Feedback requested for Virtual Storage Console 2.0 Users

[robertim]

We're looking for feedback from  customers that have downloaded Virtual Storage Console and are using it. Any and all comments and feedback welcome.

[cgrossman]

No, I'm only trying to back up the VM, not the RDM.  However, with the RDM present, the backups are not working.  It appears the issue is that the SDW VSS provider is clashing with the VMWare Tools VSS provider.  I just found the above script and was thinking this might help, but I've got other issues that are preventing me from testing it right now.

[cgrossman]

I don't know how that script I posted a few posts back was supposed to work, but I modified it a little to work for me.  According to the documentation, any scripts in that folder will run in alphabetical order.  This was a problem, because alphabetically, post-thaw-script.bat runs before pre-freeze-script.bat.  So, if you put this script, named whatever you want, as the only script in the folder, it works, at least for me.

echo off
if "%1" == "freeze" goto doFreeze
goto doThaw
:doFreeze
NET Stop navssprv
"C:\Program Files\NetApp\SnapDrive\navssprv.exe" -r service /u
goto EOF
:doThaw
"C:\Program Files\NetApp\SnapDrive\navssprv.exe" -r service -a DOMAIN\Adminaccount -p domainadminpassword
NET Start navssprv
:EOF

When VMWare goes to take the snapshot, it sends the "freeze" parameter, and will stop the NetApp VSS provider service, and unregister it.  When it releases the snapshot, it will send the "thaw" parameter, which will then register the service and start it.

I've tested this on a W2K8 virtual machine with SnapDrive 6.3.  I can take a snapshot with VMWare as well as VSX 2.01.

[acistmedical]

looks like it works for me.

i just added 2 physical RDM to the VM yesterday and here is the log from nightly SMVI Backup:

2011-02-10 20:00:01,612 PROGRESS - Starting backup request
2011-02-10 20:00:02,222 INFO - Generating backupName for the scheduleJob 49a661ce-daff-4ae2-ab4e-f0325501c951 is backup_VM DS1 Datastore_20110210200002
2011-02-10 20:00:04,972 INFO - A VMware consistency snapshot will be performed on Virtual Machine BEP-2K8-SBM.
2011-02-10 20:00:06,503 INFO - A VMware consistency snapshot will be performed on Virtual Machine BEP-2K8-EX01.
2011-02-10 20:00:06,518 INFO - A VMware consistency snapshot will be performed on Virtual Machine BEP-2K8-EX01.
2011-02-10 20:00:06,518 WARN - Virtual Machine BEP-2K8-EX01 has disks attached via raw device mapping. These disks will not be backed up.
2011-02-10 20:00:06,597 PROGRESS - Backing up datastore(s) ([VM_DS1 (netfs://192.168.10.5//vol/VM_DS1/), VM_RDM (4d53fa5c-2951c6cf-8ea0-0025b3b08e5e)])
2011-02-10 20:00:06,597 PROGRESS - Backing up the following virtual machine(s) ([BEP-2K8-SBM, BEP-2K8-EX01])
2011-02-10 20:00:06,612 PROGRESS - The following virtual machines will have a VMware snapshot taken for consistency ([BEP-2K8-SBM, BEP-2K8-EX01])
2011-02-10 20:00:07,581 PROGRESS - Creating VMware snapshots for all virtual machines that are being backed up.
2011-02-10 20:00:27,268 PROGRESS - Creating storage snapshots for all datastores/virtual machines that are being backed up.
2011-02-10 20:00:28,956 PROGRESS - Removing VMware snapshots for all virtual machines that are being backed up.
2011-02-10 20:00:41,815 PROGRESS - Applying time based retention policy by deleting backup backup_VM DS1 Datastore_20110203200000
2011-02-10 20:00:42,627 PROGRESS - Removed backup with name "backup_VM DS1 Datastore_20110203200000"
2011-02-10 20:00:43,721 PROGRESS - Sent status notification message to [my email]
2011-02-10 20:00:43,752 PROGRESS - Storing logs for backup_VM DS1 Datastore_20110210200002 in file C:\Program Files\NetApp\Virtual Storage Console\smvi\server\repository\logs\49a661ce-daff-4ae2-ab4e-f0325501c951\backup_backup_VM DS1 Datastore_20110210200002.xml

i will let you know if anything changes

[damiankarlson]

I'm running NetApp VSC 2.0.1P1 with ESXi 4.1 and vCenter 4.1. First, I really do like the integration of VSC and SMVI. It's very nice to have everything in one place. SMVI is working well for us. My issues are with the VSC side of things. I have approximately 50 filers at about 45 physical locations running on about 150 ESXi hosts. Updating the Storage Controllers list takes a VERY long time. If I make a change to recommended settings on a particular host, I have to update the entire infrastructure instead of just querying the one or more servers that I updated. In addition, the process of updating MPIO/NFS/HBA settings takes a very long time and is prone to timeouts.

[tom_maddox]

I'm running VSC 2.0 p1 on vSphere 4.0 U2, and I've found it a troublesome beast. Discovery of our NetApp filer heads (V3160's) failed initially, and the only resolution was to delete a configuration file, restart the NetApp vSphere Plugin Framework service, and only then could discovery be completed. Feedback in the UI is also a problem: I have a host which is in an "Alert" state in the VSC, but there is no indication of what the alert is in "Show details." Finally, the event log on the vCenter server is filled with SMVI Error 4096 events, and I suspect that a sudden slowness in vSphere event processing is due to issues with either the plugin or the service--a number of NetApp Storage Discovery tasks are stuck "In Progress," and several VMotions seem to be hung up.

[amritad]

Here is a troubleshooting guide for VSC

http://communities.netapp.com/docs/DOC-6534

Regards

Amrita

[tom_maddox]

One other thing I want to mention is that it doesn't seem possible to assign LUN mappings from the VSC at all, which basically makes the provisioning feature useless in our environment. Actually, this is one complaint that I have with the NetApp FCP functionality in general, which is that the only tool which allows LUN mappings to be set en masse is FilerView.

[forgette]

The lun mapping happens automatically in the Provisioning and Cloning workflow.

Could you explain a bit more?  What are you looking for that the wizard doesn't handle for you?

Thanks!

[tom_maddox]

The issue is pretty simple: there is no way that I've discovered to dictate which LUN ID is used by the NetApp to present the LUN to the hosts. To elaborate, when I create a VMFS datastore as a LUN, I might want to present it as LUN 150. The VSC will automatically assign the LUN whatever it thinks is the next available number, without regard to what LUNs are already assigned to the hosts. Since I'm using a mix of different storage systems, this behavior is not only undesirable but actually pernicious since it runs the risk of assigning multiple volumes to the same LUN ID.

[mjschneider]

Im not sure if this was mentioned already but in 2.0.1 datastores cant have the same name even in different vmware datacenters.  This includes san pass through "holder" datastores.  The jobs create snapshots on all datastores.  Also, when creating a job in the gui it would always select the datastore from the datacenter which came first alphabetically.

[jeffgarmin]

I am also getting the same issue.  I have 2 datastores in 2 different remote sites called vSphere and when I run the job for 1, it tries to snap the first one it finds in the top datacenter.

This is an annoyance but it's pretty easy to fix.

[keitha]

OK. Thanks guys, noted. Isn't having the datastore the same name a bit risky anyhow?

[dfcuomojr]

I agree with Darren.Hedges on the mbrscan and mbralign integration.  It would be wonderful if the tool could be utilized through the gui to scan and correct the VMs and LUNs.

[keitha]

Some very cool things coming in this space soon! Stay tuned!

[gabrievanzanten]

A little tip: When generating the report that displays the webpage with red values and green values.... those colors don't work for me, since I'm color blind. Would be great if like in most applications there was an exclamtion mark or stop sign or whatever instead of just changing the color. Now I always have to ask a co-worker to tell me what's wrong.

Gabrie

[keitha]

Hi Steve,

That NFS license error is a bug in VSC 2.0.1 there is a patched version 2.0.1P1 which you can download from the NOW site. Sorry abou that. Some increased Snapshot error handling is a great idea handling, we are pretty deep into our next release but it is noted.

Having said that, I have found that dispite the unfortunalte name, the crash consistent backups are just as consistent for most applications as the VMware quieced ones. Obvious that is not the case for every application but I have found most apps are either fine with just the crash consistent backup or they need more quiecing (SQL, Oracle) than what just the VMware snap provides.

Keith

[jeffgarmin]

Does anyone use qtree integration on their NFS datastores?

It appears as though any datastore I have that's using /vol/datastore/datastoreqtree doesn't show up in VSC.

[keitha]

Jeff,

Qtrees are not offcially supported with VSC but it still should not prevent you from seeing them. Do you have multiple qtrees in the volume?  Have you enabled quotas? Im not sure they may be the problem.

keith

[jeffgarmin]

Single qtree in the volume and no quotas enabled.

[keitha]

hmmm, how did you mount the datastores to ESX? Using the quota or not? I haven't worked much with quotas so can't tell you which will work but I have seen clients use them with VSC...

[jeffgarmin]

There are no quotas.

I just mounted something along these lines:

Server: netapp.domain.com

Volume: /vol/nonprod/nonprodqtree

I did play around with a volume a little bit and when I mounted it without using the qtree, it showed up just fine.  If I mounted with qtree, it wasnt there.