Several questions

[feedthemachine]

Hello. I am new to HPE Storage and have some questions I would highly appreciate assistance with!

1. What are deployment configurations for HPE 3PAR systems? What type of applications could benefit the most from running on HPE Storage? I assume there are some benefits with regard to Microsoft SQL Server OLTP databases but want to double-check it here.
   
2. Which instruments are available for pulling inventory data and performance metrics? Is that only 3PAR CLI and the IMC have such monitoring capabilities? What's about System Reporter?
   
   
3. What is the granularity of performance data stored and over what interval? Can it be altered?
   
   
4. Can performance data be pulled in a pack or does it need to be retrieved in periods?
   
   
5. What will be the performance impact (if any) during data collection? How could it be minimized?
   
   
6. Which commands need to be executed to:
   - Authenticate, connect to the array?
   - Pull performance, inventory metrics?
   - Re-configure the array / management interface
   
   
7. What are the semantics of the output and how should the output be retrieved to extract inventory and performance metrics?
   
   

Thanks in advance!

[Michal Doležal · Accepted solution]

Hi I may answer partialy:

What are typical deployment configurations for current and older HP 3PAR systems? - This depends on what you require. Be careful 3PAR filesystem is little bit different than for example Storewize and more complex. For understanding this try your HPE presale guy because this is about concepts and it is for long time (and good time for coffee). I may only point you on this: https://support.hpe.com/hpsc/doc/public/display?docId=c04204225 . Very useful guide with lot of informations. Read it. Really.

Currently used management tools are: SSMC (StoreServ Management console) and CLI + StoreFront Remote analytic tool.  And every 3PAR has Service Processor for troubleshooting, guarding and HPE remote support.

SSMC is standalone app installed on desktop but better on server (Linux/Windows) which has permanent connection to 3PAR (3PARs) and you are accessing all data over web interface. Here is also System reporter access. Forget 3PAR MC, this is obsolete now (not really, still working, but for new releases it is depreciated). 3PAR CLI usefull in some cases and for some special tasks.

You asked for System reporter and globally about monitoring. Compared to competitors this is area where 3PAR is close to top or on the top. 3PAR now includes System reporter built-in and you can access data over SSMC. 3PAR during startup creates special reporting volume where results are saved. You can access it over SSMC as I said but results can be also posted to StoreFront remote with higher analytics capability.

About periods: There are two places for performance - you can access performance statistic for each volume for 1Hr, 3hr, 4hr, 6hr, 12hr, 1 day, 3 days, 1week, 2 weeks, 3 weeks, 1 month and 3 months. And up to 3 day you will see 5 minutes samples. For more than one week you will see 1 hr stats and for more than month you will see daily stats.. But this is not all you can access System reporter directly and here you can analyze almost everything up to 3 months. But here you can see also realtime stats with 5 seconds increment - very useful in case you are looking for spikes etc.

Everything is logged automatically. Only in case you need to see realtime data you must Start the realtime monitoring.

All informations can be summarized over StoreFront Remote portal - up to 1 year. This portal also consolidates data about support including end of contract. Also suggest recommended patches and also consolidate all service tickets. From my side recommended. But it depends on company´s policy if will allow this data collection to send over internet to cloud.

Which commands need to be executed to:
- Authenticate and connect to the array? - it is classic SSH - you can use local accounts and also LDAP user source and wide range of access roles. You can also use SSH for scripting using certificates. Etc. I recommend this: https://support.hpe.com/hpsc/doc/public/display?docId=c04204251
- Pull inventory and performance metrics? - typically you are pulling performance metrics over GUI and you can export it. You can also connect your excel directly to System reporter and use it as standard analytics tool. Inventory can be visible using some set of commands: showpd, shownet, showsys or all together by showinventory etc. And also nicely visible in SSMC.
- Re-configure the array / management interface to store more performance data and re-configure it back to the original state? - this is not needed. I already explain this. There is permanent monitoring up to 3 months and after this you can use StoreFront remote up to 1 year. And surely you can make exports.

Be carefull in case of network reconfiguration (changing IP addresses for SP and 3PAR). Better to consult with HPE support. There is special procedure for this.

What are the semantics of the output and how should the output be parsed to extract inventory and performance metrics needed? - As I already mentioned - you can access System reporter directly using Excel so VERY comfortable. And there is also StoreFront remote with PDF analysis (executive overview) and you can all reports export using CSV or PDF. And if this is not enough you can surely use CLI with sr commands. (probably you asked for this). Take a look to CLI guide I posted. (page 198)

I hope this helps little bit.

[Sheldon Smith]

First, there's a lot of information at https://www.hpe.com/info/3par. The 3PAR family of storage array systems can be configured from something that would take 2U to 3U of rack space, to multiple filled racks. 10K HDD, flash, a combination. It depends on what you need to do with it. Click the CONTACT US link at the above web page.
Each system has performance and capacity monitoring built-in. You will need the System Reporter license to access all of it. The system's granularity is 5 minutes. It then averages hourly and daily. The System Reporter data is stored in a volume on the system itself.
For further information, go to https://www.hpe.com/info/storage/docs. Start with the "HPE 3PAR StoreServ Storage Concepts Guide". It sounds like you would also want to at least skim over the "HPE 3PAR Command Line Interface Administrator Guide" and the "HPE 3PAR OS Command Line Interface Reference". After that, look at the various white papers and the Implementation Guide for your operating system(s).

[Dennis Handly]

> "HPE 3PAR OS Command Line Interface Reference".

Since the CLI Reference is generated from the cli help for each command, you can also get this info from:

   command -h

Or in the CLI, using "help" for info on various subjects and categories.