NetApp itself does not really care at all. So without considering backup software the answer it - yes, you can do it. ... View more

Then create two shares that point to two different directories on a volume. Or to two different volumes. I’m still not sure I understand the problem. ... View more

Did you get approval from NetApp support for this procedure? ... View more

It sounds like you want to do application consistent snapshot. In this case yes, SnapProtect (or IntelliSnap as it is called now) can do it. ... View more

CLARiiON is active/passive, so I expect active paths reflect LUN ownership. Did you check LUN-SP assignment? ... View more

There is no way to remove single file from snapshot. You can only remove whole snapshot. ... View more

I guess, the primary reason is - you should not define more than is required for your communication. Normally there is no need for HBA to talk to HBA, so we never define zone that includes two HBA. But if vendor says it is OK - fine. Also consider security PoV - this is yet another channel which can be used to get unauthorized access, yet another thing to manage. But I have met enough customers who just plugged in all devices in virgin FC switch and it worked. I also have seen horror stories about fabric reconfiguration causing major downtime. So I tend to define only what I need just to be on safe side. As for cache consistency - I’m primarily concerned with overhead of cache coherency for every request. So it looks as promising idea for local cache, but I do not hold my breath for distributed cache implementation. ... View more

You set sync or asycn in /etc/snapmirror.conf. Default is async. SnapMirror async transfers snapshots. Until snapshot is completely transferred you always see previous volume state. If there was error during transmission, it will retry from the last check point. ... View more

Is it fabric or stretch MetroCluster? ... View more

These qlogic units require only a normal HBA driver, no guest side drivers, don't restrict any of the native functionality of vmware, seem not to impact on availability and no virtual appliances are required. AND it looks like you can do a vmotion whilst retaining the cache. You still believe in silver bullets? Quoting data sheet: Unlike standard Fibre Channel adapters, the QLogic FabricCache Adapters communicate with one another using the Fibre Channel infrastructure This does not work in case of direct storage connection directly violates primary fabric zoning rule established by industry so far - single initiator zoning Clustering creates a logical group of adapters that provides a single point‑of‑management, which cooperates to maintain cache coherence and high availability, and while optimally allocating cache resources. So we have coherency protocol between adapters which is unknown so far. What latency does it add? Idea sounds interesting, but I would wait for any real life usage reports. ... View more

NetApp offers host SSD cache adapters too. ... View more

SyncMirror is mirroring between aggregates inside one head. MetroCluster is using it to mirror data between sites. Yes, it is real time synchronization. No, it is unrelated to SnapMirror. ... View more

What is intended access method from OS X - NFS or CIFS? ... View more

Because in this case filer knows they were replaced. Just try to switch heads off and replace - you will get nasty surprise. ... View more

Yes, mailbox holds information about current state of disks (e.g. which head is current owner of disks), so it makes sense to clear this information when head identity changes. ... View more

Yes. Mailbox is not related to software/hardware disk based ownership and should always be cleaned up when head identity changes. ... View more

Yes, there was a bug similar to it. Open support case so NetApp could guide you how to fix it. ... View more

Could you explain what you mean? I am not sure I understand the question. ... View more

Unless user is in Administrators group. Then all created files belong to this group. ... View more

Not that I know of. This is standard Windows behavior. ... View more

I do not quite understand the question. Of course changing target IP will have impact on host - you will need to reconfigure it to use new IP. ... View more