All blog posts in NetApp Community

Tech ONTAP Podcast Episode 285: NetApp Astra is now GA!

parisi — Fri, 16 Apr 2021 13:38:34 GMT

This week, NetApp Technical Director Garrett Mueller (@innergy) and Senior Director of Cloud Management Sayan Saha (sayans@netapp.com) join us to discuss NetApp’s Kubernetes automation stack, Astra, achieving general availability status!

NetApp Support Site - April 1 and 8, 2021 Site Releases

Laura_C — Tue, 13 Apr 2021 16:31:49 GMT

Weekly support site release

Tech ONTAP Podcast Episode 284: Arterys and the Cloud Native Approach to Medical AI

parisi — Fri, 09 Apr 2021 12:00:00 GMT

This week, Arterys CEO John Axerio-Cillies (john@arterys.com) and NetApp Healthcare Business Development Manager Esteban Rubens (@esteban_aihc) join us to discuss Arterys and their cloud native approach to medical artificial intelligence workloads.

Tech ONTAP Podcast Episode 283: NetApp ONTAP AI Reference Architectures

parisi — Wed, 07 Apr 2021 21:28:32 GMT

This week, NetApp AI TME David Arnette (@daveA_netapp) joins us to discuss the latest NetApp ONTAP AI Reference Architecture white paper with NVIDIA and how NetApp ONTAP AI, NetApp Trident, StorageGRID and other NetApp products in the portfolio enhance AI/ML/DL use cases.

Re: FlexPod Express Converged Infrastructure Simplifies VMware Solution Design, Deployment, and Grow

jyhshing — Wed, 07 Apr 2021 16:40:20 GMT

Thank you Ramesh!

Yes, the compute in the solution can be scaled by using the licensed QSFP port to add additional C-series servers or a second blade chassis.

The design guide compute scaling section goes over that information in more details.

Re: FlexPod Express Converged Infrastructure Simplifies VMware Solution Design, Deployment, and Grow

Ramesh_Isaac — Wed, 07 Apr 2021 13:09:51 GMT

Nice summary of the solution value Jyh-shing!

Another thing to consider is that the customer does have potential expansion capabilities with the still available 40G QSFP port on each 6324, which could support another chassis or some C-series servers.

FlexPod Express Converged Infrastructure Simplifies VMware Solution Design, Deployment, and Growth

jyhshing — Mon, 05 Apr 2021 20:53:48 GMT

Industry trends indicate that data center transformation is occurring towards a hybrid cloud infrastructure with on-premises shared infrastructure, cloud computing, and the connectivity enabled by data fabric powered by NetApp to seamlessly provide data where it is needed. In addition, organizations seek a simple, reliable, and scalable VMware solution infrastructure for remote and branch offices.

In this blog, I will provide an overview of the three-tier solution architecture design and the FlexPod^® Express NetApp Verified Architecture, which implements a resilient three-tier VMware solution with Cisco UCS Mini and NetApp^® AFF or FAS systems.

Introduction

For a VMware solution to deliver the outcomes that companies depend on, it should be simple to design, deploy, maintain, and also flexible to scale and grow. Figure 1 shows a three-tier solution architecture with resiliency built into the design, including three servers, two network switches, and one highly available storage that supports NAS and SAN protocols.

Figure 1) A resilient three-tier solution architecture.

With this design, workloads can be balanced among the compute servers and compute resources can be scaled by adding additional servers or additional memories in each server. The workload and virtual machines can be live migrated off a server for server maintenance or upgrade purposes.

The networking tier includes two switches to provide redundant connectivity between the servers and the storage system.

The storage tier should meet the performance, capacity, and cost objectives, and provide the storage protocol the solution requires, such as NFS for NAS and iSCSI for SAN.

The redundant components and connectivity in the design ensures high availability for various single-point-of-failure scenarios and allows the component and software upgrade to take place without impacting the availability of the solution.

Solution architecture

Figure 2 shows how the FlexPod Express for VMware vSphere 7.0 solution architecture implements the three-tier architecture that we discussed. It includes a Cisco UCS Mini for compute, a NetApp AFF C190, AFF A220, or FAS 2700 series storage system, and two Cisco Nexus 3000 series switches with redundant connectivity between the component tiers.

Figure 2) FlexPod Express solution architecture with Cisco UCS Mini and NetApp AFF/FAS.

The Cisco UCS 6324 Fabric Interconnects embedded in chassis simplify the connectivity between the servers, switches, and the storage system. You can start with a small solution configuration using just three blade servers. Additional blades can be added into the chassis to grow the solution without requiring any additional cables. You can boot a server from its local SD card or from the iSCSI SAN.

You can choose the NetApp storage system that best meets your solution requirements and future growth projections. For a small solution, you can deploy the AFF C190 with only eight SSDs to start. You can use AFF A220 if higher storage capacity or higher I/O performance is required. If minimizing cost is your objective, you can use the FAS 2700 series storage systems.

With the NetApp ONTAP^® storage efficiency features, including thin provisioning, deduplication, compression, and compaction, your data is very efficiently stored in the system. When your data grows, you can add additional disks or disk shelves for more capacity. In addition, you can take advantage of the NetApp FabricPool technology to tier infrequently accessed cold data to the public cloud or to the on-premises object storage using the S3 protocols.

Finally, if you already have an existing networking infrastructure with switches that meets the compliant switches requirements, you can build your solution with those switches and the Cisco UCS Mini and NetApp storage to reduce costs.

Solution benefits

There are three important benefits the solution provides:

A highly flexible architecture with choices of components to meet the performance, capacity, and cost objectives of your VMware solution.
A highly available solution design with multiprotocol support, 3x storage efficiency guarantee for mixed workload, and cloud connected data fabric, making the solution simple to deploy, maintain, and easy to scale and grow.
A highly reliable infrastructure with tier-1 enterprise HW from NetApp and Cisco backed by a cooperative support model.

Summary

In summary, customers can count on NetApp, Cisco, and the FlexPod Express for VMware vSphere with Cisco UCS Mini and NetApp AFF and FAS solution to deliver a highly available, highly flexible, and highly scalable converged infrastructure. This solution will simplify your VMware solution design, deployment, and growth.

References

FlexPod Express for VMware vSphere 7.0 with Cisco UCS Mini and NetApp AFF/FAS NVA Design Guide
https://www.netapp.com/pdf.html?item=/media/22621-nva-1154-DESIGN.pdf
FlexPod Express for VMware vSphere 7.0 with Cisco UCS Mini and NetApp AFF/FAS NVA Deployment Guide
https://www.netapp.com/pdf.html?item=/media/21938-nva-1154-DEPLOY.pdf

The GRID is coming into view in Active IQ

Rip — Thu, 01 Apr 2021 17:13:14 GMT

Discover the new features in Active IQ for our StorageGRID customers.

NetApp Support Site - Mar. 18 and 25, 2021 Site Releases

Laura_C — Fri, 26 Mar 2021 11:31:38 GMT

Weekly support site releases

How to protect your valuable business data on NetApp Converged Infrastructure

CCHAN — Tue, 16 Mar 2021 23:03:31 GMT

Data is the fuel for the digital economy. Industries and organizations of all sizes have greatly accelerated their digital transformation in order to compete and stay relevant. Loss of business data could lead to financial impact and even reputation damage for the company. Enterprise customers have consistently ranked data protection among their top IT priorities. An ESG survey has shown that over 50% of organizations will increase their data protection spending in 2021, with a significant portion of that being directed towards improving backup and recovery.

To meet customers ever increasing demand for data protection, we have expanded our collaboration with industry leaders to provide a broad range of integrated backup and recovery solutions for NetApp Converged Infrastructure environments. A solution that works well for one customer might not be optimal for another. The multiple validated partner solutions, coupled with robust ONTAP data protection capabilities, give NetApp customers great flexibility to choose the solution that best meet their requirements, budget, workloads, operations and processes.

Native ONTAP Data Protection

To start, let’s take a look at the key data protection capabilities native to ONTAP – Snapshot, SnapRestore, SnapVault, SnapMirror sync & async, plus archival solution.

Snapshot and SnapRestore provide the first line of defense for local backup and recovery. It’s instantaneous and extremely efficient. Snapshot policies can be easily tailored for different workloads and users.

SnapVault disk-to-disk backup is fast and cost-effective for long term data retention. Recovery from disk backup is reliable, convenient, and much faster than conventional tape backup.

SnapMirror data replication is highly flexible and versatile. Synchronous replication guarantees 100% data currency. With asynchronous SnapMirror, destination site could be thousands of miles away for geographic separation to protect against a disaster that affects the entire region.

Many organizations also have requirement for ultra long-term data retention. NetApp StorageGrid offers an optimized archive solution with superior TCO.

You can learn more about ONTAP data protection here www.netapp.com/data-protection

Validated Data Protection solutions from NetApp partners

Gartner Magic Quadrant for Data Center Backup and Recovery Solutions (7/20202) has recognized Commvault, Veeam and Veritas as industry leaders. Each provides a portfolio of cross-platform data protection products and services for NetApp Converged Infrastructure that are complementary to the native ONTAP backup and replication solutions.

Commvault and NetApp offer integrated solutions that provides leading backup and recovery across the entire NetApp storage portfolio and FlexPod. Commvault backup and recovery software is available on the NetApp global price list.

https://www.netapp.com/pdf.html?item=/media/17072-tr4772pdf.pdf

Veeam and NetApp help organizations attain recovery time and point objectives (RTPO) of less than 15 minutes for all application and data. Veeam backup software is available on the NetApp global price list.

https://www.netapp.com/media/17069-tr4773.pdf

Veritas and NetApp enable organizations of all sizes, including some the world’s largest and most complex environments, to harness the power of their information to drive competitive advantage.

https://www.netapp.com/pdf.html?item=/media/24083-tr-4879.pdf

One thing for certain is that data growth will continue to be hyper-explosive in the next decade, and will take on even greater importance for business competition. It is paramount for organizations to orchestrate a comprehensive data protection strategy. Combining that with NetApp Converged Infrastructure’s proven record for reliability, scalability, performance, and innovations, customers can operate their business with confidence and agility, knowing that their business data is well protected against a myriad of potential data threats, human mistakes and malicious attacks.

For more information, please feel free to message here on the community.

NetApp Support Site - Feb. 25, Mar. 4 and 11, 2021 Site Releases

Laura_C — Tue, 16 Mar 2021 17:05:02 GMT

Weekly support site release features

Tech ONTAP Podcast Episode 282: Core to Cloud with NetApp SnapCenter

parisi — Fri, 12 Mar 2021 13:00:00 GMT

This week, NetApp TMEs Mandohar Kulkarni (@kmanohar81, Manohar.Kulkarni@netapp.com) and Ebin Kadavy (@ebinvarghese001, EBIN.KADAVY@netapp.com) join us to discuss the latest SnapCenter updates, including its foray into the cloud with SnapCenter Service.

Interactive Workflows in the Knowledge Base

nivitha — Wed, 10 Mar 2021 10:06:04 GMT

In mid-2020, we redesigned the NetApp Knowledge Base to provide our customers with:

Top-Valued and Top-Rated articles — the most used and relevant KB content &
Enhanced Navigation and Search Functionalities

Post the KB site revamping, some of the top-valued content were text heavy, had multiple links embedded within articles, difficult to navigate and did not align with the NetApp content standard.

The Knowledge Base Team and Knowledge Domain Experts continued working on our mission to empower customers in finding Solutions they need with minimal effort.

We are happy to present to you the Interactive Workflows in the Knowledge Base.

These interactive workflows provide customers the convenience of finding articles related to one topic or a common theme within the same location. Check out the new interactive workflows available:

These interactive workflows improve the findability, readability and usability of value-added articles.

After experimenting with different tools and refining our process several times, we strive to provide the best version of the interactive workflow for our customers' self-service experience. Today, we have a well-defined process for creating these interactive workflows and a list of articles identified to be worked into this content format.

We are working on creating interactive workflows for many more troubleshooting workflows, expert recommended articles, top issues and content, and legacy articles requested to be reinstated to the Knowledge Base by customers. We are also creating resolution paths for customers to find troubleshooting solutions quickly.

We did a usability testing on these workflows and have included some of the valuable feedback received from customers and partners to improve these workflows.

Our goal is to group related NetApp Knowledge – KB articles and documentation – in a user-friendly interactive format and to enable customers to find the information for the topic within the workflow.

We value your feedback! Please let us know your experience with Interactive Workflows in the KB site.

Re: System Manager 9.8 – New ONTAP Feature Integrations

TMADOCTHOMAS — Fri, 05 Mar 2021 14:29:43 GMT

, could not possibly agree more, just from reading about some of these 9.8 design decisions. Although there are several very nice new features (network map, automatic firmware update, etc.), none of them are worth it if you are taking away basic core functionality.

Essentially, it sounds like 9.8 makes the GUI significantly less useful and you will have to go to the command line to perform tasks that you've done for over a decade via the GUI.

Support Site Feature Focus: New System Maintenance and Support Admin role

Laura_C — Tue, 09 Mar 2021 18:42:10 GMT

New support site feature to manage bulk updates to system addresses, contacts, preferences and decommission systems.

Tech ONTAP Podcast Episode 281: Veeam is Turning it Up to 11

parisi — Thu, 11 Mar 2021 15:05:23 GMT

This week, Veeam's Adam Bergh and vMiss, Melissa Palmer join us to discuss the newest Veeam 11 release and how it's taking backup and restores to the next level.

Re: System Manager 9.8 – New ONTAP Feature Integrations

YizhaoZ — Thu, 25 Feb 2021 21:28:09 GMT

: Thank you for the feedback. I have sent you a DM to follow up.

Re: System Manager 9.8 – New ONTAP Feature Integrations

JanWWW — Thu, 25 Feb 2021 19:59:10 GMT

This is so ridiculous. Netapp is not trusting admins to understand implications of deduplication, compaction and snapshots sizing ! Viewing snapshot size gives a very quick overview and can pinpoint issues. ONTAP is complex enough that no junior admins would touch it. I just can't believe this decision. It seems with every "upgrade" Ontap Manager is getting less and less logical or user friendly. Basically it sucks more and more ...

Sorry, just frustrated

Tech ONTAP Podcast Episode 280: NetApp Trident Updates - Winter 2021

parisi — Fri, 19 Feb 2021 13:00:00 GMT

This week, NetApp Trident's product owner Chuck Fouts (fchuck@netapp.com) and Trident developer Jonathan Rippy (@jkrippy) drop by to discuss what's new for NetApp Trident!

NetApp Support Site - Feb. 18, 2021 Site Release

Laura_C — Thu, 18 Feb 2021 19:24:08 GMT

Weekly support site release

NetApp Support Site - Feb. 11, 2021 - Site Release

Laura_C — Fri, 12 Feb 2021 13:36:58 GMT

Weekly release information

Tech ONTAP Podcast Episode 279: NetApp and Oracle - What's New?

parisi — Fri, 12 Feb 2021 13:00:00 GMT

This week, Jeff Steiner (@TweetOfSteiner) joins us to drop some Oracle knowledge on us, as well as talk about how to best implement Oracle on NetApp storage and what's new for Oracle on NFS.

Tech ONTAP Podcast Episode 278: NetApp E-Series EF300 and NetApp HCI

parisi — Thu, 11 Feb 2021 18:15:17 GMT

This week, NetApp's Mitch Blackburn and Sean Lee join us to discuss the latest E-Series EF300 platform, BeeGFS and NetApp HCI!

Using AIQUM management-server/event REST API to View Events

jacoba — Thu, 11 Feb 2021 15:54:10 GMT

Using AIQUM management-server/event REST API to View Events

A new search experience coming Feb 14th on the NetApp Support Site

ljulie — Tue, 09 Feb 2021 23:23:58 GMT

On the Digital Support Team, we are always working to improve support interactions. And one of the most requested improvements is a better search experience.

Based on extensive research and your feedback, we are implementing a new AI-powered search engine that leverages more sources and more types of content to provide better search relevance and accuracy. With machine learning, we combine your interactions with our search experience to better understand what you’re looking for, so we can improve ranking, speed, and relevance. These changes will not affect the UI, but you should experience better, faster, and more relevant search results.

Visit the Award-winning NetApp Support Site to test the new search experience after Feb 14th.

The more you search, the better it gets.

A big “thank you” to everyone who participated in our feedback panels and surveys; you provided us with a solid benchmark to compare our results to. Please look for the same survey in a few weeks’ time so that we can measure our progress.

Re: 2021 Stevie® Awards Winners - NetApp Support Site and Delivery!

prcpa8w3p — Thu, 04 Feb 2021 21:56:14 GMT

Congratulations!

Re: Getting started with Tech Preview of NetApp ONTAP Storage Connector for Cisco Intersight

JeremyHall — Thu, 04 Feb 2021 15:49:43 GMT

Excellent work on this.

NetApp Support Coaching Program wins Silver Stevie Award for 2021

padmaprasad — Wed, 03 Feb 2021 12:13:17 GMT

We are proud to announce that we’ve won the Silver Stevie® Award - Customer Service Training or Coaching Program of the Year - Technology Industries for 2021. Read on to know our success story:

NetApp Support is heavily invested in helping our customers resolve any issues they face with NetApp products and services. While customer success and satisfaction are our primary focus areas, we are also constantly striving to ensure that our engineers have the right tools, training, and coaching to continue providing the best support to our customers through 1:1 engagement and by enhancing the KB database as an effective self-service portal.

New Coaching Model and Methodology:

In 2019, we revitalized our support strategy and started our journey to implement Knowledge Centered Services, Version 6 (KCSv6) methodology at NetApp. KCSv6 focusses on knowledge being the key asset of an organization and strives to integrate reuse, improvement, and if it does not exit, the creation of knowledge while solving customer issues. To ensure that our engineers understand the power of this collective knowledge and the benefits that it provides to our customers and the organization, we put in place an exemplary training and coaching program that was meticulously planned and executed.

Training and Coaching in Waves:

NetApp KCS journey started with a small, enthusiastic group of engineers, managers, and directors being trained on the methodology. This core group took upon themselves the responsibility to evangelize KCS and ignite the interest of other engineers and managers in the program. This was done by effectively communicating and displaying the benefits of KCS--which includes, improved customer success with our self-service portal, reduced time to resolve customer issues, and opportunity to continually improve our products, based on insights gained from customer problem areas.

Coaches Made it Happen:

We trained our engineers in waves; each wave comprising of 50 to 100 engineers. The training sessions were followed by extensive 1 to1 coaching by a dedicated group of coaches. Each wave produced coaches that could train and coach the subsequent wave of engineers, thereby setting in motion an organized and effective coaching methodology. Our Coaches are our secret sauce to change management.  Instead of running this as a top-down program, we’ve run it bottoms up with our Coaches.  They are the de facto leaders of our KCS Program at the local level and everything goes through them.  That is one of the primary reasons our subsequent digital transformation has been so successful.

KCSv6 Licensing

We also have a licensing program that provides our engineers increased privileges in the authoring system based on their understanding of the KCS methodology and the proficiency they exhibit in following processes and addressing customer issues. Through our world class coaching and licensing program, we were able to bring in systemic changes to the way our support team functions. Here are some of our successes:

90% support engineers licensed
100% Coaches licensed
98% Support Leadership Licensed
90% of our Knowledge Articles are available for use on our self-service portal (30% increase from last year)
Our time to publish has reduced to 1/10^th of what it was in early 2020.
Our publishing rate has increased by 10x

Why you should follow NetApp Assist

nivitha — Wed, 03 Feb 2021 05:01:43 GMT

At NetApp, we believe in the Latin phrase Scientia potentia est – Knowledge is Power.

Hence, NetApp’s Digital Support Team works closely with our Technical Experts and Knowledge Domain Experts to create and improve the Knowledge Base and Support Site for customers' success.

We also share NetApp knowledge and work on bridging the knowledge gaps via our social media accounts – Facebook page and Twitter handle – NetApp Assist.

Here are 10 reasons why you should follow NetApp Assist and what you can expect from us:

Technical and support information on NetApp products, services, features and enhancements from our Experts
Latest solutions, how-to procedures, workarounds and answers available in the Knowledge Base
Top-viewed articles in each domain
Learning, instructional and support-related KB TV videos. For more information, see the blog on NetApp KB TV
NetApp Blogs
Digital Support Blogs
Information on Digital Support's services
Tech Tips
Tech Talks and Webinars
Announcements; click here to see our latest announcement

So follow NetApp Assist and help us empower you with NetApp Knowledge.

Re: 2021 Stevie® Awards Winners - NetApp Support Site and Delivery!

Rizwan-IIPL — Tue, 02 Feb 2021 13:45:25 GMT

Great Congratulation

Getting started with Tech Preview of NetApp ONTAP Storage Connector for Cisco Intersight

sree — Mon, 05 Apr 2021 00:08:47 GMT

The most awaited NetApp ONTAP Connector with Cisco Intersight Technical Preview is out and comes with exciting new approach to manage your FlexPod from a single pane of view.

Cisco Intersight is the Cloud based system management as a service that really allows IT to operate at scale at speed beyond human limitations. Cisco Intersight capabilities include Intuitive experience, enhanced support, proactive guidance, secure and extensible SaaS. Through Device Connector Technology Cisco Intersight extends these capabilities to third party devices. VMWare Integrations are already available in Cisco Intersight using this technology. NetApp ONTAP connector is integrated with Cisco Intersight Assist, to extend these capabilities for NetApp ONTAP storage environment.

The architecture of the Integration starts with the instance of Active IQ Unified Manager deployed in your datacenter to manage one or more ONTAP Clusters. Cisco Intersight assist with NetApp ONTAP Connector is deployed as a virtual appliance on-premises. This ONTAP Connector acts as your onsite data collector to transmit data to the cloud. The ONTAP connector is really mapping the Intersight APIs to that of AIQ UM and your ONTAP storage by following NetApp’s latest REST API standards and object representations. So once your storage data is up there with Intersight, UI-SDK (built for NetApp Storage Inventory) enables you to get full access to the key attributes of the NetApp storage from Intersight Inventory view.

This collaboration with Cisco is really looking to make sure that we grow the ONTAP storage support with Cisco Intersight but do that in a way that is complementary to NetApp storage Management tools that you would traditionally have in your environment with NetApp and make sure that in doing so we are well represented into the Intersight eco-system.

Here is a link to the video to can help you Get started with the Tech Preview of NetApp ONTAP Storage for Cisco Intersight.

https://tv.netapp.com/detail/video/6228082818001

Minimum Tech Preview Hardware & software Requirement

Component	Type	Version
Hypervisor	VMware vSphere	7.0
Hypervisor	VMware vSphere	6.7
Cisco Intersight	Advantage Tier	Monitoring NetApp Storage from Cisco Intersight
Cisco Intersight	Premium Tier	Orchestrate workflows across physical compute, storage and virtualization environment.
Cisco UCS	Standalone (without Fabric Interconnect) C-Series M5 claimed in Intersight	Cisco IMC Software 3.1 and later
Cisco UCS	Standalone (without Fabric Interconnect) C-Series M4 claimed in Intersight	Cisco IMC Software 3.0(4) and later
Cisco Nexus/MDS	Cisco MDS, Cisco Nexus, Cisco Nexus-UP	Nexus 9.3(5), MDS 8.4(1a)
NetApp Array	AFF A400, A800, A700, A700s, A300, A220, C190	ONTAP 9.7
NetApp Array	FAS 9000, 8700, 8300, 8200, 2700	ONTAP 9.7
NetApp Software	AIQ Unified Manager	9.8 (Will be available by Tech Preview start)

Lab Configuration minimum requirements

Minimum Intersight Tech Preview Configuration

Lab Topology Examples

This example shows an option where one or more C220 servers are connected to Nexus 93180YC-FX switches with a converged (IP and FCoE) connection. A C220 M5 would contain either the VIC 1455 or 1457 at 10 or 25 Gbps. A C220 M4 would contain a VIC 1225 at 10 Gbps. The Nexus 93180YC-FX is used for both FC SAN and LAN switching. If the fully redundant configuration with vPC is used only one link to each switch (2 of the 4 ports on the VIC 1455/57) can be used since the links are carrying FCoE. Since the VIC FCoE is setup in the Cisco IMC on the server, initiator WWPNs could be queried programmatically in this configuration. Since this is a Tech Preview, it would be acceptable to use only one switch and one storage controller.

This example is similar to the one in the previous slide, except instead of using FCoE from the VIC, a third-party FC card from Emulex or Qlogic (listed as supported in the C220 Spec Sheets) is used to connect the FC to the 93180YC-FX which is again used for both SAN and LAN switching. Since this is a Tech Preview, it would be acceptable to use only one switch and one storage controller.

In this example, an MDS switch is used for the FC switching. Because of this any Nexus switch that supports 10 or 25 Gbps interfaces can be used for the LAN switching. Again, since this is a Tech Preview, it would be acceptable to use only one switch and one storage controller.

Claim NetApp ONTAP Storage from Cisco Intersight

Here is a link to video that demo's the claim process.

https://tv.netapp.com/detail/video/6228080442001

Start with using your existing NetApp Active IQ Unified manager 9.8 instance and connect to Cisco Intersight.

Note: Ensure that API Gateway is enabled in Active IQ Unified Manager(Settings / General / Feature Settings)

Step 1: License tier Check.

Select Settings->Licensing
A minimum of Advantage tier license is required to enable monitoring of the NetApp storage object via widget and from Storage inventory.
Premium tier licensee is required to orchestrate workflows across physical compute, storage and virtual environment.

Step 2: Claim the AIQ UM device

In Admin TAB Select Targets-> Claim a New Target
Select Storage -> NetApp Active IQ Unified Manager and Click Start
Enter the HostName/IP for the device
Enter the user credentials and click Claim
Ensure that the storage device status is connected.

Tech Preview Feature Introduction

The primary features introduced in this release of NetApp ONTAP Storage Integration with Cisco Intersight are monitoring of NetApp Storage Inventory and perform workflow Orchestration for NetApp ONTAP storage from Cisco Intersight via NetApp AIQUM device, which is claimed by Cisco Intersight.

Support for SAN and NAS storage protocols

Supports SAN (FC, ISCSI) and NAS(NFS) Protocols, Meaning Both SAN and NAS objects can be now monitored and managed from Cisco Intersight.

Monitoring ONTAP Storage

Here is a link to video that demo's the Monitoring of NetApp ONTAP Storage from Cisco Intersight.

https://tv.netapp.com/detail/video/6228096841001

ONTAP Storage can be monitored from Cisco Intersight from the Dashboard widgets or Storage inventory tab.

Storage Widgets:

Three Storage widgets are available in this release to monitor the

Storage Version Summary
Top 5 Arrays by Utilization
Top Volumes by Utilization

Storage Version Summary: View the ONTAP Model and version summary of all the ONTAP storage arrays connected via the Active IQ Unified Manager

Top 5 Arrays by Utilization: List of the top 5 ONTAP Storage Arrays based on utilization

Top 5 Volumes by Utilization: List of the top 5 ONTAP Storage Volumes across all the ONTAP Clusters in the storage inventory listed based on Utilization.

NetApp ONTAP Storage Inventory

ONTAP Storage Inventory presents a general view and an Inventory view. NetApp Storage objects in the inventory view are listed in two Sections

Hardware Section:

Nodes
Physical Ports (Ethernet and Fiber Channel)
Disks

Logical Section:

Storage Virtual Machine
Aggregates
Logical Interfaces
Volumes
LUNs
Snapshots
SAN Initiator Groups
Export Policy
Licensee

Storage Inventory General View

Storage Orchestration:

Below is a link to demo Orchestration of NetApp ONTAP Storage Workflows from Cisco Intersight

https://tv.netapp.com/detail/video/6228095945001

Cisco Intersight enables Orchestration of workflows across the physical Compute, Storage and Virtualization environments. Reference workflows are available out of box for you to orchestrate NetApp Storage objects workflows and Storage workflows for VMware VMFS and NFS datastores.

The New, Update and Remove Hypervisor Datastore workflows combine Storage and Virtualization tasks and enable you to create, expand and delete both VMFS and NFS datastores
The New, Remove and Update Storage Host workflows enable you to manage SAN Initiator groups
The New and remove export Policy workflows enable you to manage Export Policies required NFS
The New Storage Virtual Machine workflows enables you to create SVM, enable FC, ISCSI and NFS services and gives you an option to create a SVM Management LIF.
The New Storage Logical Interfaces workflows enable you to create either or both IP and FC logical interfaces for your SVM.
Using the vSphere OVF deploy workflow you can deploy a Virtual Machine using an OVF template on NetApp Storage configured as NFS or VMFS datastore.

Reference Workflows

Reference workflow	#Tasks
New HyperVisor DataStore	1. Create New Storage LUN or Volume. 2 Connect Storage to Host. 3. Create NFS and VMFS DataStore
Update HyperVisor DataStore	1. Get Hypervisor Datastore 2. Find Storage LUN/Volume by ID 3. Expand Storage 4. Expand Hypervisor Datastore
Remove HyperVisor DataStore	1. Remove a VMFS DataStore 2. Find Storage by ID 3. Disconnect LUN from StorageHost
New Storage VM	1. Create New SVM and services
New Logical Interfaces	1. Create New IP Interfaces 2. Create New FC Interfaces
New Storage Host	1. Add new Storage host. 2. Add WWNs or IQNs
Upgrade Storage Host	Disconnect or Connect WWNs or IQNs
Remove Storge Host	1. Remove WWNs or IQNs 2. Remove Storage host
New Export Policy	1. New Storage Export Policy. 2. Add Export Policy to Volume
Remove Export Policy	1. Remove Export Policy
Create VM from OVF on Hypervisor datastore	1. Create New VM on a NFS or VMFS datastore.

20 NetApp ONTAP Storage Tasks are available in the Cisco Intersight storage Library. Storage Administrators can use these tasks and build custom-defined workflows as per your operational needs

NetApp Storage Management Tasks Implemented from Cisco Intersight

Task Name	Task Details
Add Storage Export Policy to Volume	Add an export policy to a volume with Storage Virtual Machine name, Volume name, Export Policy name as the inputs. On successful execution Volume name and Export policy added are generated as outputs.
Connect Initiators to Storage Host	Connect a WWN or IQN list to storage host or iGroup. Inputs are host or iGroup name and list of WWNs or IQNs. Outputs generated are host/iGroup name created, IQN or WWN list associated with the host or iGroup. Task can be used with either WWNs or IQNs. For non-NetApp ONTAP Storage devices if both inputs are given then WWNs are given priority and added.
Expand Storage LUN	Expand a storage LUN with LUN path, Storage Virtual Machine name and LUN size as the inputs. On successful execution path and size of the expanded LUN are generated as outputs.
Expand Storage Volume	Expand a volume with volume name and size as inputs. On successful execution, volume name and size are generated as outputs.
Find NetApp IGroup LUN Map	Find if an Initiator Group is mapped to a LUN with give initiator Group name, Storage Virtual Machine name as the inputs. If initiator Group is mapped to any LUNs then initiator Group name and list of LUN names are generated as outputs, else task will fail with an error "No LUN mapped to the Initiator Group".
New Storage Export Policy	Create a storage export policy with storage virtual machine name, export policy name, Client Match List, Superuser Security Type, list of protocols, list of Read Only export policy rules, list of Read Write export policy rules as the inputs. On successful execution name of the export policy created is generated as output.
New Storage Fibre Channel Interface	Create a FC interface with interface name, Storage Virtual Machine name, Data Protocol and location properties as the inputs. On successful execution Interface Name, WWNN, WWPN are generated as outputs.
New Storage Host	Create a storage host or iGroup with host or iGroup name and list of WWNs and IQNs to be associated with it as input. Outputs are host or iGroup name, and associated IQN or WWN list. NOTE: iGroup is referred as Host for input.
New Storage IP Interface	Create a storage IP interface with IP interface name, interface IP address, interface netmask, ipspace name, storage virtual machine name and location properties as the inputs. On successful execution interface name, interface IP address, interface netmask is generated as outputs.
New Storage LUN	Create a storage LUN with inputs as LUN name, Volume name, Operating System name, Storage Virtual Machine name, size of LUN. On successful execution LUN path, NAAID and LUN capacity are generated as outputs
New Storage LUN ID	For NetApp ONTAP Storage: Connect storage LUN to a iGroup with Inputs as LUN name and iGroup name. On successful execution iGroup name, LUN name and LUN number are generated as outputs. NOTE: iGroup is referred as Host for input. Other Storage devices: Connect storage volume to a host with volume name, host name and LUN number as inputs. On successful execution, host name, volume name and LUN number allocated to connection are generated as outputs.
New Storage Virtual Machine	Create a Storage Virtual Machine with Storage Virtual Machine name and list of protocols to be enabled as inputs. optional parameters for the Management interface include Interface name, Interface IP address, Interface Netmask, Broadcast Domain, location Node name as the inputs. On successful execution Storage Virtual Machine name, Storage Virtual Machine root Volume name, Management IP address, Protocols enabled are generated as outputs.
New Storage Volume	Create a storage volume with volume name and volume size as inputs. Generates the volume name and volume size as outputs.
Remove Storage Export Policy	Remove a storage export policy with export policy name and storage virtual machine name as the inputs. On successful execution name of the export policy removed is generated as output.
Remove Storage Host	Remove a storage host or iGroup with host or iGroup name as input. On successful execution, the host or iGroup name deleted is generated as output. NOTE: iGroup is referred as Host for input.
Remove Storage LUN	Remove a LUN with LUN path and storage virtual machine name as the inputs. On successful execution the path for the LUN removed is generated as output.
Remove Storage LUN ID	For NetApp ONTAP Storage: Disconnect Storage LUN from a iGroup with LUN name and iGroup name as inputs. On Successful execution iGroup name and the LUN Path are generated as outputs. NOTE: iGroup is referred as Host for input. Other Storage devices: Disconnect storage Volume from a storage Host with Volume name and Host name as inputs. On successful execution, host name and volume name are generated as outputs.
Remove Storage Volume	Remove Storage Volume with Volume name as input. On Successful execution, the deleted Volume and Snapshot name is generated as output For NetApp ONTAP storage only deleted Volume name will be listed.

Use Cases

Use Case 1: View the NetApp Storage Inventory and Widgets after setup

Deploy Intersight Assist OVA (OnPrem task in customer vCenter Environment)
Add NetApp AIQ UM devices in Intersight Assist
Navigate the NetApp Storage Inventory
Add Widgets for Storage on Monitor Dashboard

Use Case 2: NetApp Storage orchestration to setup Storage Virtual Machines/ logical Interfaces/ Volume/ LUN / Host or iGroup / Export policy

Add vCenter target to Intersight via Intersight Assist (OVA deployed in Use Case 1 above)
Create storage SVM/ IP or FC Interfaces/ export policy/ Host(iGroup)/ Volume/ LUN on NetApp Storage
Add host to vCenter cluster and scan for Datastore in vCenter

Use Case 3: Workflow Designer Free Form

With NetApp Storage Added + vCenter environment you can custom build workflows using the tasks provided in the workflow designer. Navigate to the Orchestration tab in Intersight and select Create New Workflow.

To benefit from all these features in Cisco Intersight, claim your existing NetApp Active IQ Unified manager 9.8 instance and connect to Cisco Intersight.

Thank you

Credits

John George |TME | Cisco : Helping with the Lab topologies.

About Sree:

Sree is a Senior Solutions Architect at NetApp. She has more than 12 years of experience in data center infrastructure solutions, both in traditional and in hybrid/public cloud space. She collaborates with Marketing, Product management and engineering teams to develop and deliver technical marketing product material, which includes Reference Architectures, technical Report, presentations, blogs, demo videos and white papers. This material is aimed at educating customers, partners or sales team. She has a bachelor’s degree in Computer Science and an artist in the field of Kuchipudi dance, an Indian classical dance form from Andhra Pradesh. She enjoys organic gardening, hiking and running.

2021 Stevie® Awards Winners - NetApp Support Site and Delivery!

Laura_C — Mon, 01 Feb 2021 17:11:25 GMT

The NetApp Support Site and Support Delivery win multiple awards from Stevie® Awards for Sales & Customer Service.

Tech ONTAP Podcast Episode 277: NetApp StorageGRID Updates - SG100

parisi — Thu, 11 Feb 2021 18:11:58 GMT

This week, NetApp PM Manager Steven Pruchniewski (@webscalesteve) and StorageGRID developers Morgan Mears (mmears@netapp.com) and Sam Fink (sam.fink@netapp.com) join us to discuss the latest StorageGRID updates, as well as the new SG100 entry-level platform.

System Manager 9.8 – New ONTAP Feature Integrations

YizhaoZ — Wed, 17 Feb 2021 20:10:58 GMT

In NetApp® ONTAP® System Manger 9.8, we integrated MetroCluster IP configurations and FSA (File System Analytics) features from the ONTAP 9.8 release. Let’s take a look at them together.

The MetroCluster configuration and setup was a daunting task in the past but now it has become so simple. The process has been streamlined and using the System Manager 9.8 UI, you can control and execute the process from a single place.

FSA is a new feature in ONTAP 9.8, and you can access it within the Volumes -> Explorer tab UI within System Manager 9.8. It helps you to visualize file level access activities, and you can detect any anomaly right away for potential ransomware activities.

In System Manager 9.8, one of the most asked questions is around NetApp Snapshot™ size display. You might have noticed from the Snapshot UI that the size information is not included in the new interface.

The most common reason to care about Snapshot copy sizes is when you need to delete some Snapshot copies to free up space in a volume. The calculations to determine how much space can be recovered by deleting particular Snapshot copies are time-consuming and can be complicated. And because the Snapshot size might lead administrators to inaccurate conclusions, System Manager 9.8 and the ONTAP 9.8 APIs no longer display the size of Snapshot copies. If you wish to see this information regarding the Snapshot copy sizes, you can use the CLI to extract this info.

That’s it for now. Thank you for following this series of mini-blogs on System Manager 9.8, hopefully they were useful to you. Please do not hesitate to reach out to your account team if you ever run into additional questions or simply want to share your feedback with us.

Where can I learn more?

Please see a list of useful resources at this link.

Tech ONTAP Podcast Episode 276: ONTAP 9.8 SAN Updates

parisi — Fri, 22 Jan 2021 13:00:00 GMT

This week, Mike Peppers and Praneeth Kavuri join us to discuss SAN and what's new for block storage in ONTAP 9.8.

Single-Click Firmware Update in System Manager 9.8

YizhaoZ — Wed, 27 Jan 2021 03:12:04 GMT

For those who have updated the disk and shelf firmware, you are not alone feeling that the process is not intuitive. In NetApp® ONTAP® System Manager 9.8, we have implemented a new interface where the update process has never been easier-it can be done within the UI with a single click. Let’s pull up Cluster Overview and click the three dot icon on the top right and select ONTAP Update. Next, navigate to the firmware update page. After we select the firmware file from either a server location or the local machine and click Update, it will take care of the rest in the backend and show you the status when it’s done.

In the next blog, let’s take a look at some of the ONTAP 9.8 feature integrations in System Manager 9.8, including the new File System Analytics feature.

Where can I learn more?

Please see a list of useful resources at this link.

Hardware Visualization in System Manager 9.8

YizhaoZ — Thu, 21 Jan 2021 18:55:56 GMT

If you ever need to troubleshoot a physical connection issue where a cable could be disconnected to either host or backend switches or storage, now this can be viewed in the Hardware Visualization interface in NetApp® ONTAP® System Manager 9.8. You can interact with the objects in the UI and visualize the status of hardware components status.

To see this in action, please check out the video demo.

In the next blog, let’s take a look at how easy a firmware update can be with the System Manager 9.8.

Where can I learn more?

Please see a list of useful resources at this link.

Success starts in your language

ljulie — Fri, 15 Jan 2021 18:00:01 GMT

Digital Support Q&A Series kicks off the new year with Anna Schlegel, VP, Global Portfolio-to-Market Lifecycle.

Tech ONTAP Podcast Episode 275: ONTAP 9.8 Security Updates (featuring IPsec!)

parisi — Fri, 15 Jan 2021 13:00:00 GMT

This week, Juan Mojica and Matt Trudewind (@ntapmatt) join us to talk about the latest security updates for ONTAP 9.8, including IPsec!

NetApp Support Site - Jan. 7 & 14, 2021 - Site Release

Laura_C — Thu, 14 Jan 2021 20:14:43 GMT

Weekly support site release updates

What is New in Networking in System Manager 9.8?

YizhaoZ — Tue, 19 Jan 2021 19:20:44 GMT

Ever had issue figuring out the exact network connection down the port, protocol, storage VM (SVM) and volume level? NetApp® ONTAP® System Manager 9.8 implemented a new network interface where all network mappings are laid out and you can interact with each object.

With the help of the network mapping feature implemented in the System Manager 9.8, you can visualize the exact network connection by clicking on any object within the graph. You can see additional performance information by clicking on the three dot icon so that it can be displayed to easily identify any overloaded port situation.

Let’s address a couple of common questions around networking in System Manager 9.8.

How do I add or remove broadcast domains? And where is the subnet based network interface?

For a simpler user experience, ONTAP 9.8 automatically detects how nodes are cabled and maps the ports into broadcast domains. YOu no longer need to create broadcast domains manually. Because subnet-based network provisioning flows were rarely used based on the NetApp Active IQ data, System Manager 9.8 no longer exposes subnet-based network interfaces. If you wish to manually configure these settings, it can be done through the ONTAP CLI.

How is port selected for Network LIFs?

ONTAP 9.8 has a new feature where it can automatically select a port for new network interfaces, so the port choice is no longer presented during provisioning in System Manager 9.8. If you wish to manually pick a port, it can be done in the CLI. You also have an option to move or rehome a port through the UI after the original provisioning, especially when you see this icon that indicates the LIF is not on the home port, by clicking Revert to fix it.

To see this in action, please check out this video demo. In the next blog, let’s take a look at how the hardware visualization works.

Where can I learn more?

Please see a list of useful resources at this link.

What Are the New Features in System Manager 9.8?

YizhaoZ — Fri, 15 Jan 2021 18:37:32 GMT

There are many new, exciting features in the NetApp® ONTAP® 9.8 release and you can view the entire list of them in the release notes. Many of them are integrated with NetApp ONTAP System Manager 9.8 and here is a list of new features in System Manager 9.8. We will talk about each of them separately in this mini blog series.

Network visualization – a quick way to visualize your network map and connections

Hardware visualization–visualizing hardware status from the interactive interface

Single-click firmware update–a firmware update has never been easier

NetApp MetroCluster IP Configuration–set up and use MetroCluster with simplified processes

FSA (File System Analytics)–visualizes your file-level access activities

Data protection enhancements – added additional functions to perform reserve resync and reactivate a source SVM for disaster recovery setup

In the next blog, we will start with the network visualization feature and then go down the list to talk about each of these new features.

Where can I learn more?

Please see a list of useful resources at this link.

We value your KB Feedback

nivitha — Tue, 12 Jan 2021 12:12:34 GMT

NetApp Knowledge Base (KB) has demand-driven and value-added Support content on NetApp products and services. With the KB content – solutions, answers, and procedures – created and updated every day by NetApp's Technical Experts and Knowledge Domain Experts, we strive to provide our customers with the best self-service experience.

As Bill Gates rightly said in his TED Talk, “We all need people who will give us feedback. That's how we improve”.

At NetApp, we follow the Collective Ownership model for our Knowledge Base, and strongly believe that the best people to provide feedback to help us improve the KB site are the audience that use our content. That is why we value every KB feedback and use our customers' feedback and experience to continually improve the KB site.

The NetApp Knowledge Base Team works with the Knowledge Domain Experts to review customer feedback, address customers' concerns, and update the KB content.

Here are the feedback mechanisms to rate, comment and provide suggestions for KB content:

On the home page of the KB site, you can use the click here link for feedback. This link opens to Help and Feedback.

You can also directly click on Help & Feedback, available at the bottom-right corner of all KB pages.

Help & Feedback

Under Help & Feedback, we have the:

KB Request Form: If there is a value-added article that is important to you and it is not available in the KB site, use this form to submit a request to add the article. The NetApp Knowledge Base team will review the request, work with the Knowledge Domain Experts, and inform you if the article can be reinstated in the KB site.
Provide KB Site Feedback: Use this form to provide feedback on your experience with the KB site. Please let us know if you see any areas of improvement in the KB site.

Feedback for KB Articles

Use the Feedback section available at the end of an article:

To rate an article,
To comment on an article,
To let us know if an article needs updates/corrections, and
If you have any questions on the article content

For detailed information on the Help and Feedback channels available on the KB site, see Help and Feedback.

When viewing articles on the NetApp Support Site, you can provide KB feedback by using the Submit Feedback button on the top of the article.

Where can I learn more about Active IQ Unified Manager?

jacoba — Wed, 03 Mar 2021 05:18:13 GMT

Where can I learn more about Active IQ Unified Manager?

Tech ONTAP Podcast Episode 274: NetApp Ansible Updates Winter - 2020

parisi — Fri, 08 Jan 2021 13:00:00 GMT

This week, NetApp's Ansible expert David Blackwell (@blackwelldavidc) joins us to discuss the latest work being done on the NetApp Ansible modules and how to start learning Ansible yourself.

For a transcribed version, go to this link and use the search field to find keywords.

If you have questions, comments or show suggestions, email podcast@netapp.com

We’re available on:

How to Upgrade to ONTAP 9.8

YizhaoZ — Tue, 12 Jan 2021 19:41:35 GMT

Upgrading ONTAP has never been easier

10 Common Questions about Provisioning in ONTAP System Manager 9.8

YizhaoZ — Fri, 08 Jan 2021 19:34:04 GMT

The new UI has streamlined and simplified workflows to enhance user experience. Here are 10 common questions related to provisioning. You might have raised similar questions in the past; let’s take a look at them together.

Where are the aggregates in NetApp ONTAP System Manager 9.8?

One thing you might notice right away is that “aggregates” don’t show up in the UI anymore. “Aggregate” is an ONTAP®-specific term, which is not commonly known if you are new to NetApp®. The System Manager 9.8 UI now groups aggregates by disk type and presents them as “local tiers” along with the cluster’s “cloud tiers”. These can be viewed in the Tiers menu.

How can I create a new local tier?

When you have spare disks in a cluster, System Manager recommends how to arrange the disks into local tiers according to NetApp’s best practices. If you need to create a new local tier, just click “Add Local Tier” to review the recommendation. If you need a local tier configured in some way that’s not aligned with ONTAP best practices, it can be done by using the ONTAP CLI or REST APIs.

In addition, If you feel the need to evacuate a local tier, you can do so by moving or deleting all volumes in that local tier.

How do I pick a local tier during provisioning?

ONTAP now automatically handles provisioning new storage in the right local tiers based on your requirements, so you are not required to pick a specific local tier during provisioning. And, if you really need to pick a particular local tier, the CLI and APIs still expose that capability. You can also move the volume later to a different local tier by using System Manager, if needed.

What is the new Performance service level option in the provisioning UI?

If you’re creating a new volume or LUNs, you can select the performance policy you need for the new storage. This will guide ONTAP to choose the preferred disk media type and allocate it from the local tier with the most capacity and performance headroom that satisfies the provisioning request for workload placement. This is also known as quality of service (QoS) management, which is very beneficial and helps you avoid noisy neighbor and bully/victim scenarios. If you don’t feel that you need QoS, you can select “None” in the performance service level option.

How does ONTAP pick the best local tier?

ONTAP knows the maximum limits per node, per cluster, and is always current. ONTAP understands the current and historical performance of a given node in a cluster and will intelligently place data based on what is being requested. ONTAP also looks at storage capacity to make sure that there is enough room, and then looks to see if the workload latency requirements can be met on that node and disk type.

ONTAP picks the best local tier for the provisioned volume based on: capacity, LIF connectivity of the nodes serving each local tier and utilization, whether the local tier is or isn’t NetApp MetroCluster mirrored, whether the local tier has the required FabricPool cloud connectivity, and so on. For the service-level provisioning (QoS policy assigned during provisioning in System Manager), placement also takes into account disk type (only SSD-based local tiers are able to deliver Extreme, for example.) To choose between the same type of local tier , the algorithm looks at available space and available performance headroom. In System Manager 9.8, we actually assign a QoS policy when you pick a performance service level and only the available options are given based on the disk types available in the cluster.

What are the new default efficiency settings?

In addition to the automated placement changes, System Manager now uses platform smart defaults for more of the storage options. For example, thin provisioning is turned on for NetApp AFF arrays and turned off for NetApp FAS arrays.

How are the capacity numbers defined in System Manager?

ONTAP has several ways of understanding what’s used and available. To make this easier, System Manager now displays “logical used” and “physical available” space for local tiers. The data reduction ratios reflect logical versus physical used, including space savings from NetApp Snapshot™ copies. There are other ways to view the capacity data as well, by using the ONTAP CLI and REST APIs.

How do I configure Auto-Resize?

Making changes to the auto resize option is also easy; it can be done within the Edit Volume menu and you can pick the auto grow and auto shrink sizes as you see fit.

Can I evacuate a local tier in 9.8?

Yes. You can delete all volumes residing in the same local tier

Where can I get help if I run into more questions?

You can reach out to your NetApp Field contact or leave a comment below.

Please also see a list of useful resources at this link.

Bugs Online is now available for NetApp HCI, SolidFire and Element Software

ljulie — Tue, 22 Dec 2020 20:35:38 GMT

We are proud to announce that we have implemented Bugs Online for NetApp HCI, SolidFire and Element Software!

Bugs Online is a tool that product teams use to document known issues/bugs, it is widely used by our customers and support teams to search for bugs that may impact our products.

Previously, the known issues/bugs were manually tracked in a spreadsheet and then converted to PDF for our customers. Now, you can find these known issues/bugs within the Bugs Online tool on the NetApp Support Site.

To access the Bugs Online, simply go to the NetApp Support Site, find the product (example: Element Software) and look for the Bugs Online Tab.

NetApp Support Site - Dec. 17, 2020 Site Release

Laura_C — Mon, 21 Dec 2020 16:08:36 GMT

Weekly release update

NetApp KBTV :: Digital Support Q&A Series

ljulie — Fri, 18 Dec 2020 20:41:33 GMT

We're excited to release a new video series called Digital Support Q&A. In this series of videos, we sit down with Digital Support Specialists to talk about how they use their skill set to improve the overall NetApp Digital Support Experience.

If there's a topic you would like us to cover or a specialist you would like to us talk to, please leave a comment below!

Digital Support Q&A Series Playlist

System Manager 9.8 Interface Tips

YizhaoZ — Thu, 18 Feb 2021 20:32:29 GMT

The UI has been redesigned to create a simple and clean interface that delivers similar functionality to the previous NetApp® ONTAP® System Manager interfaces, except that ONTAP is now much more intelligent Let’s take the volume page as an example, although a similar design philosophy is applied throughout System Manager 9.8.

You might realize right away that there are less columns in the new UI compared to the classic UI. This is because most of the column’s information is tightly integrated into the sub menus to present a much cleaner interface. In addition, you can sort each column and enable the filter to search for a specific keyword in each column. A download option is also added to the interface to allow you to quickly put objects into a CSV file. For example, you can narrow down the volumes view by filtering a specific SVM name and then download all the information seen in the UI to a CSV file.

To access additional details of the volumes, you can either click on the expansion arrow to quickly see the volume information,

or click on the volume name and that will bring you to another interface with additional functionalities, such as setting up NetApp Snapshot™ copies.

A shortcut to access a list of commonly used functions, such as vol move or set up protections, is to move your cursor over the volume name field and then click on the three-dot icon.

If you need to select certain objects on the UI, make sure to move the cursor over the name field so that the menu will pop out for selection.

One new feature that we can give you a sneak peek of is volume recovery for deleted NetApp FlexVol® or FlexGroup volumes. It is available by clicking Show Deleted Volumes and then clicking Recover.

The performance charts on the dashboard received additional updates in 9.7 and 9.8. In addition to displaying live performance data in the hourly view, we now record performance data up to a year and provide an option to download the data in CSV files. You can also highlight a portion of the performance data to zoom in for a detailed view.

A common question is where to find the junction path – a quick way to do this is to click on the show/hide button from the volume page where the mount path can be enabled and shown from the UI. And they can be changed within the edit volume UI as well.

If you use the filter feature to find specific objects in certain columns, the 9.8 UI will also memorize your inputs and retain them automatically.

Lastly, the global search bar is especially useful to quickly access different function or objects in the UI.

Where can I learn more?

Please see a list of useful resources at this link.

Let's talk about few common questions on provisioning with the new System Manager 9.8 in the next blog.

Where can I learn more about System Manager 9.8?

YizhaoZ — Fri, 19 Feb 2021 20:13:42 GMT

Useful resources

Tech ONTAP Podcast Episode 273: Taking a Closer Look at the NetApp ONTAP Manageability Portfolio

parisi — Fri, 18 Dec 2020 13:00:00 GMT

This week, Mr. Manageability Chris Gebhardt and Manageability PM Yuvaraju B join us to discuss the ONTAP Manageability portfolio and where each product fits in your data management environment.

Tech ONTAP Podcast Episode 272: NetApp Keystone Flex

parisi — Fri, 11 Dec 2020 14:30:03 GMT

This week, we discuss NetApp Keystone Flex with Arun Raman (arun.raman@netapp.com) and Pavan Panduranga (pavan.panduranga@netapp.com) and how the “pay as you go” subscription model is changing how customers think about buying storage.

Self-Managing Storage: Part 5 Understanding Security Lifecycle Management

jacoba — Fri, 11 Dec 2020 11:55:07 GMT

Welcome to the last part of the “Self-Managing Storage” blog series. In this blog, let us try to understand how Active IQ Unified Manager simplifies Security Management through lifecycle management.

Self-Managing Storage: Part 4 Understanding Capacity Lifecycle Management

jacoba — Fri, 11 Dec 2020 11:53:46 GMT

Welcome to part 4 of the “Self Managing Storage” blog series. In this blog post, I will discuss how NetApp Active IQ Unified Manager simplifies capacity management through lifecycle management.

Self-Managing Storage: Part 3 Understanding Workload Performance Lifecycle Management

jacoba — Fri, 11 Dec 2020 10:45:58 GMT

Welcome to the third part of the “Self-Managing Storage” blog series. In this blog post, I explain Workload Performance Lifecycle Management and how Active IQ Unified Manager simplifies this management through lifecycle management.

Self-Managing Storage: Part 2 Understanding Storage Resource Performance Lifecycle Management

jacoba — Fri, 11 Dec 2020 10:39:59 GMT

Welcome to the second part of the “Self-Managing Storage” blog series. In this blog, we discuss Storage Resource Lifecycle Management (SRLM) and how Active IQ Unified Manager simplifies management with this function.

Self-Managing Storage:Part1 Understanding Active IQ Unified Manager Storage Lifecycle Management

jacoba — Fri, 11 Dec 2020 10:36:59 GMT

Welcome to part 1 of the “Self-Managing Storage” blog series. NetApp^® introduced a storage performance and capacity lifecycle management feature in Active IQ Unified Manager 9.7, and management actions have been further expanded in Active IQ Unified Manager 9.8.

This blog describes Storage Lifecycle Management, which forms an integral part of self-managing storage.

Active IQ Unified Manager Backup and Restore using ONTAP Snapshot copies

jacoba — Fri, 11 Dec 2020 10:35:33 GMT

Active IQ Unified Manager 9.8 now allows you to perform backup and restore using ONTAP^® Snapshot™ copies of the Unified Manager database. In this blog, we explore this feature in depth to help you understand how to use it.

Active IQ Unified Manager 9.8- Custom Reporting Using Excel

jacoba — Fri, 11 Dec 2020 10:30:27 GMT

In Active IQ Unified Manager 9.8, you can bring your own excel sheets with customized reports. With this feature, you can customize existing UM reports by creating a formula, charts, etc, and upload it back into UM. Now each time the report is created manually or through a schedule, the customized report will be generated with the latest updated values. You can use this feature in 3 simple steps.

In this blog, we will walk you through how to bring in your own Excel for custom reporting.

NetApp Support Site - Dec. 3 and 10th, 2020 Site Release

Laura_C — Thu, 10 Dec 2020 20:25:06 GMT

Weekly release updates

Tech ONTAP Podcast Episode 271: NetApp Active IQ Unified Manager 9.8 Updates

parisi — Fri, 04 Dec 2020 13:00:00 GMT

This week, NetApp Active IQ TME Jacob John Andethethu (jacob.a@netapp.com) joins us to discuss the latest updates with the NetApp Active IQ Unified Manager 9.8 release.

Tech ONTAP Podcast Episode 270: NetApp ONTAP File Systems Analytics

parisi — Mon, 30 Nov 2020 13:00:00 GMT

This week, we do a deep dive into the new ONTAP 9.8 feature in System Manager - File Systems Analytics - and why it's improving the lives of storage administrators.

NetApp KB TV

nivitha — Thu, 26 Nov 2020 05:34:32 GMT

At NetApp, we aim to continually provide the best customer experience with our Products, Services, Support, Documentation, and Knowledge Base.

The NetApp Support Center and Digital Support Team work together to produce quality – written and visual – Knowledge Base content. This content helps customers learn about NetApp products and find the information/solutions they are looking for. For customers that prefer video content, we have NetApp KB TV.

NetApp KB TV is the YouTube channel that hosts technical, learning, and support-related videos, covering a wide range of topics on NetApp Products and Support.

KB TV videos are created by NetApp’s Technical Experts, SMEs, and Digital Support Specialists.

On NetApp KB TV, you can see videos on:

Latest NetApp products
How-to procedures for NetApp products, their features, and enhancements
Troubleshooting solutions and workarounds
Answers to frequently asked questions
Configuration
Setup and maintenance
Tech Talks
Tech Tips
Learning and instructional content from NetApp Experts

You must check out the webinars called Knowledge and Know How with Support. At these webinars, NetApp’s Support Leaders and Experts share their knowledge as well as troubleshooting tips and tricks to help customers understand and manage their NetApp products.

NetApp KB TV has Playlists for different products and services. To view videos for a specific product, you can simply click on the Products’ Playlist and get the list of videos available.

To learn more about NetApp Support, NetApp Support Site, and NetApp Digital Support and Knowledge Programs, please see the respective playlists.

With these technical and support videos, our objective is to be proactive and help customers know their products and solutions.

Subscribe to NetApp KB TV to help us provide efficient self-service experience and be successful with NetApp.

Episode 269: Medical Imaging Workloads with NetApp Solutions

parisi — Mon, 30 Nov 2020 21:11:41 GMT

This week on the podcast, NetApp's Tony Turner drops by to talk about how NetApp solutions are driving successful deployments for medical imaging workloads.

NetApp Support Site - Nov. 19th, 2020 Site Release

Laura_C — Thu, 19 Nov 2020 18:47:56 GMT

Weekly release on support site

NetApp Support Site - Nov. 12th, 2020 Site Release

Laura_C — Mon, 16 Nov 2020 13:19:03 GMT

Weekly release update

Tech ONTAP Podcast Episode 268: NetApp FabricPool and S3 in ONTAP 9.8

parisi — Fri, 13 Nov 2020 13:00:00 GMT

This week on the podcast, we discuss the new changes in the ONTAP 9.8 release for NetApp's cloud tiering solution - FabricPool - and the official support for ONTAP's S3 server with TME John Lantz and Product Manager James Hunter!

Tech ONTAP Podcast Episode 267: SnapMirror Business Continuity (SM-BC) for ONTAP 9.8

parisi — Fri, 06 Nov 2020 16:00:00 GMT

This week, NetApp SnapMirror TME Cheryl George joins us to discuss the new SnapMirror Business Continuity (SM-BC) feature available in ONTAP 9.8.

Episode 266: NetApp ONTAP System Manager 9.8

parisi — Fri, 30 Oct 2020 15:00:00 GMT

This week, Mr. Manageability Chris Gebhardt and TME Yizhao Zhuang join us to discuss all the latest changes in ONTAP 9.8 for NetApp System Manager.

Episode 265: NetApp SnapMirror Cloud featuring ProLion

parisi — Fri, 23 Oct 2020 15:00:00 GMT

This week, NetApp TME Charlotte Brooks joins ProLion's CEO Robert Graf to discuss the new ONTAP feature SnapMirror Cloud and how it integrates with ProLion's backup features.

Find Digital Support Specialists at NetApp INSIGHT

ljulie — Tue, 20 Oct 2020 17:09:16 GMT

NetApp INSIGHT kicks off Monday Oct 26, 2020 and there’s still time to register! Catch all 9 technical sessions at NetApp INSIGHT presented by our Support Specialists

Tech ONTAP Podcast Episode 264: NetApp ONTAP SnapDiff

parisi — Fri, 16 Oct 2020 15:00:00 GMT

This week, NetApp Technical Directory Ling Zheng and TME Charlotte Brooks join me to talk about SnapDiff, as well as the latest version and what it helps ONTAP accomplish in the cloud.

NetApp Support Site - Oct. 8th and 15th, 2020 Site Release

Laura_C — Fri, 16 Oct 2020 12:44:28 GMT

Support site feature releases from Oct. 8 and 15.

Introducing NetApp ONTAP Storage integration with Cisco Intersight

sree — Fri, 16 Oct 2020 00:13:20 GMT

“Building a good customer experience does not happen by accident. It happens by design” by Clare Muscutt.

Tech ONTAP Podcast Episode 263: Virtualization in ONTAP - Fall 2020 Update

parisi — Fri, 09 Oct 2020 13:45:35 GMT

This week, NetApp ONTAP Virtualization PM Karl Konnerth (@konnerth) and Virtualization TME Chance Bingen (@CB8MyDataCenter) join me to discuss the latest updates to ONTAP for VMware virtualization integration, as well as what sessions they recommend for NetApp Insight 2020.

Tech ONTAP Podcast Episode 262 - See Spot Run (Your NetApp Cloud Infrastructure)

parisi — Mon, 05 Oct 2020 23:34:46 GMT

This week, Tomer Hadassi of newly acquired Spot joins us to discuss what Spot can do to save your organization money on their cloud implementations.

Tech ONTAP Podcast Episode 261: How DreamWorks Animation Creates New Worlds on NetApp ONTAP

parisi — Mon, 05 Oct 2020 23:29:06 GMT

This week, I was lucky enough to snag a long-time NetApp customer and engineering partner DreamWorks Animation to talk about how the studio leverages NetApp ONTAP to build some of the most creative and effects intensive CG animated films on the planet.

Tech ONTAP Podcast Episode 260: NetApp Insight 2020 Preview

parisi — Mon, 05 Oct 2020 23:21:26 GMT

This week, we invite the NetApp Insight team to talk to us about this year’s 100% virtual event and how not being there in person actually has some benefits!

NetApp Support Site - Oct. 1, 2020 Site Release

Laura_C — Thu, 01 Oct 2020 17:57:59 GMT

Support Site weekly release information for Oct. 1, 2020.

Re: NetApp Knowledge Base

loganb — Wed, 30 Sep 2020 17:50:12 GMT

My name is Logan and I am part of the Technical Support team.

I'd like to say thank you to the customers / partners who have provided feedback to the articles in the past few months, since our launch of our new and improved KB site.

I can personally say that I along with my colleagues have updated and improved many Articles based on your feedback.

Whether its a broken link, confusing info or to suggest new content, let us know and NetApp will Get it Done!

NetApp Knowledge Base

padmaprasad — Wed, 30 Sep 2020 17:05:45 GMT

A look at the capabilities and features of the new Knowledge Base

Re: NetApp Support Site Wins Overall Best Support Site in ASP Awards

leiz — Mon, 28 Sep 2020 02:49:13 GMT

Congratulations!!!

NetApp Support Site - Sep. 24, 2020 Site Release

Laura_C — Thu, 24 Sep 2020 18:13:18 GMT

Support Site weekly release updates.

NetApp Support Site Wins Overall Best Support Site in ASP Awards

Laura_C — Thu, 24 Sep 2020 18:45:20 GMT

The NetApp® Support Site won the inaugural Overall Best Support Site Award in the Association of Support Professionals (ASP) Best Websites Competition with the highest average scores in more categories than any other company.

New Blog – All Things Digital Support

Laura_C — Wed, 16 Sep 2020 14:17:02 GMT

Learn about the new digital support blog.