How could a company as mighty and diverse as HP have had so many issues with executive management?

HP stumbled mightily in 2011, and it had nothing to do with product or people. Even sales remained strong, though the PC business is changing. HP’s mighty stumble was a crisis of confidence due to a chain of shenanigans at the very top. This culminated with the short reign of Léo Apotheker, leaving HP to reassure the market of its strategy.

HP And the Enterprise IT Industry

Sometimes, it’s hard to get a sense of scale when talking about very large things. How big is the solar system? How far away is the nearest star? The same is true of earthly things, exemplified by popular misconceptions about the global financial crisis. It’s difficult for people to understand just how much money a trillion dollars is.

In my little world of enterprise storage, it’s difficult to reconcile “big storage” players like EMC and NetApp with “big storage and everything else” players like HP, Dell, Oracle and IBM. Sure, EMC and NetApp lead the pack in terms of market share, but they’re nowhere near as large as the integrated players. HP has more than 7 times the revenue of EMC, which makes 3 times more than NetApp.

This old slide might need updating, but you get the picture...

HP is an incredibly diverse company, dominant in the PC, printing, and blade server market and top 5 just about everywhere else, including networking, services, and enterprise storage. And HP has nearly 325,000 employees, all working to move the company forward in one direction or another.

NetApp is a motorcycle, with one drive wheel pushing it forward at high speed; HP is more like NASA’s shuttle crawler-transporter, a 16 motor mammoth. Single-purpose companies can be agile, but they can also be derailed by market downturn or technological shift. Storage specialists like NetApp continually try to innovate and acquire to keep themselves vital, while larger companies like Cisco and EMC try to diversify while maintaining market leadership. HP doesn’t need to try; it is diverse.

HP Is a Very Large Thing

I watched HP's rise in the server market of the 1990's

HP has long been synonymous with innovation, high-technology, and silicon Valley. I have been an HP customer as long as I have been in IT, and watched as they integrated technology from Apollo and Convex in the 1990’ s. The server products that resulted became the dominant UNIX platform, but HP’ s innovative storage concepts didn’ t take the market by storm.

After HP merged with Compaq (which brought Tandem and Digital Equipment Corporation), the company vaulted ahead in the Wintel market and also gained valuable storage expertise. Throughout the last decade, HP was firing on all cylinders and dominant in nearly every arena. The company owns half the blade server market, is tied for first in servers, leads in PCs and printers, and is a contender in networking and storage. It’s simply impossible to say what HP is in a single sentence.

HP storage has an extremely broad product range, which management is working to reconcile. Acquisitions of LeftHand, Ibrix, and 3PAR gave HP storage shot in the arm to be sure. An injection of startup mojo has energized the marketing and product groups within HP just when the company needed it. HP’ s market share has grown somewhat as a result, though not as much as the hyper-focused NetApp. HP networking similarly took on 3Com, bedeviling Cisco in the Ethernet switch market.

The Executive Soap Opera

It takes a lot to bring a mammoth to its knees, but a shot between the eyes usually does the trick. While the many engines of HP push it forward, the company’s upper management has seemed, at times, suicidal. Business schools could design an entire curriculum around the folly of Patricia “I spy” Dunn and Mark “penny-pinching” Hurd. Who would think that HP management could top this?

From August 2010 through September 2011, HP dominated IT headlines in completely the wrong way. The board wanted a change, and selected Léo Apotheker to transform HP. But it was a soap opera from the very start, with Oracle hiring Mark Hurd and sending Apotheker into hiding among accusations of corporate espionage while at SAP.

The new CEO didn’t seem to understand HP at all, though he was intent on steering it in a new direction. Apotheker set about dismantling HP’s consumer and end-user businesses, killing Palm/WebOS and threatening to sell off the PC business. The company was to focus instead on enterprise computing, but these drastic moves spooked the entire industry.

It wasn’t long before HP’s board struck again, with a shake up at the hands of Ray Lane and former eBay CEO Meg Whitman brought in to replace Apotheker. The first order of business for the new HP executive team appears to be reassuring the entire world that management has not gone completely insane.

Stephen’s Stance

To an outsider like me, the most disappointing thing about HP’s mighty stumble is that it has nothing to do with the people who really make the company what it is. I have met many creative, hard-working individuals in HP’s storage, server, networking, and printer groups, and they could not be more different from the executive soap opera. I only hope that this new board and CEO will bring some stability and let HP cruise forward once again.

Disclaimer: HP has sponsored the Tech Field Day events which I organize, and has on occasion invited me to attend events at their expense.  But I do similar work with nearly every company in the IT industry, and this piece is my own opinion.

© sfoskett for Stephen Foskett, Pack Rat, 2012. | HP’s Mighty Stumble
This post was categorized as Computer History, Enterprise storage, Gestalt IT. Each of my categories has its own feed if you'd like to filter out or focus on posts like this.

I Promise Not To Quote That Old Annoying Dell PC Slogan

I’ve been buying Dell computers for decades, but not really because I loved them. Sure, my XPS laptop was awesome, but it burned out its motherboard and I never really touched the RMA replacement, having bought a MacBook Pro in the meantime. Enterprise buyers seem to have the same ambivalence about Dell. They buy it, but I’m not sure they really “buy” the company as an IT partner.

I’m sure you’ve heard the same comments as me: “Dell just assembles off-the-shelf components and sells them in volume” or “Dell’s a follower, not an innovator.” There seems to be a great deal of respect for Dell’s ability to produce competitive products and sell them at reasonable cost. Truly, most of their competitors would love to have this kind of reputation. But most of their competitors also have a reputation for partnership, innovation, and solution selling.

Dell Is Making An Effort

It seems clear that Dell would like to change this attitude, and they are investing serious resources to make it happen. While acquisitions like Compellent and Force10 raised eyebrows in storage and networking, it is the activity I see behind the scenes that paints the clearest picture. Dell isn’t just buying into new markets, they’re investing to change the company.

When Dell acquired EqualLogic in 2008, many assumed it was a tactical investment to increase margins over the (resold) EMC storage equipment the company was then pushing. Pundits were similarly dismissive of the acquisition of Perot Systems in 2009, calling it a “me too” effort after HP acquired rival EDS. Regardless of the motivations, however, Dell was becoming more of a serious challenger to HP and IBM every day.

After failing to acquire 3PAR in 2010, then picking up Compllent shortly after, accusations that Dell was “mini me” to HP were rampant. But HP stumbled mightily in 2011, and many in IT quickly lost confidence in that company’s management. All the while, Dell moved forward, increasing in-house IP and expanding enterprise offerings.

What Is The Result?

Today, one sees a very different landscape than just last year. Dell’s acquisitions focused on some of the ripest spots in storage and networking, and no one would disagree that the company has the ability strongly to push these products. Compellent and Force10 went from interesting startups to serious contenders overnight.

Dell really pulled out all the stops to tell us they are "Fluid by Design"

More importantly, Dell has retained much of the innovation these companies offered, from employees to support programs. Last week, I attended the Dell Storage Forum in London, an event initiated by Compellent prior to the acquisition. At the event, I talked to many Dell employees who came to the company through acquisition but had now been given power to challenge the status quo in their respective areas.

If Dell really intended only to push product, why retain marketing personnel? Why invest in the Dell Storage Forum? Why continue Compellent’s beloved Co-Pilot support program?

Then there are the products. Dell leveraged its investment in Ocarina Networks to create a deduplicating backup appliance, the new DR4000. They salvaged file system startup ExaNet and are beginning to bring scale out technology to market. The latest revision of the Compellent software finally brings it to parity in terms of VMware support. And Dell is really working to sell their DX Object Store.

This is the sort of activity one would expect from a contender, not a “box pusher”.

Stephen’s Stance

In the words of Malcolm Reynolds, my days of not taking Dell seriously are certainly coming to a middle. Dell is investing in product IP, innovative marketing and PR events, customer support, and personnel. This does not mean that Dell is instantly a player in the enterprise storage and networking markets, or that all this work will pay off. But I don’t laugh when I hear Dell boast that they intend to be a “top three” enterprise storage company in a few years. It could happen.

Disclaimer: Dell sponsored two Tech Field Day events in 2011, paid me as a speaker at two DX events, and paid for my trip to Dell Storage Forum in London. But no one can buy a post on this site, and I did similar business with IBM, HP, Cisco, and many other companies. This is my opinion.

© sfoskett for Stephen Foskett, Pack Rat, 2012. | Why Should Anyone Take Dell Seriously in Enterprise Storage?
This post was categorized as Computer History, Enterprise storage, Gestalt IT, Virtual Storage. Each of my categories has its own feed if you'd like to filter out or focus on posts like this.

I’m very pleased to have been invited to attend the Dell Storage Forum in London on January 9-12. I’ve been closely following Dell’s progress in the field of enterprise storage, and look forward to learning more at this event. Even better, I have been told that many of my friends in the enterprise storage community will be joining me in London, including Chris Evans, Nigel Poulton, Martin Glassborow, and many others.

This post is really something of a placeholder at this point, and I will be updating it with information as the event approaches.

Ok, a bit more information. I’ve been told the following folks will be there, and I’m really looking forward to seeing them again!

• Barry Coombs - virtualisedreality.com
• Hans Deleenheer - hansdeleenheer.blogspot.com
• Chris Evans - thestoragearchitect.com
• Martin Glassborow - storagebod.com
• Greg Knieriemen - NekkidTech.com
• Martin MacLeod - bladewatch.com
• Chris Mellor - theregister.com
• Nigel Poulton - nigelpoulton.com
• Fabio Rapposelli - juku.it
• Ed Saipetch - breathingdata.com
• Bruno Sousa - planetzorg.wordpress.com

Then there are all the great folks from Dell itself who’ll be there:

• Jason Boche - boche.net
• Lance Boley - iscsiking.info
• Alison Krause - (no, not Alison Krauss)
• Liem Nguyen - compellent.com/blog
• Gina Rosenthal - gminks.edublogs.org
• Will Urban

Even if you’re not coming to Dell Storage Forum, you can join the crew in London for storagebeers on Tuesday evening at Ye Olde Cheshire Cheese in Fleet Street. Greg Knieriemen and Ed Saipetch will be recording the Nekkid Tech podcast, and it looks like a huge number of storage folks will be there.

More information about this event is available at the following links:

• Time to pack your bags for the Dell Storage Forum in London!
• Tech Prep: Dell Storage Forum 2012 London
• #storagebeers – London 2012
• Dell Storage Forum 2012: London

If you are interested in my tech travel preparations, I recommend reading the following articles:

• An Inexpensive Mobile Broadband Alternative When Traveling in the UK
• How to Prepare Your AT&T Phone for Travel Abroad

Disclaimer: As is the case with many similar events, Dell is paying my travel and living expenses to attend the Storage Forum. But if you think I’m going to write about Dell just because I went to this event you’ve got it exactly backwards. I’m going to attend the Storage Forum because Dell is a critical company in my area of expertise and I will be writing about them regardless. I’ll just be better informed (and better armed) thanks to this event.

© sfoskett for Stephen Foskett, Pack Rat, 2011. | Dell Storage Forum – London, UK
This post was categorized as Personal. Each of my categories has its own feed if you'd like to filter out or focus on posts like this.

I'll be presenting at two private events and one public webinar this week!

I’ve been quite busy lately recording webinars, writing articles, and setting up speaking events. This week, I’m in Boston and New York for private speaking engagements. I’ll also be recording a webinar with an exciting new storage/virtualization company, Nutanix, and I urge you to tune in to that one!

Nutanix is Truly Innovative

Watch Nutanix present at Tech Field Day 8

It’s rare to come across a truly innovative idea in enterprise IT, but that’s exactly what Nutanix is. They’ve taken the scale-out Google Filesystem and ran with it, applying it to the core issues of sever and desktop virtualization.

My webinar with Nutanix is little bit different from the typical “give them an excuse to go through their slide deck” event. We’ve organized it as a discussion between me, Tiffany To of Nutanix, and a customer of the company. Tiffany will have a set of slides as backup, but we won’t walk through them one by one.

I’m glad to be able to shake things up a little bit, since the old webinar formula is getting pretty stale. We were able to do this thanks to the third party involved in this production: Truth in IT. They have put together an excellent webinar platform and are eager to try new ideas.

If you would like to view the recording, it is now available. You can register to view this webinar at the TruthinIT website.

Speaking Engagements in the Northeast

I’m also speaking on a couple of interesting topics this week. Today, I’m giving an overview of enterprise storage industry trends to an investment banking firm. I often get this sort of request, and am happy to develop a customized presentation. In this case, the event was initiated by an attendee at my Storage for Virtual Environments seminar.

On Thursday, I’ll be speaking at a private event in New York City sponsored by Dell and Symantec. This time, the topic is the divergent paths of performance and capacity in enterprise storage. This is another topic I’ve spoken and written about in the past, but developed some new content just for this CIO audience. I will probably be delivering similar evening speeches and events next year.

Sadly, my Storage for Virtual Environments seminar in San Diego next week has just been canceled by the organizer. I was really looking forward to this, my final seminar of the year. But I’ll be in San Diego regardless, and look forward to meeting up with some of my friends who are planning to attend. If you are around next week, drop me a line.

Oracle ZFS Storage Appliance

I’ve also recorded a webinar with Oracle last week. We talk about my favorite Oracle product: The Sun ZFS Storage Appliance. This hasn’t been posted yet, but I’ll link to it here when it appears!

© sfoskett for Stephen Foskett, Pack Rat, 2011. | Two Online Events You Should Attend (And Two More That You Can’t)
This post was categorized as Enterprise storage, Everything, Personal, Virtual Storage. Each of my categories has its own feed if you'd like to filter out or focus on posts like this.

VASA allows a "provider" application to tag vSphere storage with a "capabilities" string

The list of VMware storage integration features in vSphere is growing at a rapid pace. From backup to enterprise array offload, VMware is staking their claim. But information about one new storage feature in vSphere 5 has been scarce: The true nature of the Storage API for Storage Awareness (VASA) is only just beginning to be revealed.

VASA: Born of Necessity

vSphere has some amazing automated storage mobility features. The ease of moving data between LUNs and even arrays with Storage vMotion is a revelation to those of us unlucky enough to have used manual migration methods in the past. And VMware has automated this with the new Distributed Resource Scheduler (DRS) capability, allowing vSphere to make its own decisions about data placement.

But this kind of dynamic movement can hurt as well as help. What if an administrator moves a VMDK from high-performance to low-performance storage? Server responsiveness would suffer, perhaps even resulting in an application outage. And how could Storage DRS avoid doing the same thing?

VMware realized they needed some mechanism that could “tag” a storage resource with its capabilities. This is the real reason for their creation of Profile-Driven Storage and VASA.

VASA Does One Thing

In vSphere 5, VASA is incredible simple: It is a basic protocol for vSphere to request a “capabilities” string regarding a LUN or NFS share from a “provider”. The content of this response, and indeed the form that this provider will take, is left up to the individual storage vendors.

VASA Providers can take many forms. Dell is reportedly developing a vCenter plugin to report capabilities. EMC and NetApp will use a software application that runs on a virtual or physical server. In all cases, the software uses a proprietary call to the storage array, in effect relaying and translating the VMware request.

The VASA “Capabilities” string is undefined as well. Most vendors use a list of technical attributes as their response string, and each has adopted their own strategy about how to present information:

• Dell’s EqualLogic returns a comma-separated list like “RAID, SSD, REPLICATED”
• NetApp’s provider uses semicolons, as in “Dedupe; Replication”
• HP’s is very detailed, with a schema specifying Drive Type, RAID Type, Provisioning Type, VV Type, and Remotecopy
• EMC appears to have a standardized set of much-shorter tags, like “Performance”, “Multi-Tier”, “Capacity” and such

These are passed through to vCenter, where an administrator can decide how to interpret them.

VASA Today and Tomorrow

In its simplest form, VASA capabilities tags enable both manual and automatic storage placement features to respect tiered storage policies. This is important to maintain proper system performance and availability. In the future, I expect more advanced VASA providers, perhaps even integration of the providers into vCenter plugins. I also look forward to a standard capabilities tagging schema and smarter handling of returned tags. Right now, for example, EMC’s Clariion and Symmetrix lines both tag LUNs as “Performance”, but these are obviously not equivalent.

© sfoskett for Stephen Foskett, Pack Rat, 2011. | What is VMware VASA? Not Much (Yet)
This post was categorized as Enterprise storage, Features, Virtual Storage. Each of my categories has its own feed if you'd like to filter out or focus on posts like this.

I'll be returning to San Jose for another Tech Field Day event this week

This is an exceptionally busy but rewarding week. I’m traveling to the San Jose, CA area for two events I’ve organized: The OpenFlow Symposium and the second Networking-focused Tech Field Day. I’ll be surrounded by some of the smartest and most interesting folks in networking all week, which is both daunting and exciting for a storage guy like me. I invite my readers to follow along on Twitter, in blogs, and through live streaming video.

The OpenFlow Symposium

OpenFlow is a huge challenge for datacenter networking. OpenFlow is a type of Software-Defined Networking (SDN) in which a controller directs the actions of switches using a standard protocol. It’s really in its infancy, having burst onto the scene after promising deployments at Stanford, Google, Yahoo, and similar massive scale data centers. Now the enterprise networking folks are starting to get interested.

Greg Ferro of Packet Pushers and Etherealmind has been a partner on Tech Field Day planning since the very beginning, and he helped put together the OpenFlow Symposium concept. It’s a simple event, with two long panel discussions planned for Wednesday. But actually pulling it off was quite a challenge!

Our OpenFlow panel includes experts from key companies in the space: BigSwitch Networks, Brocade, Cisco, Juniper, and NEC. We’ll also welcome end-user experts from Google and Yahoo, and the whole thing will be moderated by the Packet Pushers crew.

I expect a very lively discussion on the technology involved as well as the basic concept. Ivan Pepelnjak of IOSHints has been very critical of the need for OpenFlow in general, so it’s great to have him involved as a Devil’s Advocate!

Networking Field Day

The Tech Field Day concept has really grown beyond my wildest expectations. Beginning with a one-off “Gestalt IT” event in 2009, we’ve now blossomed to include a number of focused events including this week’s datacenter-networking themed Field Day.

Networking Tech Field Day 2 (“Net Field Day”) has become the go-to event for the best independent networking folks, and we’re pleased to be bringing back many folks from our 2010 event as well as some newcomers.

Presentation-wise, we’ve got some solid returning companies like Juniper, Force10 (now part of Dell), and Cisco. But we’re also glad to welcome Brocade, Gigamon, NEC, and networking startup Embrane.

Stephen’s Stance

I’m thrilled just to be part of the great group of companies and thought leaders who are gathering in San Jose this week. To be the “ringleader” and orchestrator is more than I thought possible! Watch live at TechFieldDay.com Wednesday through Friday, and join us on Twitter. If you’re in the area, drop me a line – maybe you can join us at the Symposium or our Thursday night party!

© sfoskett for Stephen Foskett, Pack Rat, 2011. | Networking Field Day and OpenFlow Symposium
This post was categorized as Enterprise storage, Everything, Gestalt IT, Personal, Virtual Storage. Each of my categories has its own feed if you'd like to filter out or focus on posts like this.

Ready For Prime Time?

Now, “ready for prime time” isn’t really a technical term with a defined meaning, and perhaps this is the root of our issue. “Prime time” refers to the weekday night hours that have  traditionally been popular with television viewers and from which network ratings are derived. A program in prime time must have broad appeal and be developed well enough for a good long run if it becomes popular. It doesn’t need to be popular yet, but it must be ready for mass market acceptance.

J Metz goes out of his way to argue that FCoE really is “ready for prime time”, refuting four “statements” attributed to critics (including me). But he appears to be using a different definition of that term, suggesting that Cisco’s product GA is sufficient. This is his opinion, but I don’t share it. I think it takes much more than a few initial products and deployments for any technology to be ready for prime time, especially in storage!

Multi-Hop Standards

My article poses the question, “why use a 10 Gb Ethernet standard that remains in flux when 16 Gb FC is shaping up nicely?” Looking back, I agree that the standards aren’t what’s in flux so much as the interpretation and implementation of them. Although the standards will evolve (and are already evolving), they are fixed and functional today.

The standards for DCB are done, and implementation and interoperability is looking good (with the exception of QCN, which is of questionable value). But multi-hop FCoE needs way more than DCB. FC-BB5 is the real standard for placing Fibre Channel over an Ethernet backbone, and that’s been accepted for a long time. Real scalable FCoE networks will also probably need a datacenter fabric, and Cisco’s TRILL-esque FabricPath technology is closest to some kind of standard for that.

But real, functioning end-to-end multi-hop FCoE networks need more than standards, they need consistent and predictable implementation, and that picture is a lot less clear. For every confident Metz, Miniman, or Onisick there’s a Ferro, Fratto, or Bourke who continue to question the implementation of, and need for, these standards.

Multi-Hop Implementation

I later call Fibre Channel Forwarding and Ethernet fabric technology “decidedly experimental.” Metz counters that Cisco has a functional implementation, and I do not doubt that. But one company’s recent GA status doesn’t make Multi-Hop FCoE “ready for prime time” by my standards. By his own admission, “multihop FCoE for Director-Class systems (the most common for Aggregation and Core deployments) has only been available for two months.”

I trust that Cisco and Metz have a working implementation, but not enough to go out telling enterprise storage administrators to take the plunge on multi-hop FCoE in general or even Cisco’s product in particular. Give it a little more time to mature, and give me a reference customer or two. And it would be nice to have more than one vendor to buy from.

FCoE Interoperability

I also state that Multi-Hop FCoE interoperability “is a serious question” and Metz points out that HP and Cisco have an interoperable solution. But his example is an FEX module for HP blade servers, not an FCoE-capable switch that interacts correctly with Cisco Nexus using standards-based Multi-Hop FCoE technology. It’s not even using FabricPath, let alone TRILL or some other FCoE standard!

This whole interoperability conversation reminds me of the “Fool the Guesser” scene in The Jerk: Your interoperability is right here, between the ashtrays and the thimbles. As long as you want to connect this very specific thing with that very specific thing, ignoring the rest of the world of products, you’re interoperable. And don’t ask for multi-vendor FC forwarding yet.

Metz also makes a non-sequitur suggestion that someone wants the industry to wait for Brocade, but I’ve never said anything of the sort. We don’t need everyone to proceed, but we do need more than one company. Standards only matter if they help us do something productive and positive, and single-vendor standards might as well not exist at all.

The bottom line is that we do not have interoperability of FCoE switches today, and we won’t have it for a long, long time. This is not Cisco’s fault, since they’re closest to standards-compliant, but it’s the truth. Eventually someone (Juniper? HP? Brocade? Dell?) will come out with a standards-compliant FCF/TRILL FCoE switch and they will issue a joint press release with Cisco and the industry will rejoice. But most customers probably won’t mix switch vendors anyway…

FCoE Adoption

This big V8 is a "mild hybrid", delivering all of the "warm fuzzies" of alternative fuels without changing the world...

Metz’ final point is to refute something I’ve often said: That “no one” is using FCoE today. Truly, I say this more for laughs and to provoke thoughtful questions than as a statement of fact. I know that lots of customers are using edge-only FCoE in critical production environments with Cisco UCS today. In fact, I consider edge-only FCoE to be a sound practice and do recommend it to buyers of high-end enterprise IT gear.

But edge-only FCoE adoption is a double-edged sword (if you pardon the pun) for proponents of convergence. It benefits customers with simplified client connectivity, delivering much of the benefit of convergence in an easy-to-adopt package. And it gets the protocol out there in production, offering a path to an Ethernet-based SAN future. But it might just short-circuit the value proposition for full end-to-end FCoE, blunting its impact and slowing the urgency for exactly the kind of customers who might adopt FCF switches.

Metz and I have often talked about real customer adoption, and he assures me that there are customers of “Full Monty FCoE” out there, but they’re not talking yet. After all, it’s only been available for two months.

Stephen’s Stance

I leave it to the reader (and the buyer) to decide if FCoE is ready for prime time.

• First, they have to define FCoE: Does edge-only count?
• Then they have to decide if they have a use case that some flavor of FCoE fits.
• Then there’s the real question of risk: Are you ready to take the plunge?

I know that a number of FCoE-related standards are settled, and I know that there are products in the market and even some limited multi-vendor compatibility. I even accept that some customers are deploying real “Full Monty FCoE” in production. But I just can’t recommend that technology yet: It’s not prudent, widespread, and low-risk, so I say it’s not ready for prime time.

© sfoskett for Stephen Foskett, Pack Rat, 2011. | Multi-Hop FCoE Is Not Ready For Prime Time (Yet)
This post was categorized as Computer History, Enterprise storage, Virtual Storage. Each of my categories has its own feed if you'd like to filter out or focus on posts like this.

whith·er – Adverb/ˈ(h)wiT͟Hər/
1. To what place or state: “whither are we bound?”.

VMworld always generates buzz, but news of a major push to change the basic access method for enterprise storage took many by surprise. Extending the work already done with VAAI and VASA, this new development takes VMware storage integration to a whole new level. But the one element of announcement caused alarm for many: VMware’s admission that they would be working with just five major enterprise storage companies to develop this technology. Missing along with the many exciting storage startups is Hitachi Data Systems (HDS), undoubtedly a major player in the industry.

HDS and VMware: Expertise and Partnership

Where is HDS in VMware's roadmap?

Hitachi Data Systems (HDS) is perhaps not as well-known as storage giants EMC and NetApp and server leviathans, IBM, HP, and Dell. But HDS is a major player in the industry with a long history of innovation and expertise in storage and server virtualization.

HDS has lately driven innovation in virtualization of block storage (the VSP), object storage (HCP), midrange performance (AMS), and recently announced they would acquire enterprise NAS contender, BlueArc. Although not quite market leaders, HDS has a huge base of enterprise storage customers and a broad product line from midrange to massive scale.

HDS was right there with EMC and NetApp at VMware’s original announcement of VAAI, even as the mainstream products from IBM and HP lagged months behind. And HDS’ Chief Scientist, Clais Mikkelsen, assured me at their “Geek Day” earlier this year that his company was deeply involved in developing the VAAI specification with VMware. Indeed, VAAI was a major theme of the presentations back in March, with Virtualization Product Manager Michael Heffernan dazzling us with his knowledge of the subject.

You might also like reading Concerning HDS and VMware VAAI Storage Array Support in Plain English

Wherefore Art Thou, HDS?

Now that all that has been said, consider how startling VMware’s omission of HDS was when outlining “VAAI 3.” This is a huge snub for such a major player in the industry with deep expertise and a long history of partnership with VMware. Contrast this to IBM and HP, who were notably absent in many earlier discussions of VAAI, and are still working to bring VAAI to all their platforms. Only HP’s LeftHand and (ironically) Hitachi-sourced XP/P9000 arrays included VAAI plugins from the start. HP’s 3PAR had VAAI too, but HP didn’t have that yet.

Many will likely blame EMC, claiming their influence on VMware (a child company) pushed HDS aside. This same line of reasoning was suggested regarding IBM and HP when VAAI version 1 appeared. But IBM and HP (not to mention NetApp and EMC’s new rival Dell) are at the table this time around, and EMC seems far more concerned by competition from them (not to mention new startups!)

So Where is HDS?

Let me get this straight: WMware is NOT working with HDS on next-gen VAAI storage?

Perhaps this is all some sort of gigantic mistake. Maybe the VMware presenter simply failed to include HDS in his list. Or maybe HDS didn’t choose to get involved this time around, though I can’t fathom why. I put the question to HDS on Twitter over the weekend and hope to hear some sort of answer, though I fear that a convincing response might not come.

The HDS response was unsurprisingly nonspecific (and surprisingly "teen txt-spk")

The only response I got from HDS was a tweet from Claus Mikkelsen stating that HDS and VMware “work all levels to deliver solutions” and that there was “more 2 come.”

What does this mean? I can think of a few possibilities:

1. HDS is way beyond every other storage company, and the “VAAI Cabal” are themselves the odd ones out, trying to keep up with HDS’ “L33T” tech and VMware influence
2. HDS was indeed omitted from the list and possibly the “cabal” and are busy working in the background to make sure they’re included in the future

Personally, the second possibility seems much more plausible.

Update: Some responses to this post:

• Exclusion or Not? (Scott Lowe of EMC)
• VAAI Posturing (Chris Evans)

Stephen’s Stance

If VMware aims to transform storage presentation, and is working with major storage vendors to make it happen, HDS ought to be part of it. Their history, technology, and market position earn them a spot in the “VAAI Cabal” and their omission was a bombshell to industry-watchers like me.

Then there is the other question: What about the startups? Innovation in enterprise storage is often driven by new companies, and VMware would be better served by working with the likes of Tintri, Nutanix, and Fusion-io than the same old major players. But this, as they say, is a topic for a different day.

Disclaimer: I’ve never done business with HDS, but they did fly me to the UK for their 2011 “Geek Day” along with a number of other independent bloggers. I have attended similar events sponsored by HP, IBM, and EMC. VMware, EMC, Dell, HP, and NetApp have sponsored Tech Field Day, and I am currently writing for an online community supported by IBM.

© sfoskett for Stephen Foskett, Pack Rat, 2011. | Alas, VMware, Whither HDS?
This post was categorized as Computer History, Enterprise storage, Everything, Gestalt IT, Virtual Storage. Each of my categories has its own feed if you'd like to filter out or focus on posts like this.

VMware's PSA is awash in abbreviations and options

I am often questioned during my Storage for Virtual Environments seminar presentations about VMware’s Pluggable Storage Architecture (PSA). This system is fairly straightforward and concept: VMware provides native multipathing support for a variety of storage arrays, and allows third parties to substitute their own plug-ins at various points in the stack. But the profusion of acronyms and third-party options makes it difficult for end-users to figure out what is going on. In an effort to help, I present here another entry in my “VMware storage features in plain English” series.

Note: I am more of a storage guy than a virtualization expert. I consider myself one of those end-users who have had trouble figuring out what’s going on with PSA specifically, in VMware storage features in general. I welcome comments and suggestions for corrections or improvements to this and all of my articles. Thanks for your help!

Introducing Pluggable Storage Architecture (PSA)

Pluggable storage architecture was one of the major enhancements introduced in vSphere 4. Functionally similar to Microsoft’s MPIO stack for Windows, PSA includes native multipathing support and allows vendors to plug in their own advanced features.

I find the VMware diagram confusing. Is mine more or less accurate and readable?

The ESX kernel (VMkernel) walks down through three layers when communicating with storage:

1. In the top layer, VMware native NMP or third-party MPP software decides which SATP to use, or whether to use the native interface. MASK_PATH also operates at this layer.
2. The SATP layer includes native generic path selection (active/active, active/passive), standard ALUA, as well as allowing third-party plugins (SATP) to override its behavior. The SATP monitors these paths, reports changes, and initiates fail-over on the array as needed.
3. At the PSP layer, software decides which physical channel to use for I/O requests.

There are three types of PSA plugins for vSphere 4:

1. Storage Array Type Plug-In (SATP)
2. Path Selection Plug-in (PSP)
3. A complete third-party multipathing software stack (MPP)

As is the case with VAAI, VMware includes a number of third-party plug-ins in the ESXi install. Users can simply activate many of these according to their needs, though some require additional fees and licensing.

Storage Array Type Plug-in (SATP) List

Storage Array Type Plug-Ins (SATPs) to the VMware Pluggable Storage Architecture multipathing solution for the specific characteristics of the storage array. This is very important, since each storage array design differs substantially in detail and support, especially when it comes to load-balancing and failover between controllers, ports, and paths. So it is critical for VMware to have developed a standard interface to communicate with arrays.

SATPs allow load balancing across multiple paths, intelligent path selection, and over troubled conditions such as “chatter”, when passed rapidly fail back and forth between controllers.

The SATP has critical tasks to perform in the PSA stack:

1. Decide which method of communication to use with the storage (PSA or native)
2. Monitor the health of the physical I/O channels or paths
3. Report any changes in the state of the paths up the stack
4. Perform actions required to fail over storage between controllers on the array

VMware vSphere includes a variety of generic plugins for storage arrays. I’ve identified the following:

• VMW_SATP_LOCAL – Local SATP for direct-attached devices
• VMW_SATP_DEFAULT_AA – Generic for active/active arrays
• VMW_SATP_DEFAULT_AP – Generic for active/passive arrays
• VMW_SATP_ALUA – Asymmetric Logical Unit Access-compliant arrays

Although I have sometimes seen other SATP plug-ins mentioned, the following plug-ins are all that are listed in the VMware ESX Hardware Compatibility List.

• VMW_SATP_LSI – LSI/NetApp arrays from Dell, HDS, IBM, Oracle, SGI
• VMW_SATP_SVC – IBM SVC-based systems (SVC, V7000, Actifio)
• VMW_SATP_CX – EMC/Dell CLARiiON  and Celerra (also VMW_SATP_ALUA_CX)
• VMW_SATP_SYMM – EMC Symmetrix DMX-3/DMX-4/VMAX, Invista
• VMW_SATP_INV – EMC Invista and VPLEX
• VMW_SATP_EQL – Dell EqualLogic systems

EMC PowerPath and HDS HDLM also support a variety of storage arrays, but I would classify these as full MPP replacements for PSA, rather than SATP plug-ins.

You can see which SATP plug-ins are available using the following esxcli command:

esxcli nmp satp list

Path selection plug-in (PSP) List

In contrast to the diversity of VAAI and SATP plug-ins, the universe of path selection plug-ins is fairly small. Most storage arrays are supported with either Most Recently Used (MRU) or Fixed path selection approaches. Many also support Round Robin (RR) path selection. The only vendor with a specific PSP that is not also part of a full MPP (like EMC PowerPath or HDS HDLM) is Dell, which offers a special routed path selection plug-in for the EqualLogic iSCSI arrays.

• VMW_PSP_MRU – Most-Recently Used (MRU) – Supports hundreds of storage arrays
• VMW_PSP_FIXED – Fixed – Supports hundreds of storage arrays
• VMW_PSP_RR – Round-Robin – Supports dozens of storage arrays
• DELL_PSP_EQL_ROUTED – Dell EqualLogic iSCSI arrays

As mentioned, EMC PowerPath also offers path selection as a plug-in in addition to the full MPP stack. Many other vendors offer unique path selection plug-ins, over 100 in total, but these are not specifically called out in the VMware HCL apart from their existence. I would love to learn more about them, however.

You can see which SATP plug-ins are available using the following esxcli command:

esxcli nmp psp list

Tell Me More About PSA!

As mentioned above, I am by no means an expert in VMware Pluggable Storage Architecture. Rather, I am interested in learning more and passing on this knowledge to others. I welcome your comments and feedback, and especially your corrections to the information presented here. I will try to keep this page updated as new versions of vSphere are introduced and as I learn more about this technology. Thank you for your help and understanding!

Further Reading:

• What’s New in VMware vSphere 4: Storage
• Next-Generation ESX Storage: A Pluggable Core Storage Architecture
• Storage Changes in the VMware vSphere 4 Family
• Pluggable Storage Architecture, exploring the next version of ESX/vCenter
• Vmware vSphere 4.1 PSA (Pluggable Storage Architecture) Understanding
• Explain the Pluggable Storage Architecture (PSA) Layout

© sfoskett for Stephen Foskett, Pack Rat, 2011. | VMware PSP and SATP in Plain English
This post was categorized as Enterprise storage, Everything, Virtual Storage. Each of my categories has its own feed if you'd like to filter out or focus on posts like this.

Join me in Chicago for Storage Decisions, June 21

Next month, I will be heading to Chicago for TechTarget’s Storage Decisions conference. This show does a good job on the editorial side, suggesting timely topics and bringing in independent voices like Howard Marks. I will have three presentations to give: Sessions on data reduction and storage virtualization in the main conference track, as well as a dinner discussion focusing on controlling the growth of data. Registration is free for qualified end-users, and I urge you to attend on June 21, 2011.

Reclaim Capacity with Data Reduction for Primary Storage

Depending on which industry study you read, most companies are wasting anywhere from 30% to 50% of their installed disk capacity, which translates into thousands of dollars spent with no effective return on investment. Storage vendors are beginning to provide tools that can help storage managers make the most of the disk they have installed. For example, data reduction for primary storage borrows data deduplication technology developed for backup and classic compression algorithms to help squeeze the air out of nearline and primary data and reduce its footprint. This session’s topics will include an overview of data reduction technologies and where they will have the greatest impact, what key storage vendors are offering in data reduction and an update on the major players, and the consequences of using primary data dedupe along with dedupe for backups. We’ll also look at the potential for vendor lock-in and consider why we’re reducing data in the first place.

Topics include:

• Introducing data reduction technologies
  • Compression: How it works and where it’s found
  • Deduplication: From single-instancing to variable block
  • Application-specific: Cracking open files
• Overview of data reduction products
• Where to use them
  • The capacity conundrum: Store less and reduce utilization
  • Ideal applications: Justifying the cost of data reduction
  • Side effects: Considering the impact on backup, replication, I/O workload and vendor lock-in

Storage Virtualization: Who’s Doing It and Why

Storage virtualization has been around for decades and, although research indicates that 70% of companies have already virtualized at least some of their installed block or file storage, most remain unaware of this technology. Grandiose schemes for comprehensive virtual SANs have given way to more practical host- and array-based virtualization technologies, and server virtualization has created a new opportunity to create a pool of storage. This session will look at the current state of storage virtualization, how to quantify its benefits and describe which approaches are best for particular environments, and also cover how storage virtualization compares to private storage clouds.

Topics include:

• Defining storage virtualization: What it is and where to find it
  • Abstraction of storage resources
  • Tiered storage
  • Flexibility
• Popular approaches to storage virtualization
  • SAN controllers
  • File virtualization
  • Volume managers
• The pool, the hypervisor and the cloud
  • The impact of server virtualization
  • Is this a private cloud?

Cutting Off Data Growth at the Disk

In this special dinner presentation, Stephen Foskett will discuss how to apply key data management technologies to arrest the growth of data. You’ll learn how capacity optimization technologies such as data deduplication and compression can reduce the trajectory of data growth as well as how tiering can reduce the cost of storage. Finally, Stephen will explore why the time may have finally come for active archiving and will leave you with practical ways to help your corporation better manage its data.

Note that space is limited for the dinner, which is sponsored by my friends at Dell.

Registration

To register for Storage Decisions Chicago, just go to the TechTarget registration page. Dinner guests will apparently be selected from that same pool of attendees.

Disclosure: TechTarget pays my expenses to attend and present at Storage Decisions, and has for many years. I also get a speaker fee for the dinner session.

© sfoskett for Stephen Foskett, Pack Rat, 2011. | Storage Decisions Chicago: All About Capacity Optimization
This post was categorized as Enterprise storage, Personal, Virtual Storage. Each of my categories has its own feed if you'd like to filter out or focus on posts like this.