[UPDATED: 9/9/2011, 2:35pm – included VASA demo]
The whole “policy driven storage” model in vSphere 5 is the beginning of a long march towards automation and abstraction of storage models under vSphere. If you look at the content behind the VMworld VSP3205 session (and yes, I’m aiming to do a post on it post VMworld Copenhagen), you can see where it is going directionally.
TODAY, however, in the baby steps, the idea of the storage subsystem “reporting up” system capabilities is an important one.
The way it works is pretty basic – the array publishes a set of strings that reflect LUN/filesystem capabilties. That string can be as complex or as simple as the vendor chooses.
Recommended reading:
- Scott Lowe did a post on it “A Deeper Look at VASA”, and then a followup “Looking again at VASA”.
- Cormac Hogan did a preview of the various array vendor’s VASA providers “A sneak-peek at how some of VMware's Storage Partners are implementing VASA”
EMC’s first VASA provider just finished all the VMware certs, and will be GA very shortly (available now if needed urgently). Here’s what it looks like:
That ALL said – now that the 1.0 EMC implementation is out, we are working on the next VASA rev (and embedded array VASA providers). Would LOVE customer/partner feedback on what matters to you.
Making you all “part of engineering” for a bit – the debate is tricky when you dive a bit down.
The temptation is “show everything”, but if you think about it, it becomes CRAZY complex. Think about the various configuration/function combinations and permutations. You have RAID type, spindle type, thick/thin, snapshots, remote replicas, compress/dedupe. Also, and just as importantly, the information has varying “meanings”. Sometimes people argue about RAID type and the correlation of performance – but the answer is “it depends”. Parity RAID and low RPM SATA can be “smoking fast” for certain IO loads, and suck for others.
At the same time – in general, simpler, more abstract is more useful IN PRACTICE.
So – help us help you – here’s a quick survey. Literally this goes right into the product development – so be open, be blunt.
He Chad, I think your youtube like is not working.
Regards,
Sander Biemans
Posted by: Sander Biemans | September 12, 2011 at 08:43 AM
First thing to improve VASA would be an manual for the linux based installation :)
Posted by: VASAguy | February 29, 2012 at 07:41 AM