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NetApp Keystone – A deep dive into ONTAP AQoS and how they drive STaaS Service Levels

I’ve been spending some time getting spun up on Keystone, and subsequently went down the rabbit hole as far as I could go. Keystone is structured around service levels. And to properly understand those service levels it helps to understand the concept of IO Density, alongside how that is implemented with ONTAP Adaptive QoS. Join me as I go down said rabbit hole through the underlying concepts and hopefully pop up on the other end as a Keystone service level expert. I/O Density Starting things off with I/O density. NetApp defines it as the “number of input/output operations processed per[…]

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SaaS Ruminations – Thinks to consider before consuming software-as-a-service

I was asked by a colleague to put together some notes on the importance of protecting SaaS solutions ala traditional backups. Me, being the long winded person I am, ended up putting together this piece. As I took a closer look at SaaS the more I realized the availability and security of your data is entirely at the whim of your service provider. That raises some interesting questions, such as what happens to your business if the data is unretrievable? Who’s legally responsible when data is exposed? Even if you’re not legally responsible, who will your users direct their ire[…]

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NetApp Insight 2023 – Event Rundown and Tech Updates

Before I start rattling off some tech updates to come out of NetApp Insight 2023 I wanted to start by rambling about the event in general. On the off chance someone who’s actually in charge of the event will swing by here. I know a lot of my colleagues will swing by here, and a lot will be on the same page. First and foremost, after being remote for several years, Insight back in person was fantastic. I got to meet friends and colleagues I haven’t seen in ages, and meet new folks I would’ve never spoken to otherwise. Everyone[…]

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Cribl – A Long Ass Beginners Introduction

Welcome to the first of what’s likely to be a series of blog articles about Cribl. Don’t know what Cribl is? That’s okay, neither did I a few weeks ago. It’s something I found very interesting and valuable, and those of you who know me personally recognize my need write things down as part of a self education exercise. Gotta do something to make roots in the mind an engineer pulled six ways from Sunday. So what is Cribl? Well I’m going to cheat and ask what ChatGPT thinks first… Me > Tell me about Cribl ChatGPT > Cribl is[…]

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NetApp BlueXP – Setting up an on-premises Cloud Connector

Before you can roll up your sleeves and start using BlueXP from NetApp you need to set up a Cloud Connector. These are small virtual machines which run a myriad of containers to facilitate all the various bits and bobs that provide a connectivity foundation for the BlueXP feature set. Ideally, well, ideally if you’re using resources in one of the large hyperscalers (AWS, Azure, GCP) you want to deploy a connector there. That gives you the ability to use the Cloud Connector as, basically, a API and command pass through. Essentially allowing BlueXP to talk directly to the hyperscaler[…]

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AWS and VMware Cloud go live with FSx NetApp ONTAP datastores – An introduction and guide

Recently, at VMworld Explore, VMware and AWS announced general availability of the much-anticipated integration of AWS’ FSx NetApp ONTAP NFS shares for use in their VMware Cloud virtualization stack. This article will cover the benefits and considerations so you can see whether it fits with your cloud journey. I tried to create a title for this post that wasn’t incredibly long, without using a metric ton of acronyms. Forewarning this post is going to be acronym heavy, even more so as usual, since we’re combining technical concepts across three acronym pushing tech companies. TL;DR VMware’s stack in AWS, VMC, now[…]

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NetApp Cloud Volumes ONTAP – Understanding Offerings, Licensing, Pricing, and More

The sky above the port was the color of television, tuned to a dead channel. “All these different licensing tiers are confusing,” Judsonian heard someone say, as he shouldered his way through the crowd around the door of NetApp. “It’s like someone took a simple concept and set the difficulty to 11.” It was a Cloud voice and a Cloud joke. Simply put, NetApp’s Cloud Volumes ONTAP (CVO) is a simple great product. The licensing around it, well, that’s a lot more cumbersome. CVO – What is it? How is it licensed? CVO is NetApp’s ONTAP software running in AWS,[…]

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Deploying Azure NetApp Files – A Quick Guide

I wanted to write a quick guide on Azure NetApp Files in Microsoft Azure, with info on how the service works and how to deploy it. I say quick but ended up adding more technical details than one might say is required – that’s just he engineer in me. I hope you find this helpful and relatively straight forward. Azure NetApp Files – What Is It? Azure NetApp Files (ANF) is an Azure native deployment of NetApp’s ONTAP platform in their cloud environment. ANF is simply high performance file shares using NFSv3, NFSv4.1, SMB, or a combination. As part of[…]

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Amazon FSx for NetApp ONTAP – A Brief-ish Overview

Who is your daddy and what does he do? What is it? Amazon FSx is AWS’s managed services for filesystems. Basically if you want Windows File Server or Lustre out of the box – aka don’t want to manually setup and support those in your environment – you can use FSx to deploy an AWS managed environment. FSx NetApp ONTAP, FSx for ONTAP, FSx ONTAP, or FSxO (pick your preferred name out of a hat) is the same. It allows AWS users to provision NetApp’s ONTAP environment as a service managed directly by AWS. Dec 10 Update – The internal[…]

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Getting to know NetApp’s Cloud Backup Service and SnapMirror Cloud

I initially started writing this blog as an introduction and explanation of Cloud Backup Service by itself. I quickly realized that you can’t really understand Cloud Backup without talking about the SnapMirror to Cloud functionality now available in ONTAP 9.8. Bear with me and you’ll see what I mean. Oh, and for the sake of (relative) simplicity I will try and use full terms for each of the components I’m talking about. Though I may refer to Cloud Volumes ONTAP as CVO here and there. It’s bad enough that there’s multiple terms for the same functionality without adding “CBS” “SM2C”[…]

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