topic Re: need help with basic capacity reporting in HPE Primera Storage

need help with basic capacity reporting

apol — Mon, 15 Apr 2024 04:38:31 GMT

Hi,

longtime 3par/primera/alletra user here. Starting with our first array (a v400), we struggled with very basic capacity reporting. We buy systems with a "usable capacity", meaning the capacity we can use, without the capacity for spare and raid-"losses". This value is displayed by the sizer (ninja stars), but we don't know a way to get it directly from an array.

We used to take the output from showspace -cpg <<cpgname> and added cpg total + ldfree. It didn't really match the value from the sizer, but it was a close miss, so we lived with it. For some time, I even put the value from the sizer in the owner filed of the system descriptor just to be able to dynamicall retrieve it. Don't ask.

Now, after a change in capacity reporting to another toolchain using wsapi, it seems the ldfree value is not available here. So our workaround does not work any more.

I had a look at the returned values for /system, /cpg (with single cpg given), /capacity and /spacereporter. Lots of numbers, but not the one we were expecting.

Twelve years after our first 3par, there still is no way to ask an array about it's usable capacity??? This is weird. Does anybody know a trick?

Edit: Removed bogus sentence that was a remainder of an early draft of the message

Re: need help with basic capacity reporting

Arnaud Delaloy — Mon, 16 Sep 2024 09:20:08 GMT

hello,

As longtime 3par array user, I ended up using stor2rrd ( https://stor2rrd.com/ ) to get consistent metrics across different array models (the ones with all NL FS and SSD tiers were a nightmare to perform capacity planning on them)

(before, I used the lune liste file export from the old Java IMC to complete a custom spreadsheet , and THAT was quite the hassle)

over time, Store2rrd will build up a baseline and the graphs will be quite easy to read , mabe you'll get the trend for the storage needed.

moreover it is quite useful for many diagnostics and analysis, such as getting a specific LUN's I/O history...

Re: need help with basic capacity reporting

apol — Mon, 15 Apr 2024 04:42:14 GMT

Thank you, but it's not about graphics. We need it for customer accounting (with customer that actually want to know how much usable space is left), reporting to team leader and his boss among others.

Re: need help with basic capacity reporting

Dardan — Mon, 15 Apr 2024 05:51:15 GMT

hi @apol

I've written a Powershell script that uses 3PAR/Primera WSAPI PS module to pull out the total capacity of the array (Total, Allocated and Free capacity):

# Credentials
$Credentials = IMPORT-CLIXML ".\storcred.xml"
$username = $Credentials.UserName
$password = $Credentials.GetNetworkCredential().Password

# Connect to 3PAR WSAPI
$postParams = @{user=$username; password=$password} | ConvertTo-Json
$headers = @{}
$headers["Accept"] = "application/json"
$credentialdata = Invoke-WebRequest -Uri "$APIurl/credentials" -Body $postParams -ContentType "application/json" -Headers $headers -Method POST -UseBasicParsing
$key = ($credentialdata.Content | ConvertFrom-Json).key

# Poll 3PAR System Info
$headers = @{}
$headers["Accept"] = "application/*"
$headers["Accept-Language"] = "en"
$headers["X-HP3PAR-WSAPI-SessionKey"] = $key
$WSAPIdata = Invoke-WebRequest -Uri “$APIurl/capacity/” -ContentType “application/*” -Headers $headers -Method GET -UseBasicParsing

Then I convert WSAPI content to readable data

# Convert $WSAPIdata variable with /capacity/ info to a Powershell Object
$CapacityObject = ($WSAPIdata.Content | Convertfrom-Json)

# Poll storage required data from /capacity/
$TotalCapacity = $CapacityObject.allCapacity.totalMiB / 1024 / 1024
$AllocatedCapacity = $CapacityObject.allCapacity.allocated.totalAllocatedMiB / 1024 / 1024
$FreeCapacity = $CapacityObject.allCapacity.freeMiB / 1024 / 1024

Let me know if this is helpful, I can make an detailed article on this.

Cheers,

Dardan

Re: need help with basic capacity reporting

apol — Mon, 15 Apr 2024 12:44:53 GMT

Sorry, but that does not nail the basic problem: We also have our fair share of scripts etc., the problem is: the value we want/need is, on the cli, just available as a weird approximation, and not available at all with wsapi.

An example: one of our arrays has a usable capacity of 14.4TiB, that's 15,099,494MiB. Total raw system space is 29,286,400 MiB which is nearly twice as much.

The basic problem is: the sizer shows usable capacity, presales sells the arrays with a usable capacity, but the array has no means of telling you its' usable capacity.

We considered using raw capacity numbers, but they are 1) wrong (the array mentioned above can NOT hold more than 14,4TiB of user data), and 2) an empty array would start with about 20% (raid and spare) used (that some customer would have to pay for according to management..).

Re: need help with basic capacity reporting

Ramesh_Kumar_P — Mon, 16 Sep 2024 09:21:26 GMT

Hi Apol,

From the above information, I understand that you wanted to get the usable space in the array(after RAID overhead and the spares).

The LDFree shows the real usable space available in the array from "showspace -cpg <cpg name>" by CPG level.

Also, you may use showspace command to get overall UsableFree in the array.

You may please check and report, if you still need any help.

Thank you!

Re: need help with basic capacity reporting

apol — Wed, 17 Apr 2024 07:03:02 GMT

The LDFree shows the real usable space available in the array from "showspace -cpg <cpg name>" by CPG level.

that is exactly what I wrote in my first post. But this value is not available in the wsapi. An getting overall usable capcity for an array can only be done (afaik) by adding this to the allocated cpg space, which delivers an "unstable" result that changes slightly between days.

Re: need help with basic capacity reporting

Ramesh_Kumar_P — Mon, 22 Apr 2024 19:29:42 GMT

We request you to log a case on HPE Support Center portal for further resolution using the link: https://support.hpe.com/hpesc/public/home/