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Automating Storage as a Service

There are hardly any tools to truely automate a Multivendor Storage Services Environment.
Storage Admin's are stuck with Veriety of Independent Web interfaces or commandline tools with little or no common semantics for common configuration elements or a provisioning activities. The procedures are generally convoluted with myriad manual settings...

This is the most realistic dipiction of Multi-vendor Storage Administrators Plight...
I was a ECC(http://www.emc.com/products/family/controlcenter-family.htm) user and large-size env.. EMC Storage admin.. ECC got very close... but it was pig... to slow. Good for Symmetrix..Weak for for Clariion and third party arrays..

There are tools like NetAPP SanScreen(http://www.netapp.com/us/products/management-software/sanscreen/sanscreen-service-insight.html), Symantec Command Central( and HP AppIQ(http://h18006.www1.hp.com/products/software/bto/srmgt/index.html), itheon's SRA http://www.itheon.com/solutions/storage_resource_analysis.html, look interesting, They are mostly limited data collection and do very fractured provisioning/monitoring/Host-Side SRM Functions...

I am still on the lookout for a simple tool that is intellegent enough to understand a SAN/iSCSI Network. Automate Zoning/VLAN creation, Mapping of LUNS, help in LUN masking and collect host-side Usage information.

This is the first step to storage automation, consequently integrating CMDB, Incident and Change management logic into the storage environment with Explicit awareness of Snapshots, Replica's and Remote replication processes(like EMC Replication manager).

The Second Step is understanding the complexity/flexibility offered by Storage arrays for features like SANcopy and other host based Bit-Wise LUNcopy software and integrating into the hierarchical storage management lifecycle.

The Third Step is to enable Physical(Boot form SAN) and Virtual Machine Management for Optimised storage usage. For example: VMware's Storage DeDuplication for VDI solution Allows one 10 GB LUN being used for 100's of desktops. Understanding Application level storage usage (Storage Resource Management Functionality) can be benefecial for Not only for Remote side Storage allocation using Thin Provivisioning techniques but also for Backup Verification


The Landscape for Storage services both on the cloud and in house environments is changing rapidly. Cloud Storage here to stay, however storage resource management is even more critical in cloud storage since there is a direct revenue impact due to over provisioning. The In-house environments are converting to more centralised service provider like architecture.
Using Centralised tool is extreme valuable, however if the cost is prohibitive or if the products donot meet safety and usability standards. we need to go back to the vendors to get commandline API's to start automating the key processes(Provisioning, Chargeback/Billing and Capacity planning) as soon as possible.

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