Symmetrix Optimizer /

Virtual Lun Migration /

Fully Automated Storage
Tiering (FAST) for DMX

Andres Nourian
Implementation Specialist
andres.nourian@emc.com

Copyright 2011 EMC Corporation. All rights reserved. 1

 Symetrix Optimizer

Copyright 2011 EMC Corporation. All rights reserved. 2

What is Symmetrix Optimizer?
Symmetrix Optimizer improves array performance by
continuously monitoring access patterns and migrating devices
(Symmetrix logical volumes) to achieve balance across the
disks in the array.
This process is carried out automatically based on user-defines
parameters and is completely transparent to end users, hosts,
and applications in the environment.
Symmetrix Optimizer operates within the confines of Symmetrix
physical disk groups. Symmetrix disk groups are defined in a
Symmetrix bin file, and separate physical drives based on drive
technology, drive size, and drive rotational speed.

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Symmetrix Optimizer operations
Symmetrix Optimizer operates totally autonomously on the Symmetrix
service processor to perform the following steps:
1. Builds a database of device activity statistics on the Symmetrix back end.
2. The optimizer algorithm identifies busy and idle devices and their locations on
the physical drives.
3. The next phase is to carry out the Symmetrix device swaps. This is done using
established EMC TimeFinder technology, which maintains data protection and
availability.
4. Users can specify if swaps should occur in a completely automated fashion, or if
the user is required to approve Symmetrix device swaps before the action is
taken.
5. Once the swap function is complete, Symmetrix Optimizer continues data
analysis for the next swap.

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Supported environments and Restrictions
Symmetrix Optimizer can optimize all open system and mainframe RAID1, RAID5
(3+1 and 7+1), RAID6 (6+2 and 14+2), and RDF-protected volumes in an array.
Optimizer does not work with volumes configured for use with the AS/400 OS.
Optimizer does not consider BCVs, DRVs, SFS devices, target of SNAP devices, thin
devices, and thin data pools for swapping.
Optimizer does not change the protection of a device.
The following restrictions apply to devices that are considered for a swap:
Same size and emulation
Same protection (Enginuity 5874)
Available DRVs for both source and target

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Configuration requirements
In order for Symmetrix Optimizer to function, DRVs must first be configured
and Symmetrix Optimizer enabled by EMC from the service processor.

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Dynamic Reallocation Volumes (DRV
technology)
The DRV is a non-user-addressable logical volume used by Symmetrix
Optimizer to temporarily hold customer data while reconfiguration (on
logical volume granularity) is executed. Data is available and protected
during the reconfiguration process
As a minimum, two DRVs must be configured for each size and emulation of
volume to be swapped by Optimizer.
RAID6 devices or devices with at least three local copies of data do not
require DRVs for swapping.
DRV devices are configured as unprotected devices, and can be created as FBA or
CKD. DRV devices can be created on EFD, FC, or SATA.

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Requirement for open mirror position
Optimizer does have a requirement for an open mirror position to be able to
perform a swap. This limitation is the four mirror slots for a volume on the
Symmetrix system.

Requirement for open configuration lock

In order for Optimizer to perform a swap, it needs to hold the configuration
lock. The configuration lock is an exclusive lock on the Symmetrix system for
performing configuration changes.
This lock prevents multiple applications from changing the Symmetrix
configuration at the same time.

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Swap procedure
Mirrored device swap steps

Identify volumes to swap

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Swap procedure
Mirrored device swap steps

Copy a volume to DRV

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Swap procedure
Mirrored device swap steps

Copy DRVs to new locations

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Swap procedure
Mirrored device swap steps

DRVs are split

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Managing time windows
There are different types of time windows:
Data movement for disk group provisioned devices (-dp).
Performance time windows which control the collection of statistics.

A defined time window needs to be specified as either inclusive,

which allows the operation to be executed repetitively, or
exclusive which prevents the operation for a future specific date
and time.

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Optimizer controller settings
There are multiple Optimizer settings that affect the behavior of
the Optimizer controller. These include:
Data Movement Mode
Maximum Moves Per Day
Maximum Simultaneous Moves
Initial Period

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Data Movement Mode
In User Approved mode, Optimizer will generate swap lists , but
will not perform any swaps until the list is approved and
scheduled by a user.
In Automatic mode, swap lists will be generated and executed
at the beginning of each inclusion swap time window, without
user involvement.
The default mode is Automatic.

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Maximum Moves Per Day
As two devices are involved in a single swap, each swap
performed will count as two devices moved towards this total.
The maximum moves per day setting may be configured
between 2 and 200. The default setting is 200.

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Maximum Simultaneous Moves
The maximum simultaneous device moves value is dependent
on the number of DRVs configured on the Symmetrix. If there
are only four DRVs configured, Optimizer will only be able to
swap a maximum of two device pairs
The maximum simultaneous moves setting may be configured
between 2 and 8. The default value is 8.

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Initial Period
Optimizers Initial Period defines the minimum amount of data
Optimizer should wait to collect before generating its first swap
list.
The initial analysis period can be configured to be between 1
hour and 4 weeks.
The default is 1 week.

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Setting manual swap lists
To set a manual swap list, use the following form:
set swap_list {Hyper1} with {Hyper2} [, {Hyper3} with {Hyper4},... ]
[begin_at=TimeVal];
Where:
Hypern is of the form DDD,I,T,HH:
DDD is the director identifier
I is the director interface
T is the target ID
HH is the hyper number
TimeVal is in the form of MMDDYYYY:HHMMSS.

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 Virtual Lun Migration

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Virtual LUN migration
Symmetrix devices can be manually moved between physical disk groups, of
different disk technologies, using the Virtual LUN migration feature of
Optimizer.
Virtual LUN technology enables transparent, non-disruptive data migration
between storage types that have the same RAID protection scheme.
Virtual LUN migrations can be managed with the Solutions Enabler SYMCLI
symoptmz command, or from Symmetrix Management Console (SMC).
When performing Virtual LUN migrations, data can be migrated to either
unconfigured or configured space.
A migration can only be initiated by a user.

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Virtual LUN migration features
Symmetrix Optimizer symoptmz command has been enhanced with the
following features for data migrations:
The source devices to be migrated can be specified as a device group or a
range of devices.
The target disks can be a disk group number or a list of physical disks.
You can optionally specify that unmapped and/or unmasked devices can be
used as target devices.

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Virtual LUN migration - unconfigured or
configured space
When devices or device group devices are migrated to target disks or disk
groups, Optimizer looks for free space on the target disks for the migration.
If the target disks do not have any free space, you can specify to use
unmapped and/or unmasked devices.
When this option is specified, Optimizer will NOT look for free space on the target
disks but will only look for matching unmapped and/or unmasked devices.
As with all device migrations, devices on the target disk list must match the size,
emulation, and protection type of the source devices for the migration to succeed.

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Migration requirements
Virtual LUN technology is a feature of Symmetrix Optimizer and as such it has
similar configuration requirements in order to perform a migration.
These are:
Dynamic Reallocation Volumes (DRVs)
Open mirror position
Open Symmetrix configuration lock

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Device migration control
Once a Virtual LUN migration begins, there is no interface which allows the
migration to be stopped. Any migration that has started will need to be
completed.
In the event that an executed migration is no longer wanted, the migration
can be reversed using the Symmetrix Optimizer rollback feature.

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Virtual LUN migration (symcli examples)
To perform a migration a text file similar to the following should be created:
migrate devices 240, 245:247 to disks {16B, C, 0}, {4D, C, 0};
migrate device_group Mydgname to disk_group_num 1;
migrate devices 240, 245:247 to disk_group_num 2;
migrate device_group Mydgname to disks {16B, C, 0}, {4D, C, 0};
migrate devices 240, 245:247 to disks {16B, C, 0}, {4D, C, 0}
unmapped=TRUE;
migrate device_group Mydgname to disk_group_num 0 unmasked=TRUE;
migrate devices 240, 245:247 to disk_group_num 0 unmapped=TRUE
unmasked=TRUE;

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Virtual LUN migration (symcli examples)
Once the device file has been created, the migration can be submitted to
Optimizer by running:
symoptmz -sid 3542 -f migrate.txt commit v

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Virtual LUN migration (smc examples)

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Virtual LUN migration (smc examples)

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Virtual LUN migration (smc examples)

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 Fully Automated Storage
Tiering (FAST) for DMX

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Fully Automated Storage Tiering (FAST) for
DMX
Provides automated tier management at the LUN/volume level within the
array. FAST supports standard provisioned environments for both open
systems and mainframe environments. (FAST does not support Symmetrix
Virtual Provisioning.)
FAST automatically relocates data across storage types as needed to
optimize the overall performance of the system, making the best use of
high-performance enterprise Flash drives and high-capacity SATA drives.
With FAST, the workload on an array can be balanced across all drives.
Management of FAST for DMX requires a minimum of Enginuity
5773.155.107 and SMC 7.1.

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FAST Device movement control
Once a FAST swap has begun, there is no interface which allows the swap to
be stopped. Any swap that has started will need to be completed, even if
the swap time window has expired.
In the event that a FAST swap needs to be reversed, the Symmetrix
Optimizer rollback feature can be used.
FAST for DMX cannot move logical devices between different RAID schemes.
At least two DRVs, of each emulation to be swapped, must be configured in
the array for FAST to perform swap operations .

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FAST movement of metadevices
FAST for DMX supports the relocation of metadevices between disk
technologies.
Symmetrix configuration rules mandate that all members of a metadevice
must be configured on similar disks, in terms of technology, size, and
rotational speed. In addition to this rule, the metadevice members must be
configured within the same physical disk group.
When FAST determines that a metadevice needs to be relocated to another
disk group within the array all members of the metadevice must be swapped
within the same swap list.

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FAST Device movement

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FAST Implementation
A new type of device movement rule, called a Cross Disk Group rule, has
been added to Optimizer to support FAST for DMX. When created, the rule is
associated with a list of Symmetrix devices, an Optimizer device list.
The Optimizer device list can contain devices of multiple sizes and RAID
protection types, configured across multiple physical disk groups and drive
types. However, when associated with a Cross Disk Group rule, Optimizer
will only perform swaps among devices of the same size and protection
type.
Multiple Cross Disk Group rules may be created by creating and associating
additional device lists. However, FAST for DMX will only perform swaps of
devices pairs contained within the same list, and that are of the same size
and RAID protection type.
Management and operation of FAST for Symmetrix DMX is provided by the
Symmetrix Management Console (SMC).

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FAST Requirements
FAST for DMX is a feature of Symmetrix Optimizer and as such it has similar
configuration requirements in order to perform a migration. These are:

Dynamic Reallocation Volumes (DRVs)

Open mirror position
Open Symmetrix configuration lock

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FAST eligible devices
The following devices are eligible to be managed by FAST, under a cross disk
device rule:

RAID 1
RAID 5 3+1 and 7+1
RAID 6 6+2 and 14+2
SRDF devices (R1 and R2)

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FAST administration (SMC)
Enabling Symmetrix Optimizer monitoring

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FAST administration (SMC)
Stopping/Starting Symmetrix Optimizer

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FAST administration (SMC)
Optimizer controller Settings

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FAST administration (SMC)
Creating Optimizer disk list

To create an
Optimizer disk list,
the Choose Rules
and List drop-down
menu should be set
to Disk Rules & List.
With this selected,
click on the New
button located to
the right of the Disk
List list. When
clicked the
following dialog box
will be displayed.

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FAST administration (SMC)
Creating Optimizer disk list

Once a list name

has been provided,
physical disks in
the array can be
added to the list by
selecting them in
the left-hand panel
and clicking the
Add button.

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FAST administration (SMC)
Creating an Optimizer disk rule

To create an
Optimizer disk
rule, click on the
New button
located below the
Disk Rules list.
When clicked the
following dialog
box will be
displayed.

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FAST administration (SMC)
Creating an Optimizer disk rule

A priority can be assigned to

the rule, and the rule can be
created as active or inactive.
Finally, the list of disks the
rule will be applied to will be
chosen. All available disk
lists will be displayed in a
drop down list.

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FAST administration (SMC)
Creating an Optimizer disk rule & list

To execute the creation

of new disk rules and
lists, the Apply button
should be clicked on
the Settings dialog.

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FAST administration (SMC)
Creating an Optimizer device list

To create an Optimizer
device list, the Choose
Rules and List drop-
down menu should be
set to Device Rules &
List. With this selected,
click on the New
button located to the
right of the Device Lists
list.

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FAST administration (SMC)
Creating an Optimizer device list

Once a list name has

been provided,
swappable devices in
the array can be added
to the list by selecting
them in the left-hand
panel and clicking the
Add button.

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FAST administration (SMC)
Creating an Optimizer device rule

After providing a rule

name, the rule type
needs to be chosen.
Finally, the list of
devices the rule will be
applied to will be
chosen. All available
device lists will be
displayed in a drop
down list.

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FAST administration (SMC)
Creating an Optimizer device rules & lists

To execute the creation

of new disk rules and
lists, the Apply button
should be clicked on
the Settings dialog.

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 Q&A

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