Storage Management

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The Abstracts

An Introduction to Managing Storage

Russell Warren Download

This session will discuss managing the storage infrastructure. It will describe the basic of storage management, describe how SMI-S helps with managing diverse storage networks, and provides approaches that can be undertaken to get answers to many storage questions.

Learning Objectives

Review basics of managing a storage environment and how SMI-S fits with providing better management.
Describe approaches that can be taken and define the goals and objectives that will help you achieve improved management of your storage infrastructure
Tie storage management to enterprise management, including automation, service management and links to your enterprise management solutions

High Availability Using Fault Tolerance in the SAN

Mark Fleming
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Availability is typically expressed as a percentage of uptime in a given year. Modern SANs have developed numerous methods using hardware and software fault tolerance to assure high availability of storage to customers. From the storage controller through the paths to the end servers, numerous methods exist to ensure continued access to storage in the event of faults and hardware/software failures.

Learning Objectives

Understand how Fault Tolerance and High Availability are related.
Understand availability methods from the storage to the server.
Learn common single points of failure, and hear stories from the field.

SRM - Can You Get What You Want?

John Webster
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Storage resource management tools are now maturing and becoming more of a “must have” capability. However, a broad range of products, each with many different options now confront the potential buyer. Therefore, using the Request for Information (RFI) and Request for Proposal (RFP) processes to differentiate the vendors and their offerings is highly recommended. This tutorial starts with some RFP basics, then moves to a discussion of the important things to look for in storage management applications. It will also include an elucidation of the various standards at play including SMI-S.

Learning Objectives

Understand how to structure an RFP for SRM products that draws differentiated responses.
Gain a better understanding of where SRM vendors are going with their products and product capabilities.
Gain more insight into the standards at play in SRM and how to include them in an RFP.

Lowering Storage TCO: Reducing Expenses by Increasing Functionality

Jamie Blomquist
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Traditional SANs are typically thought of as difficult to manage, require extensive training to operate and expensive to purchase and maintain over long periods of time. However, new technologies and the driving need for less costly, easier to maintain network storage solutions are propelling advancements in storage technology. As a result, these technologies are increasing functionality while decreasing the financial burdens that traditionally come with them. Advanced applications like automated boot from SAN, continuous snapshots, remote replication, automated tiered storage, thin provisioning and storage and server virtualization are becoming more common in the industry and users that implement them are realizing a drastic reduction in total cost of ownership (TCO). It is to the benefit not only for IT and network administrators to understand how these storage technologies affect TCO, but also for CIOs and other decision-makers to have a firm grasp on how TCO can affect their bottom lines.

Learning Objectives

Understand the different components of storage TCO, how they impact IT budgetary planning and why all relevant costs should be considered when making
Discuss the traditional difficulties typically associated with SANs
Examine various storage technologies available today to IT and how they help lower TCO; learn how to measure TCO and conduct an accurate TCO analysis

Solving Business-oriented Goals with SMI-S

Paul von Behren Download

This tutorial discusses how the SMI-S standard relates to business goals related to storage management.SMI-S is a standard for storage management; the standard itself is targeted to developers and does not directly talk a lot about its relationship to businesses.This tutorial looks at the capabilities offered by SMI-S and presents them with a focus on how they apply in an IT environment.The tutorial looks at the functionality is SMI-S 1.0 and 1.1 (available in many shipping products), additional functionality added in the recently completed 1.2 version, and functionality planned for future releases.In addition to looking at the functionality in the standard itself, this tutorial also looks at end-user oriented aspects of the SMI ecosystem, including conformance testing and recent activity aimed at making it easier to install SMI-S solutions.

Learning Objectives

How end users, storage vendors, and application vendors benefit from use of a standard such as SMI-S
How the SMI-S standard has evolved to meet requirements and objectives of its stakeholders