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Foglight for Storage Management Shared 6.1.0 - User Guide

Getting Started Configuring Agents to Monitor Storage Devices
Brocade SAN Switches Cisco SAN Switches Dell Compellent Arrays Dell EqualLogic PS Series Array Groups EMC CLARiiON CX Series Arrays (CLI) EMC CLARiiON, VNX, or VMAX Storage Arrays (SMI-S) EMC Isilon EMC VPLEX Hitachi Data Systems AMS, USP, and VSP HP EVA Storage Arrays HP 3PAR Arrays NetApp Filers Configuration Procedures
Managing Agents Using Foglight for Storage Management Monitoring Storage Performance Investigating Storage Devices Investigating Storage Components Investigating VPLEX Storage Troubleshooting Storage Performance Managing Data Collection, Rules, and Alarms Understanding Metrics Appendix: Supported Storage Devices Table Online-Only Topics

Next Steps

Your next steps depend on whether you want to monitor your storage environment to identify problems or whether you need to respond to the report of a problem in the virtual infrastructure.

Monitoring Your Storage Environment

The following workflow suggests one approach to monitoring your storage environment and investigating issues. You may prefer a different approach, depending on your monitoring needs.

1
Performance Monitoring — Start by assessing alarms on all storage devices. See Monitoring Storage Performance.
2
Capacity Monitoring — After you acknowledge and/or resolve device-level alarms, you may want to investigate individual storage devices and their components. See Investigating Storage Devices.
3
Connectivity and I/O Performance Monitoring — You can identify performance or connectivity problems that occur during I/O requests by viewing diagrams that place storage components within the context of the virtualization environment, from VMs and hosts to storage devices. See Assessing Connectivity and I/O Performance.
Responding to Problem Reports

Storage Administrators need to respond to reports about problems in the storage environment.

•
When you receive reports from colleagues about poorly-performing VMware virtual machines, use the Storage Troubleshooting analysis tool to determine whether resources in the SAN are contributing to the problem. For instructions, see Troubleshooting Storage Performance.
•
When you receive emails from Foglight for Storage Management about a storage device or component that has entered a problem state, click the link in the email to navigate to the dashboard that provides details about the alarm. To learn how to set up email notifications, see Configuring Email Notifications for Alarms.

Monitoring Storage Performance

This section introduces the Storage Environment dashboard and guides you through monitoring your storage environment by assessing device status and alarms. The next sections provide alternative approaches to assessing your storage environment through the use of questions or by assessing the connectivity and port performance within the context of your virtual infrastructure. The last section introduces reports.

This section covers the following topics:

•
Introducing the Storage Environment Dashboard
•
Monitoring Your Storage Environment
•
Asking Questions About the Monitored Storage Environment
•
Assessing Connectivity and I/O Performance
•
Monitoring Storage Capacity
•
Creating Storage Reports

Introducing the Storage Environment Dashboard

The starting point for monitoring storage performance is the Storage Environment dashboard. The Storage Environment dashboard contains the following tabs:

•
Monitoring Tab — Monitor your overall storage environment by device type. For more information, see Summary and Resource Information for each Collected Target:.
•
Insights Tab — Break down to three views, Analytics, Live Troubleshooter, and Reports, to:
•
Retrieve important data about your monitored storage environment. For more information, see Asking Questions About the Monitored Storage Environment.
•
Investigate a potential storage performance issue. For more information, see Starting a Troubleshooting Investigation.
•
Use templates to create reports on your storage environment. For more information, see Creating Storage Reports.
•
Storage Capacity tab — Monitor your storage capacity by device type. For more information, see Monitoring Storage Capacity.

If your Foglight for Storage Management user account includes the Storage Administrator role, the Storage Environment dashboard also displays these tabs:

•
Administration Tab — Manage configured agents, credentials, and modify data collection settings.
•
Getting Started Tab — Purchase a product license.
To open the Storage Environment dashboard:
•
On the navigation panel, under Dashboards, click Storage & SAN > Storage Environment.
The first time you open this dashboard, the Monitoring tab is displayed, showing the overall status of your monitored storage environment.

 
Table 14. The Monitoring tab contains the following screen elements:
Screen Element
Description
Time Range

Controls the period of time represented in the dashboard. The default is the last four hours. For more information, see “Time Range” in the online help.

Tiles

Summarizes how many of each type of device—Fabrics, Storage Arrays, and Filers—are being monitored, and breaks down the total number by alarm severity (from left to right: Fatal, Critical, Warning, and Normal). Tiles control the Quick View area as follows:

•
Click the top half of a tile to open the device type’s quick view with the Summary view displayed.
•
Click a status icon in one of the tiles to open the device type’s quick view containing only devices with that status.
Quick View

Contains four areas: Device List, Device Summary, FAQts, and Alarm Summary.

Device List

Displays the list of storage devices that match the selected tile.

•
Click Summary to display the top storage devices in terms of key performance or capacity metrics.
•
Click a device name to display metrics for that device only.
Device Summary

Displays performance and capacity metrics for the device selected in the Device List.

FAQts

Offers common searches in the form of questions. Scroll through questions, and click Show Me to see the answer to the currently displayed question. For more information, see Asking Questions About the Monitored Storage Environment.

Alarm Summary

Displays a list of alarms for the device selected in the Device List. For more information, see Understanding Status, Alarms, and Rules in Foglight for Storage Management.

Summary and Resource Information for each Collected Target:
1
Open the navigation panel, under Dashboards, select a target type. Then, select a target and click Explore.
2
In this view, you will see the following items:
•
Product Name: Shows the target type name
•
Vendor: Shows vendor name
•
Model: Shows the model of the target
•
DeviceID: Shows the name of the target
•
IP Address: Shows the IP addresses of the target
•
Total Disk Capacity: Shows the total disk capacity of the target
•
Missing or Removed Disks: Shows the missing or Removed Disks, if any
•
Disks with no Information: Shows the disks reported as No Information, if any

Monitoring Your Storage Environment

When you begin monitoring your storage environment, a good way to start is by identifying poorly-performing devices and resolving the issues that are contributing to the problems. In Foglight for Storage Management, all storage devices and their child components are assigned a status, which enables you to see at glance which elements in your storage infrastructure need attention. Any device that enters a non-Normal status triggers an alarm. For more information, see Understanding Status, Alarms, and Rules in Foglight for Storage Management.

The procedures in this section show you how to use the Monitoring tab in the Storage Environment dashboard to assess alarms and drill down to the components used by storage devices, such as the LUNs and NASVolumes that supply the physical storage for datastores.

This section describes the following topics:

•
Understanding Status, Alarms, and Rules in Foglight for Storage Management
•
Reviewing the Status of All Devices
•
Assessing Storage Alarms
•
Monitoring Fabrics
•
Monitoring Storage Arrays
•
Monitoring Filers
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