam etc. .

Data Domain systems are commonly monitored by everyone is using auto support emails and web interface of Data Domain. There another option available is syslog configuration which is centralized logging option. In this post we will cover how to configure syslog in Data Domain System.

Data Domain logging to a syslog server is efficient and insightful. All commands executed on the Data Domain – regardless of whether they’re issued by a logged in user, a remote user, or the system itself – appear in the logging, giving you a very effective overview of what is going on for the system.Logging gives you another avenue of understanding your environment – and, depending on your environment, may be more suitable for centralised monitoring of systems. While the auto-support emails sent by the Data Domain are comprehensive, and the alert emails are useful, the logs are an information provision point particularly applicable to many enterprise automated monitoring systems.

Configure Syslog

To configure the Syslog you have to access the Data Domain console and use log host commands.

Login to Data Domain via ssh and perform below steps

log host will give you available commands you can use for log host configuration

sysadmin@VMARENA-DD# log host

Show the current configuration

sysadmin@VMARENA-DD# log host show

Reset  the current configuration

sysadmin@VMARENA-DD# log host reset

Enable and Disable Remote Logging

sysadmin@VMARENA-DD# log host enable 

sysadmin@VMARENA-DD# log host disable

Add or Delete Remote Hosts

sysadmin@VMARENA-DD# log host add " IP or FQDN of the host "

sysadmin@VMARENA-DD# log host remote  " IP or FQDN of the host  "

Conclusion

Dell EMC Data Domain is industry leading protection storage device which having higher compression rate compares to all other devices .We have discussed about the Dell EMC Data Domain Syslog configuration with steps all to follow .Also all the usable commands of log host  option with required information.

Overview of UnityVSA

UnityVSA (Virtual Storage Appliance) is a software defined storage platform that provides users greater agility and flexibility. UnityVSA can be deployed on a Individual VMware ESXi host or vCenter with ESXi host and enough resources . UnityVSA is available in two editions – Professional Edition (PE) and Community Edition (CE). Professional Edition is a licensed product available at capacity levels of 10 TB, 25 TB, and 50 TB. Community Edition is a free downloadable 4 TB solution recommended for non-production use .

In this post we wills hare you the key features, requirements and steps to follow for deployment and initial configuration of  Dell EMC Unity VSA.

Key features:

• Provides a software-defined version of Dell EMC Unity storage
• Available in 10, 20, or 50 TB – lower capacities upgrade seamlessly to 50 TB
• Sets up for NAS and SAN in minutes
• Unifies block, file, and VMware VVols support
• Enables VMware administrators to manage storage from VMware vCenter

Installation requirements

Resources –  A 64-bit ESXi host running 5.5 or later that meets the following requirements.

Note:- It is recommended to use ESXi version 6.0 or later. To support VVols, the ESXi host must be running at least 6.0.

License requirements: While there are no further licensing or registration requirements to run Dell EMC UnityVSA for non-production use, if you are ready to purchase Dell EMC UnityVSA, contact your Sales Associate, Dell EMC Authorized Reseller, or visit Dell EMC UnityVSA in the Dell EMC Store.

Activate Your Dell EMC UnityVSA: Get Your System License for Full Functionality

System Requirements:

Infrastructure Requirements – Common to all use cases:

• • vCenter version:  5.5 update 2 or later
  • ESXi: 5.5 – 6.5
  • Web-Browser: Chrome v57, IE v10, FireFox v52, Safari v6 or later
  • Number of ESX hosts: Equal to the number of Dell EMC UnityVSA nodes needed (1:1 mapping)

Dell EMC UnityVSA

• •  RAM for each Dell EMC UnityVSA VM: 12 GB
  • vCPU for each Dell EMC UnityVA VM: 2vCPU
  • Physical Server Requirements: Dual Core CPU 64-bit x86 Intel 2GHz+ (SSE4.2 or greater)
  • Hardware RAID Controller: 512MB NV Cache and Battery Backed (recommended)
  • Type of HDDs: SATA, SAS, SSD
  • I/O Ports (Front End or External): 1GbE / 10GbE
  • Physical Memory Requirements: 16GB (ESXi 5.5) or 18GB (ESXi 6.0) or 20GB (ESXi 6.5)
  • Maximum Number of Pool LUNs: 64
  • Maximum LUN Size: 16 TB
  • Maximum File System Size: 50 GB
  • Maximum File Systems: 32
  • Maximum Usable Capacity: 4TB Community Edition / 10TB, 25TB, and 50TB Professional Edition

Download

File Type – The download package contains the Dell EMC UnityVSA Operating Environment OVA installation file.

File Type: *.ova ,  File Size: 2.4 GB  , Version: 4.4.0

Deploy Unity VSA 

Navigate the cluster you wan to deploy Unity VSA  ->  Actions -> Select Deploy OVF Template  or Right click on the host  and select Deploy OVF Template

Select Source as the OVA you downloaded using Browse option

Review the details and “Accept extra configuration options”

Provide the Name for the VSA and select a folder and click next

Specify the Storage from available list and click next , you may select the VM storage policy from here

Choose the required networks  and click next

Note:- There will be a management port and Data Network Ports

Next Customize the template you can specify the System Name, IPv4 Management and IPv6.  Leave the IPs blank if you want to use DHCP and click next

Review the details and  click on finish to start the Deployment

You may select the power on after deployment option or once deployment completed  you can power on  . It may take 10-20 minutes for UnityVSA to be up and running.

After the deployment you add new hard disk in VSA by editing the settings which you want to use o use for VSA storage.

Initial Configuration Wizard

Once the VSA is up and running start the Initial Configuration by accessing VSA console from web-browser using the Management IP and using the default admin credentials

Introduction Page will popup initially Click Next to continue

Accept License Agreement and Click Next

Set the new admin and service account passwords , they can be set to the same by selecting the option “set service password the same as admin password ”

Add the DNS servers and click next

Add the NTP Server

Next is License the VSA by using the System UUID identified

Activate Your Dell EMC UnityVSA: Get Your System License for Full Functionality using the System UUID to create the license

Download the License File

Note if the license file is opening new page you can copy the content to notepad and save it as .lic extension

Browse and upload the license file and click Finish

After the successful message you may close the page to proceed other settings

Next option is create pool , you may create for now or create later , we are skipping this now and will publish another post for configuring this .

Specify the Email and SMTP and click Next

If you have proxy server in your environment , specify them else skip this step

Create any iSCSI Network interfaces now or skip this by click next , we will discussing this later in another post

Create any NAS Servers or configure it later , here skip this since will explain it later .

Now the Initial Configuration is complete ad you may close the page

Next you can access the console with capacity of the disk available  .

Conclusion

We have shared small overview of  EMC Dell UnityVSA  and deployment steps and initial configuration also here . We are deployed the current latest version Unity VSA 4.4.0 and it is top of vSphere 6.7 host for VMware SRM testing purpose. We will be sharing more blog posts of other configuration required for ISCSI , NAS , Replication etc .

In my previous post – Dell EMC UnityVSA Storage Configuration , I shared Storage Pool  Creation ,iSCSI Interface Creation , LUN Creation  and Configuring hosts and presenting Luns to hosts .In this post we will cover how can we configure LUN replication on UNITY VSA .

Procedure 

• Create a Replication Interfaces
• Create a Replication Connection
• Configure the LUN Replication

Requirements

• Dell EMC Unity VSA deployed as a source and a target
• Storage Pools created at Source and Target
• LUNs are available  on the Source VSA for replication
• Source and Target Unity Boxes should have communication

Creating a Replication Interface

The first step for configuring replication is to create replication interfaces at both the Source and Target Unity VSA systems.

Navigate to Protection & Mobility ->Interfaces and Click on  ” + ”  symbol to  create a new interface.

Select the replication interface from drop down and enter the  IP address, Subnet, Gateway and VLAN ID if required  and Click OK

The replication interface will then be created and  you can view on the interfaces Page

Proceed the same on the Second UNITY VSA

Replication Connections

After creating the Replication Interfaces on both UNITY VSA  nodes , you have to create the Replication Connection to your Target Unity VSA

Navigate to the Protection & Mobility -> Replication -> Connections

Click on ” + “ symbol to create a replication connection and provide the information of your target system Management IP, User Name, Password, Local System admin password and connection Mode , Click OK

 

Connection Process will start and once the connection has showed up you can click on Verify and Update

Now You can view the connection is active

 Configure Replication the LUNs 

After the creation of the Replication Connection you can configure the replication your LUN .

Navigate to Storage ->Block -> LUNs  and  Select the Properties of the LUN you have need to replicate.

Navigate to Replication Tab of the Selected LUN and Click on Configure Replication

Select the replication mode , RPO and Replicate to as target UNITY Node and Click on Next

Configure the Destination storage resource  ,  Specify Name, Storage Pool you may select the type as thin and Tiering policy and Clik Next

Review the details and Click on Finish

You can monitor the result over there and close once creation of replication session is completed

The Replication Tab will now show the active Replication status

And from session tab  on the Replication you can view the status of the LUN replication

Once the Replication is configured you have allow the access to  hosts for  the Second Location as shown below

Navigate to Storage->Block a-> select the Replicated LUN and Properties

From Host Access Tab you can assign the permission to hosts and configuration is completed

 

 

Conclusion

We have successfully configured the replication of the LUN from Primary UNITY VSA node  to secondary node. We using Unity Box for VMware SRM testing and this is very easy to configure .