h7409: increase operational efficiency for sap ... · this solution highlights how you can use...

White Paper

EMC GLOBAL SOLUTIONS

Abstract

This solution highlights how you can use EMC® TimeFinder® Snap and Duplicate Snap replication technologies to reduce the infrastructure costs of an SAP non-production environment. It also demonstrates how you can use EMC software to automate SAP system management and reduce the amount of complexity needed to support your SAP operations. September 2011

INCREASE OPERATIONAL EFFICIENCY FOR SAP INFRASTRUCTURES WITH EMC TIMEFINDER DUPLICATE SNAPS An Architectural Overview

2 Increase Operational Efficiency for SAP Infrastructures with

EMC TimeFinder Duplicate Snaps—an Architectural Overview

Copyright © 2011 EMC Corporation. All Rights Reserved. EMC believes the information in this publication is accurate of its publication date. The information is subject to change without notice. The information in this publication is provided “as is.” EMC Corporation makes no representations or warranties of any kind with respect to the information in this publication, and specifically disclaims implied warranties of merchantability or fitness for a particular purpose. Use, copying, and distribution of any EMC software described in this publication requires an applicable software license. For the most up-to-date listing of EMC product names, see EMC Corporation Trademarks on EMC.com. VMware is a registered trademark of VMware, Inc. All other trademarks used herein are the property of their respective owners. Part Number H7409



Table of contents

Executive summary ............................................................................................................ 5

Business case ..................................................................................................................... 5

Solution overview ................................................................................................................ 5 Key results/recommendations ............................................................................................. 6

Introduction ...................................................................................................................... 7

Purpose ............................................................................................................................... 7

Scope .................................................................................................................................. 7

Audience ............................................................................................................................. 7

Terminology ......................................................................................................................... 7

Key components ................................................................................................................ 9

Components ........................................................................................................................ 9

EMC Symmetrix VMAX and Enginuity 5875 .......................................................................... 9

EMC Symmetrix TimeFinder/Duplicate Snaps .................................................................... 10

SAP Enterprise Resource Planning 6.0 Enhancement Pack 4 .............................................. 11

VMware vSphere 4.1 .......................................................................................................... 11

VMware vCenter Server ...................................................................................................... 11

EMC Replication Manager .................................................................................................. 11 EMC PowerPath® ....................................................................................................................... 12

Physical solution architecture .......................................................................................... 12

Environment profile ......................................................................................................... 13

Hardware resources ........................................................................................................... 13

Software resources ............................................................................................................ 13

VMAX Storage Configuration .............................................................................................. 14

Installing and configuring the SAP ERP 6.04 systems ......................................................... 15

Installing and Configuring Replication Manager ................................................................. 16

Testing and Validation ..................................................................................................... 17

Overview ........................................................................................................................... 17

Phase 1: Create a TimeFinder clone ................................................................................... 18 Creating an application set for the SAP production system......................................................... 19 Defining a new TimeFinder clone job ......................................................................................... 21 Starting the replication job ........................................................................................................ 26

Phase 2: Create TimeFinder Snaps for testing .................................................................... 27 Creating a new application set from the TimeFinder clone-based SAP system (Gold Copy) .......... 28 Creating two new TimeFinder Snap-based SAP systems DE1 and QA1 ........................................ 30

Phase 3: Create TimeFinder Duplicate Snaps ..................................................................... 37 Creating two new TimeFinder Duplicate Snap-based systems DE2 and QA2 ............................... 38



Phase 4: Determine the growth in the save device pool ..................................................... 48 Loading data into SAP ............................................................................................................... 48 Monitoring the data change ...................................................................................................... 48

Phase 5: Verify the dependency between the TimeFinder Duplicate Snap and the TimeFinder Snap ........................................................................................................... 50

Restoring a TimeFinder Duplicate Snap-based SAP system to another system ................... 52

Test results ..................................................................................................................... 53

Overview ........................................................................................................................... 53

Time savings ..................................................................................................................... 53

Storage savings ................................................................................................................. 54

Conclusion ...................................................................................................................... 58

References ...................................................................................................................... 59

White papers ..................................................................................................................... 59

Product documentation ..................................................................................................... 59



Executive summary

Business case SAP customers regularly face complex challenges with creating and managing multiple system copies for non-production work.

It is common for SAP teams to have several full copies of multi-terabyte SAP production databases that support their development and testing efforts. The SAP Basis and storage teams must often scramble to find enough available storage to create these duplicates. The effort to create and maintain these duplicates is considerable.

Developers cannot perform the necessary advanced “destructive” tests in these environments because they must preserve the system integrity needed for the rest of the SAP teams. Administrators cannot quickly provision isolated systems to SAP developers because of the required dedicated infrastructure.

This solution documents best practices that can drive significant cost savings and better performance for demanding application workloads, while accelerating the customer’s journey to their cloud.

Solution overview To overcome these challenges, the typical enterprise SAP customer endures relatively high costs, in terms of maintenance, management, and infrastructure. Additionally, managing this very large information infrastructure is a daunting task. Customers can use EMC® TimeFinder® Duplicate Snap technology to set up SAP systems for new projects based on the previous projects.

Customers can use either clones or snaps to produce copies of existing SAP systems, depending on the reason for creating the copies. Clones require dedicated space, and are recommended in certain situations such as performance load testing. Customers may prefer TimeFinder Snaps when repurposing is the primary objective and they demand storage space savings where performance is not crucial. With EMC TimeFinder Duplicate Snaps, SAP administrators can now create Snaps, and then create duplicates of those Snaps based on a point in time to support new projects that need to inherit configuration and data of an ongoing or previous project. This new technology extends and improves the existing traditional EMC cloning and snap offerings.

This white paper demonstrates how SAP customers can increase the efficiency, time savings, and costs savings when implementing projects or supporting daily maintenance over the lifetime of their applications by leveraging EMC TimeFinder Duplicate Snaps. The cost savings is derived by measuring the difference between the storage consumed by EMC TimeFinder clones and EMC TimeFinder Snaps/Duplicate Snaps and also the flexibility and simplicity of how to provision new SAP systems based on EMC TimeFinder Duplicate Snaps.

EMC TimeFinder/Duplicate Snap technology captures TimeFinder/Snap replicas from another TimeFinder/Snap point in time copy. This functionality is particularly useful in SAP environments where customers require copies of their production environments and repurpose them for testing, QA, and development.



Key results/recommendations When using EMC Symmetrix TimeFinder/Duplicate Snaps in Enginuity™ 5875, SAP customers can:

• Reduce the space requirements of their non-production systems by more than 60 percent using Snaps and Duplicate Snaps.

• Set up new independent SAP systems automatically and quickly.

• Achieve greater flexibility to meet the business requirements for non-production SAP systems with the ability to set up independent SAP systems using TimeFinder/Duplicate Snaps from previously created snaps.

• Restore a TimeFinder Snap or Duplicate Snap system to another clone or promote it to a full clone as required.

• Rapidly provision new SAP systems for application testing, development, or training with the on demand creation of capacity-efficient TimeFinder Snaps or Duplicate Snaps.

• Customers can selectively destroy the TimeFinder Snaps or Duplicate Snap copies that are no longer required without affecting the previously created TimeFinder Snaps or Duplicate Snap-based systems.

• Simplify management and automate the cloning process for administrators though the use of EMC Replication Manager.



Introduction

Purpose The purpose of this white paper is to highlight how you can use Symmetrix TimeFinder/Duplicate Snap replication technologies to reduce the storage footprint of an SAP non-production environment as well as to demonstrate how you can use EMC Replication Manager software to automate its management and reduce the effort needed to support such operations.

Scope The scope of this paper is limited to the solution validation (build, test, and document) activities performed by EMC engineers in an EMC lab. What was built and tested is described and, where possible, recommendations and guidelines are provided for professionals to design an identical or similar solution. The concepts, instructions, procedures, recommendations, and guidelines presented in this document are by no means exhaustive.

The scope of the solution described in this white paper is to demonstrate the storage and timesavings when using TimeFinder Snap/Duplicate Snap technology rather than using clones when duplicating SAP environments.

Audience The target audience for this white paper is business executives, IT directors, and infrastructure administrators who are involved with the company’s SAP landscape.

The target audience also includes professional services groups, system integration partners, and other EMC teams tasked with deploying SAP systems in a customer environment.

A high-level understanding of SAP solutions, SAP landscapes, and the practice of storage administration is beneficial. Familiarity with virtualization concepts is also beneficial.

Terminology Table 1 defines terms that may appear in this document.

Table 1. Terminology

Term Description

Enginuity The operating environment that provides the intelligence that controls all components in a EMC Symmetrix VMAX™ array.

Gatekeeper A small logical volume on a Symmetrix storage system used to pass commands from a host to the Symmetrix storage system.

Logical Unit Number (LUN) A unique identifier used to distinguish storage devices.

Save device A save device is a Symmetrix device that is not accessible to the host and can only be accessed through virtual devices that point to it. SAVE devices provide pooled physical storage and are configured with any supported RAID scheme, depending on Enginuity level and Symmetrix hardware model.



Term Description

Save device pool A set of save devices that provide a pool of physical space used to store pre-update images of tracks changed on the source device or new writes to the virtual devices.

Standard device A Symmetrix storage device that is configured for normal Symmetrix operations under a desired protection method (SRDF, RAID 1, RAID 5, or RAID 6).

SYMCLI Symmetrix Solutions Enabler command line interface

Tiered storage Tiered storage is the process of maintaining storage of varying performance characteristics, or protection requirements, within the same array or across multiple arrays. Tiered storage gives administrators the flexibility to utilize their resources effectively by aligning storage technology to the appropriate information value and access speed requirements.

TimeFinder clones A full-device TimeFinder clone is a licensed Symmetrix local replication solution that creates full-device point-in-time copies of critical data.

TimeFinder clones provides point-in-time copies of devices that can be used for backups, decision support, data warehouse refreshes, or any other process that requires parallel access to production data.

TimeFinder Snaps A TimeFinder Snap is a space-saving mechanism for providing logical point-in-time images called snapshots. See also the section entitled “EMC TimeFinder Snap Duplicate Snap” below for more details.

TimeFinder Duplicate Snaps

TimeFinder Duplicate Snap functionality allows you to duplicate a point-in-time copy of a virtual device, which is paired in a previously activated snap session, to another virtual device. TimeFinder/Duplicate Snap is a feature of EMC Enginuity 5875 or higher releases.

Virtual device (VDEV) A host-accessible device containing track-level location information (pointers) that indicate where the copy session data is located in the physical storage. VDEVs consume minimal physical disk storage, as they store only the address pointers to the data stored on the source device or a pool of Save devices. Using virtual devices, TimeFinder/Snap operations provide instant snapshot copies.



Key components

Components The section identifies and briefly describes the validated solution environment’s major components, which include:

• EMC Symmetrix VMAX storage array

• EMC TimeFinder Snap/Duplicate Snap

• SAP ERP 6.0 EhP4 Core

• VMware® vSphere™ 4.1

• EMC Replication Manager 5.3.2

The following sections describe these components.

EMC Symmetrix VMAX and Enginuity 5875 EMC’s latest Proven Solutions for both desktop and business-critical application environments make it easier and faster to manage infrastructure and clone applications for test and development through virtualization and other technologies.

EMC Proven Solutions use new and enhanced features to validate storage efficiency and scale for organization growth.

• New duplicate TimeFinder/Snaps—create capacity-efficient replicas for application testing and development, maximizing the use of existing storage, enabling the business to bring new applications online sooner, improving the ability to apply maintenance to SAP systems, and providing automation of cross-functional processes.

• EMC Symmetrix VMAX Fully Automated Storage Tiering for Virtual Pools (FAST VP)—provide better optimization of high-performance Flash drives, and better responsiveness to changes in data activity through sub-LUN automated storage tiering

• VMware vStorage APIs for Array Integration (VAAI)—enable storage administrators to maintain control of the infrastructure, while managing virtual server storage and other applications sharing the same storage array



EMC Symmetrix TimeFinder/Duplicate Snaps

EMC Symmetrix TimeFinder/Duplicate Snaps offer the ability to capture TimeFinder/Snap replicas from another TimeFinder/Snap point-in-time copy. This functionality is particularly useful in SAP environments where customers copy their production environments and repurpose them for testing, QA, training, and development. During development or testing, the SAP teams may need to create additional copies of their systems to perform isolated work in parallel. They can create and delete intermediary TimeFinder Snaps or Duplicate Snaps without affecting any of the other TimeFinder Snaps or Duplicate Snaps.

All EMC TimeFinder/Snap replicas are read/write capable. The Duplicate Snap copy is independent of its TimeFinder/Snap source and its pointers point to the source’s standard device/save device pool. Users can work against TimeFinder/Snap copies and create subsequent Snap copies (up to 128) for additional downstream phases or for checkpoint backups.

The TimeFinder/Duplicate Snap feature provides the ability to:

• Create Duplicate Snap copies

• Create persistent Snap copies

• Read or write each Snap

• Issue multiple concurrent snaps to capture equal point in time replicas

Figure 1 shows TimeFinder’s new support for creating Duplicate Snaps with Enginuity 5875.

Figure 1. New replication capabilities with Enginuity 5875



SAP Enterprise Resource Planning 6.0 Enhancement Pack 4 SAP Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) 6.0 Enhancement Pack (EhP) 4 is a fully integrated solution that fulfills the core business needs of midsize and large organizations across all industries and market sectors. Powered by the SAP NetWeaver technology platform, SAP ERP 6.0 EhP4 helps enterprises to perform financial analysis, human capital management, procurement and logistics, product development and manufacturing, and sales and service. These functions support analysis, corporate services, and end-user service delivery. Together with SAP NetWeaver and a repository of enterprise services, SAP ERP 6.0 EhP4 is a solid business process platform that supports continued growth, innovation, and operational excellence.

VMware vSphere 4.1 VMware vSphere 4.1 a scalable and powerful virtualization platform that delivers the infrastructure and application services that organizations need to transform their information technology and deliver IT as a service. VMware vSphere provides agility, control, and efficiency while fully preserving customer choice.

VMware vCenter Server VMware vCenter™ Server presents a universal hub for managing the VMware vSphere environment. It provides unified management of all hosts and virtual machines in a data center from a single console. VMware vCenter Server enables administrators to improve control, simplify day-to-day tasks, and reduce the complexity and cost of managing an IT environment.

EMC Replication Manager EMC Replication Manager automates and simplifies the management of disk-based replicas. It orchestrates critical business applications, middleware, and underlying EMC replication technologies to create and manage replicas at the application level to achieve operational recovery, backup, restore, development, simulation, and repurposing.

EMC Replication Manager also helps customers safeguard their business-critical applications such as SAP, using either point-in-time disk-based replicas or continuous data protection sets that you can restore to any significant point in time that falls within the protection window.

EMC Replication Manager masks the complexity of managing replication technologies with automated cloning, replication, and recovery, making it easy for storage administrators as well as personnel such as database administrators and SAP Basis administrators who may not be familiar with storage management. EMC Replication Manager can automatically discover, manage, schedule, and track all required storage LUNs based on the awareness of key databases that support SAP. The process of managing all the replicas created by Replication Manager is automated and managed through a user-friendly graphical user interface that combine application and storage information in the same place, reducing complexity and maintenance costs.



EMC PowerPath® EMC server-resident software that enhances performance and application availability by supporting multiple I/O paths to logical devices, and intelligently distributing I/O requests across all available paths. PowerPath also provides automatic failover in the event of a hardware failure by automatically detecting the path failure and redirecting I/O to another path.

Physical solution architecture The solution architecture consists of VMware ESX® 4.1 servers that contain the entire infrastructure required to operate an SAP ERP 6.0 EhP4 testing bed, including Replication Manager, two development systems, two QA systems, and one baseline system clone from production system. SAP ERP 6.0 EhP4 is hosted on a Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5/Oracle 10g platform. EMC Symmetrix VMAX provides flexible and highly available storage for the entire SAP system landscape.

Figure 2 shows the architecture as validated in this solution.

Figure 2. Solution architecture



Environment profile

Hardware resources Table 2 provides information about the EMC hardware used in this solution.

Table 2. Hardware resources

Equipment Quantity Configuration

EMC Symmetrix VMAX 1 Array type: VMAX

Memory: 56 GB

Enginuity: 5875.135.91

Guest OS and SAP clone drives: 8 x 450 GB FC 15 K (Raid 5 3+1)

Save device pool：4 x 450 GB FC 15 K (Raid 5 3+1)

VMware ESX Server 3 CPU type: 4 x Quad Core 2.93 GHz Nehalem

Memory: 96 GB

6 SAP VMs, each with 8 GB RAM and 4 vCPUs

1 EMC Replication Manager VM with 4 GB RAM and 1 vCPU

Other 4 Two SAN switches

Two IP switches

Software resources

Table 3 provides information about the EMC software used in this solution.

Table 3. Software resources

Software Quantity Details

SAP central system 6 SAP ERP 6.0 EhP4 IDES ABAP stack

SAP NetWeaver 7.01 Unicode

Oracle Enterprise 10.2.0.4 64 bit x 64

Red Hat Linux Enterprise 5.2 64 bit x 64

EMC Replication Manager Server 1 5.3.2 (Microsoft Windows 2008 SP1)

EMC Replication Manager Agent for Linux 6 5.3.2 with 71502 hot fix for Linux

EMC Solution Enabler 6 v7.2.0 Edit level:1108

EMC Symmetrix Management Console (SMC)

1 7.2.2.1

EMC PowerPath/VE 2 5.4 SP1

VMware vSphere Server 2 v4.1 SP1

VMware vCenter Server 1 v4.1 SP1

VMware vShpere Client 1 v4.1 SP1



VMAX Storage Configuration Table 4 provides detailed information about the solution’s storage LUN configuration for the baseline system RE2, the snap system, and the duplicate snap systems.

Table 4. Storage LUN configuration

Purpose File system Standard device number

Datastore type/name Capacity (GB)

RAID Type

Linux OS 5 VMFS/Snap_dup_datastore 90 R5 (3+1 )

RM server 1 VMFS/Snap_dup_datastore 40 R5 (3+1 )

Oracle binary fsoraclesid 5 VMFS/SAP_VM<#>_Oracle_Bin1

32 R5 (3+1)

SAP binary fssapsid 5 VMFS/SAP_VM<#>_Bin1 32 R5 (3+1)

SAP data fslvsapdata1 1 Physical Raw Device Mapping 128 R5 (3+1)

fslvsapdata2 1 Physical Raw Device Mapping 128 R5 (3+1)





SAP online log fslvmirrlogA 1 Physical Raw Device Mapping 32 R5 (3+1)

fslvmirrlogB

fslvoriglogA 1 Physical Raw Device Mapping 32 R5 (3+1)

fslvoriglogB

SAP offline log fslvsaparch 1 Physical Raw Device Mapping 64 R5 (3+1)

SAVE devices N/A 34 N/A 8 R1



Installing and configuring the SAP ERP 6.04 systems The SAP ERP 6.04 systems RE2, DE1, QA1, DE2, and QA2 are central systems with IDES (International Demonstration and Education System) databases, the ABAP stack on Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5, and an Oracle 10g database. This section describes the steps that the EMC validation team used to install and configure the SAP ERP system.

To install and configure the SAP ERP system:

1. Configure Linux according to SAP-specific notes

2. Configure the database patches, parameters, and statistics according to the SAP installation guides and notes

3. Apply the latest SAP kernel patch to all of these systems

4. Download and apply the required SAP licenses

5. Download the SAP SPAM, and the support packages SAPKA701004, SAPKA701005, SAPKB701004, and SAPKB701005 from SAP Service Marketplace to the RE2 /usr/sap/trans/EPS directory

6. Unpack the patches, upload them, and apply the new Support Package Manager (SPAM).

7. Configure the SAP transport route in the TimeFinder clone RE2 system.

Figure 3 shows the transport route structure.

Figure 3. The SAP system transport route structure

8. Copy the Oracle parameter profile init<SID>.ora located in /oracle/SID/102_64/dbs to /opt/emc/rmc/client/bin/SID to avoid overwriting the Oracle parameters after running the TimeFinder Snap or Duplicate Snap jobs.

Note: For additional information on installing and configuring SAP systems, refer to the document entitled Installation Guide for SAP ERP 6.0 - EHP 4 Ready ABAP on Linux: Oracle Based on SAP NetWeaver 7.0 including Enhancement Package 1, located on the SAP Service Marketplace website at www.service.sap.com/instguides.

http://www.service.sap.com/instguides�



Installing and Configuring Replication Manager EMC Replication Manager is software composed of a server, clients (agents), and a management console. This section provides a high-level summary of the steps required to install and configure EMC Replication Manager before you can create TimeFinder clones, Snaps, and Duplicate Snaps.

Where Steps

VMware vCenter console Create a VM with 2 vCPUs and 4 GB RAM (more memory and vCPUs for vCenter depending on the size of your environment)

Follow VMware vCenter sizing recommendations documented on the VMware documentation

EMC Symmetrix VMAX Storage Management Software

Mask the VDEV devices to respective mount hosts, using one of the following:

• EMC Control Center

• EMC SMC

• The SYMCLI command line

• Symmwin

Note: For additional information on how to perform the storage administration procedures, refer to the Symmetrix TimeFinder or Symmetrix Array Controls documentation available on the EMC support website.

1. Configure the TimeFinder clone SAP Gold Copy system:

a. Create and mask the standard devices to be used by the SAPVM1-GOLD system.

b. Configure these devices to have same size and geometry as the source volumes (for example, SAP Production saperp001 VM).

c. Present these devices to the mount host (SAPVM1-GOLD).

2. Configure the TimeFinder Snap and Duplicate Snap SAP non-production systems

a. Create and mask the virtual devices (vDEVs) to be used by the SAP non-production systems SAPVM2-DE1, SAPVM3-QA1, SAPVM4-DE2, and SAPVM5-QA2.

b. Configure these devices with the have same size and geometry as the source volumes (for example, SAPVM1-GOLD).

c. Present the vDEVs to the mount hosts SAPVM2-DE1, SAPVM3-QA1, SAPVM4-DE2, and SAPVM5-QA2.

EMC Replication Manager Management Console

Note: For additional information on how to perform the EMC Replication Manager procedures, refer to the EMC Replication Manager Product and Administration guides.

1. For the TimeFinder clone, SAP Gold Copy system:

a. Create the RM Storage pool SAPVM1_pool

b. Add the clone devices (target) to the RM storage pool SAPVM1_pool.

2. For the TimeFinder Snap and Duplicate Snap SAP Non-production systems:

a. Create the RM storage pools SAPVM2_pool, SAPVM3_pool, and SAPVM4_pool

b. Add the VDEVs to the RM storage pools SAPVM2_pool, SAPVM3_pool, SAPVM4_pool, and SAPVM5_pool to be used by the SAPVM2-DE1, SAPVM3-QA1, SAPVM4-DE2, and SAPVM5-QA2 systems respectively.

3. Register all SAP hosts to be used for creating TimeFinder clones, Snaps, or Duplicate Snaps.

If the EMC Replication Manager Agent is installed and running, EMC Replication Manager discovers all the storage resources being used by each host during the registration. To register a host, the Replication Manager Agent must be running on that host.



Testing and Validation

Overview The validation team created a typical SAP system landscape in which to test and validate this solution. We divided the tests into five phases to demonstrate the how TimeFinder Snaps and Duplicate Snaps can be incorporated into an SAP system landscape. We used EMC Replication Manager to simplify and automate the EMC TimeFinder technologies used in this solution, including TimeFinder clones, Snaps, and Duplicate Snaps. Table 5 describes the phases executed to validate the storage efficiencies in this solution.

Table 5. Testing phases

Phase** Description Details

1 Create a TimeFinder clone baseline Create a SAP Gold copy system (RE2) from the source SAP production system using TimeFinder clone technology.

2 Create TimeFinder Snaps for testing Create two new TimeFinder Snap-based SAP systems (DE1 and QA1) based on the TimeFinder clone gold copy RE2 for testing.

3 Create TimeFinder Duplicate Snaps Created two new TimeFinder Duplicate Snap-based SAP systems (DE2 and QA2) for testing.

4 Determine the growth of the save device pool

Load data into the TimeFinder Snap and Duplicate Snap-based SAP systems (DE1, DE2, QA1 and QA2) and monitor the growth of the save device pool.

5 Determine the dependency of the TimeFinder Duplicate Snap from the source TimeFinder Snap

Delete the newly created TimeFinder Snap-based SAP system and verify its affect on the TimeFinder Duplicate Snap-based SAP system from which it was created.

** The validation team followed the procedures described in these phases in our lab to validate the results presented in this paper. Specific details may differ depending on your environment. The following sections provide the details of each phase.



Phase 1: Create a TimeFinder clone This section describes how to create a SAP System Gold copy from the SAP production system RE2 (SAP VM saperp01). We used the EMC Replication Manager job RE2-to-Gold configured to create an EMC TimeFinder clone and present it to the mount host SAPVM1-GOLD.

Note: Register both SAP system hosts that will participate in the TimeFinder clone job (RE2-to-Gold) as described in the section entitled “Installing and Configuring Replication Manager” on page 16.

Figure 4 provides a graphical representation of TimeFinder clone replica.

Figure 4. The TimeFinder clone environment

To create the Symmetrix TimeFinder/Clone replica using Replication Manager Console:

1. Create the application set (by selecting the Oracle instance).

2. Create a new TimeFinder/Clone job.

3. Run the replication job.

The following subsections detail these steps.

Note: TimeFinder allows you to create a TimeFinder Snap replica from the production system directly. To prevent any performance impact to the production system, EMC recommends that you first create a TimeFinder clone to serve as the SAP Gold copy source of all TimeFinder Snaps or Duplicate Snaps.



Creating an application set for the SAP production system

To create the application set, perform the following steps from the EMC Replication Manager Management Console:

1. Right-click Application Sets on the tree panel in the left pane and click New Application Set.

2. The Application Set Wizard screen appears. Click Next.

3. Enter your application set name and expand the host where the Oracle instance you want to use is located.

4. Expand the Oracle folder under that host as shown in Figure 5.

Figure 5. Creating the application sets

5. Select the Oracle instance (check the box) for your application set and click Next.



6. The Application Credentials dialog box appears as shown in Figure 6. Enter the login specifications to connect to the Oracle instance and click OK.

Figure 6. Connecting to the Oracle database

Note: Ensure that the Oracle TCP/IP listener and databases are configured properly and running. Also, verify that the database username has SYSDBA privileges user in the source system.

7. Select the objects in Oracle database that you want to replicate as shown in Figure 7.

Figure 7. Selecting the Oracle database objects to replicate



8. Click Next. This completes the steps required to create the application sets and specify the Oracle instance to replicate.

Defining a new TimeFinder clone job To define a new job:

1. Right-click Jobs in the menu tree panel and select New Job from the context menu.

2. The initial Job Wizard screen appears. The Wizard steps you through the process needed to create a job. Select the application set that you want to replicate from the drop-down list box as shown in Figure 8 and click Next.

Figure 8. Selecting the application set to replicate

Note: The Application Set selected points to the SAP production system, the source devices for the TimeFinder clone to be created.



3. Specify the job name, select the Primary Storage as the Replication Source, select TimeFinder clone as Replication Technology, and click Advanced as shown in Figure 9.

Figure 9. Defining a new TimeFinder clone job



4. The Advanced Replication Settings dialog box appears. Select Use Consistent split and Online without hot backup Mode as shown in Figure 10.

Figure 10. Advanced replication settings

Note: EMC consistent split technology allows you to create a crash-consistent Oracle database clone without putting it in hot backup mode. Refer to the EMC Replication Manager Product and Administration guides for more information about this feature.



5. The Job Wizard displays the Replication Storage dialog box, shown in Figure 11. This screen allows you to define which storage pool (target devices) you want to use for the replica created by this job.

Figure 11. Selecting the storage for replication

Notes:

Clicking Topology displays a graphical representation of the replication.

Clicking Properties shows all the devices in the selected storage pool.

Clicking Required Storage verifies all the required storage devices for the replication.

You can use an existing storage pool if you have already created one or you can create a new storage pool on this screen. To create the storage pool on this screen, select Create a New Storage Pool from the drop down list box under the What storage do you want to use? and specify a name for that pool and select the required storage. SAPVM1_pool is an existing storage pool that we selected from the drop-down list box. Select your choice from the drop-down list box and click Next.

Refer to the EMC Replication Manager Product Guide for additional information on how to create storage pools.



6. The Mount Option panel appears as show in Figure 12. Specify the mount options and click OK to complete the job definition.

Figure 12. Mount Option panel

Note: Figure 12 highlights the important information for the job you are creating. The mount host SAPVM1-GOLD is the SAP Gold Copy VM that holds an exact copy of the SAP production system RE2. We selected Original path to keep the same file systems from production (/oracle/RE2). You must set the Oracle Recover and Open option to Read/Write. This is a support requirement when using the mounted TimeFinder clone as the source for creating TimeFinder Snaps and Duplicate Snaps.



Starting the replication job The Job Wizard displays your options in the screen shown in Figure 13. This screen allows you to define how to invoke the job.

Figure 13. Starting the replication job

Make your selection and click Next. A job summary appears that shows all of the new job’s properties for review and confirmation. You can modify the job properties after the job is created, if necessary. You can simulate the job before executing it to verify that all of the required components are available and correct for the job’s execution.

Note: After the RE2-to-Gold job (TimeFinder clone) is executed, all the SAP database file systems are cloned, mounted to the new VM (SAPVM1-GOLD), and the Oracle instance RE2 is started. The validation team did not start the SAP Central Instance in that VM, because the role of this system is the Gold Copy in the SAP system landscape strategy we adopted. We use this TimeFinder clone-based system (RE2) later as the source for all other TimeFinder Snaps systems (DE1 and QA1) and TimeFinder Duplicate Snaps systems (DE2 and QA2).



Phase 2: Create TimeFinder Snaps for testing This section describes how to configure Replication Manager to set up the new TimeFinder Snap-based system. Figure 14 provides a simple graphical representation of a TimeFinder snap environment.

Figure 14. TimeFinder/Snap environment

This phase describes how to create two new TimeFinder Snap-based SAP systems for testing.

1. From EMC Replication Manager console, complete the following steps:

a. Register the SAP hosts SAPVM2-DE1 and SAPVM3-QA1, according to the process described in the section entitled “Installing and Configuring Replication Manager” on page 16.

b. Create two new storage pools (SAPVM2_pool and SAPVM3_pool) with the VDEVs to store the TimeFinder Snaps, according to the process described in the section entitled “Installing and Configuring Replication Manager” on page 16.

c. Create a new application set from the TimeFinder clone-based SAP system (Gold Copy) created during Phase 1.

d. Create two new TimeFinder Snap-based SAP systems called DE1 and QA1 for the VMs SAPVM2-DE1 and SAPVM3-QA1. We created the new TimeFinder Snaps from the application set created in Step c.

2. From the SAP front end:

a. Apply the support packages SAPKB70104 and SAPKA70104 to both of the SAP systems DE1 and QA1.

b. Use the SAP LSMW transaction to load data into the QA1 system.

3. From the SMC or SYMCLI, measure the storage space consumed in the save pool.



Creating a new application set from the TimeFinder clone-based SAP system (Gold Copy) To create a new application set from the TimeFinder clone-based SAP system (Gold Copy) for the TimeFinder Snap-based SAP systems DE1 and QA1, perform the following steps:

1. Right-click Application Sets on the left tree panel and click New Application Set.

2. The Wizard screen appears. Click Next. Enter your application set name and expand the host where the Oracle instance you want to use is located.

3. Expand the Oracle folder under that host as shown in Figure 15.

Figure 15. Creating the application sets


5. The Application Login dialog box appears as shown in Figure 16. Enter the login specifications to connect to the Oracle instance and click OK.


Note: The application set created and used for the TimeFinder Snap is different than the one created and used for the TimeFinder clone created in Phase 1 since the validation team wanted to create the TimeFinder Snaps and Duplicate Snaps from the TimeFinder clone (SAP Gold), not directly from the production system.



7. The Application Credentials dialog box appears as shown in Figure 16. Enter the login specifications to connect to the Oracle instance and click OK.

Figure 16. Connecting to the Oracle database

Note: The Oracle TCP/IP listener must be running and the database username must have SYSDBA privileges in the source system.

8. Select the objects in Oracle database that you want to replicate as shown in Figure 17.

Figure 17. Selecting the Oracle database objects to replicate



9. Click Next. You have completed the steps required to create the application sets and specify the Oracle instance to replicate.

Creating two new TimeFinder Snap-based SAP systems DE1 and QA1 To create the two new TimeFinder Snap-based SAP systems called DE1 and QA1 for the VMware VMs SAPVM2-DE1 and SAPVM3-QA1, perform the following steps:

1. Right click on Jobs in the left tree panel and select New Job from the context menu.

2. The Job Wizard dialog box appears. Select the application set that you want to replicate (SAP-GOLD in our example) and click Next.

3. Follow the Job Wizard steps through the job creation phase. Specify the Job Name, select Primary Storage as the Replication Source, TimeFinder Snap as the Replication Technology, and click Advanced shown in Figure 18.

Figure 18. Define a new TimeFinder snap job



4. Set the advanced replication settings by selecting Use consistent split as the General Replication Option and Online without hot backup as the Consistency method as shown in Figure 19. Online without hot backup option means that the source database will not be put in hot backup mode, but the Oracle database will be in a crash-consistent state. Refer to the Oracle metalink article 604683.1 for more information.

Figure 19. Advanced replication settings



5. Click OK. In the Replication Storage panel, define which storage pool will be used as a target destination for the replicas to be created by this job as shown Figure 20.

Figure 20. Select the replication storage pool

Note TimeFinder Snap and Duplicate Snap jobs created by Replication Manager require that VDEVs be added to Replication Manager in advance. These devices should have similar characteristics to those of their source volumes. Starting with EMC Replication Manager release 5.3.1, you can select a customized Symmetrix save pool, other than the default save pool. An environment variable EMC_ERM_SAVEPOOL needs to be set in the mount hosts. You can use custom save pools to separate their utilization from the default save pool. If this custom save pool runs out of space, it will not affect the rest of the storage system, therefore, EMC recommends that you use custom save pools. Use the Advanced button to specify the save pool.

6. You can use an existing storage pool if you have already created one, or you can create a new storage pool using this Replication Storage screen, by selecting Create a new Storage Pool. Refer to the EMC Replication Manager Product Guide for information about how to add the virtual devices to a new storage pool. Make your selection and click Next.



7. The Mount Option dialog box appears. Some of the mount options are:

a. Select the mount host.

b. For Alternate paths choose path mapping from the source host’s Oracle SID name to the target host’s name since they were different. Enter the Source and Destination File System in the Path Mapping Table as shown in Figure 21.

c. To recover and open, select Read/Write mode and change the Start instance user, ORACLE_HOME, Database name, SID name since the source host’s Oracle SID name is different from the target host’s name. The source host’s oracle SID name is RE2 and target’s oracle SID name is DE1 as shown in Figure 21.

d. Click Set SYS password to set a new Oracle password for the SYS user on the mounted database or SID as shown in Figure 21 then click Next.

Figure 21. The Mount Option panel



8. Start the Replication Job. You can start the job manually, schedule the job, or have it triggered externally from the command line (RMCLI) or by a third-party scheduler as shown in Figure 22. Make your selection and click Next.

Figure 22. Starting the job

Note: For more information on how to call a Replication Manager job externally, refer to EMC Replication Manager documentation available on EMC’s support website.



9. A job summary appears for review and confirmation as shown in Figure 23. Click Finish to complete the job.

Figure 23. Completing the job

Note: Figure 23 highlights the important information about the job’s properties.



Note: To start the job manually, from EMC Replication Manager, right-click on the job you wish to start and choose Run as shown in Figure 24.

Figure 24. Starting the Replication Job manually

Note: For information about automating post-cloning tasks through callout scripts in the configuration of the replication job, refer to the Replication Manager documentation. For information about automating SAP-specific pre- and post-cloning tasks through the callout scripts refer to the publication entitled EMC Intelligent Cloning for SAP Solutions on EMC available on EMC’s online support website.



Phase 3: Create TimeFinder Duplicate Snaps This phase creates two new TimeFinder Duplicate Snap-based SAP systems for testing. Figure 25 shows a graphical representation of the TimeFinder Duplicate Snap environment.

Figure 25. TimeFinder Duplicate snap environment

This phase includes the following steps:

1. From EMC Replication Manager, complete the following steps:

a. Register the SAP hosts SAPVM4-DE2 and SAPVM5-QA2, according to the process described in the section entitled “Installing and Configuring Replication Manager” on page 16.

b. Create two new storage pools with the VDEVs to store the TimeFinder Duplicate Snaps, according to the process described in the section entitled “Installing and Configuring Replication Manager” on page 16.

c. Use the new SAP-GOLD application set created earlier from the TimeFinder clone –based SAP system (Gold Copy) created during Phase 1.

d. Create two new SAP systems called DE2 and QA2 using TimeFinder Duplicate Snap technology as described in this section. Create these two TimeFinder Duplicate Snap-based SAP systems from the TimeFinder Snap-based SAP systems DE1 and QA1 created in Phase 2.

2. From the SAP front end:

a. Apply the support packages SAPKB70105 and SAPKA70105 to both of the TimeFinder SAP-based systems DE2 and QA2.

b. Use the SAP transaction LSMW to load data into the QA2 system.

3. From the SMC or SYMCLI, measure the storage space consumed.

This section describes how to configure EMC Symmetrix TimeFinder Duplicate Snaps using EMC Replication Manager.

Note: After the new TimeFinder Duplicate Snap-based system (SAPVM4-DE2) is created, it will inherit all the data from the source replica (the SAPVM1-GOLD TimeFinder clone) as well as all the changes applied to the TimeFinder Snap replica (SAPVM2-DE1). The same will happen for the new TimeFinder Duplicate Snap-based system (SAPVM5-QA2 in the scenario described in this solution). After creating the TimeFinder Duplicate Snap replica, use the same procedure to mount, unmount, and delete a replica using EMC Replication Manager Management Console.



Creating two new TimeFinder Duplicate Snap-based systems DE2 and QA2 From the EMC Replication Manager Management Console:

1. Right-click Jobs in the tree panel.

2. Select New Job from the context menu. The Job Wizard displays the dialog box in Figure 26.

Figure 26. Creating a new job

3. Select the application set that you want to replicate and click Next.

Note: Creating a TimeFinder Duplicate Snap uses the same application set as the TimeFinder Snap system (SAP-GOLD appset). You do not need to create a new application set for the TimeFinder Duplicate Snaps.



4. When you create the TimeFinder Duplicate Snap job (VM2_to_VM4), specify the job name and select the TimeFinder Snap job (VM1_to_VM2) as the Replication Source. Then select TimeFinder Snap as Replication Technology as shown in Figure 27.

Figure 27. Defining a new TimeFinder Duplicate Snap job

5. Click Advanced and specify the advanced replication settings. Click Next to continue.

6. The Replication Storage panel allows you to define the storage pool to use for the replicas to be created by this job, as shown in Figure 28, then click Next.



Figure 28. Select the Replication storage pool and save device pool



7. Select the storage pool in the drop down list as shown in Figure 29.

8. Optionally choose a custom save pool (non-default) by clicking the Advanced button and selecting it from the drop down and clicking Next. Click Next to continue. Note: Refer to the EMC Replication Manager Production Guide for information about how to add a virtual device to a new storage pool and for more information on how to use customized save pool devices.

Figure 29. Specifying the device pool

9. The Mount Option panel appears, allowing you to set the mount options:

a. Select the mount host

b. Choose Alternate paths using path mapping if the source host’s Oracle SID name is different from the target host’s name. Enter the Source and Destination File System in the Path Mapping table as shown in Figure 30.

c. In the TimeFinder Duplicate Snap-based systems, the Oracle SID name is from the TimeFinder clone system (RE2). The Path Mapping Table is shown in Figure 30. For Oracle, select Read/Write mode, change the start instance user, ORACLE_HOME, database name, and SID name since the SID in the target host should be different from the source. In our scenario, the source host's Oracle SID is RE2 and the target is DE2 as shown in Figure 30.

d. Click Set SYS password to set a new Oracle password for the SYS user on the mounted database or SID and click Next.



Figure 30. Mount Option panel



Note: The Source File System in the Path Mapping Table (shown in Figure 30) is /oracle/RE2 since it comes from the TimeFinder clone (SAPVM1 Gold). The path mapping information is not recorded as part of the replica itself. The manipulation of the paths is accomplished on the fly and does not affect the data on the replica (Oracle database). EMC Replication Manager by design catalogs information that is relevant to the source TimeFinder clone (SAPVM1 Gold). Any change to the TimeFinder Snap (SAPVM2-DE1) is not lost, and is contained as part of any Duplicate Snap (SAPVM4-DE2) created from this TimeFinder Snap. In order for the changes to be transferred from the TimeFinder Snap to the TimeFinder Duplicate Snap, the TimeFinder Snap must be mounted Read/Write (before the changes occur). If the entry in the Source File System field in the Path Mapping Table is not valid at the time of the mount, the mount will continue as if that entry did not exist (path mapping rename will not occur). In that case, Replication Manager attempts to mount the data to the same location as it occupied on the source host (SAPVM1-GOLD). For more information about mounting options, refer to the EMC Replication Manager Product Guide on EMC’s online support website.

10. The Job Wizard displays several options for scheduling your job. Replication Manager, by default, links the job being created to its source. Always select Manually, or using a third party scheduler as shown in Figure 31and click Next.

Figure 31. Choosing “Manually, or using a third party scheduler”

Caution: You must choose the Manually, or using a third party scheduler option in the Job Wizard Starting the Job dialog box to prevent the Job Wizard from creating a link between the two RM jobs VM1-to-VM2 and VM2-to-VM4. If the jobs are linked, the TimeFinder Duplicate Snap-based SAP system DE2 will be refreshed automatically every time the TimeFinder Snap job VM1 to VM2 is executed. Always select the manual option on this screen.



Figure 32. Removing the link between TimeFinder Snap and Duplicate Snap-based systems

Note: If you miss this specification while creating the job, you can change the job properties after the job is created to remove the link by removing the check from the Start this job after another job completes box shown in Figure 32.



11. The next job wizard step defines the users’ e-mail address to which RM should send notifications regarding the job completion. If you want to receive notifications by e-mail, enter your e-mail address in the Job Wizard email address field. Click the check box if you wish only to be notified by email if the job fails. Click Next.

12. The final wizard screen appears with a summary of the job settings. Review the settings as shown in Figure 33 and click Finish to complete the job.

Figure 33. Reviewing the job settings



13. Unmount the TimeFinder Snap replica system as shown in Figure 34.

Figure 34. Unmounting the TimeFinder Snap replica

Important: The procedure above describes the steps to create a TimeFinder Duplicate Snap-based SAP system (SAPVM4) from a TimeFinder Snap (SAPVM2) created in Phase 2. The last step of this procedure is to shut down the SAP system DE1 running on the TimeFinder Snap system DE1 (SAPVM2) and unmount its replica before running the job to create the TimeFinder Duplicate Snap. Based on the validation we performed, the time required to run the job to create a TimeFinder Duplicate Snap was only seven minutes. Note that all the SAP systems based on TimeFinder Snaps are non-production systems.

14. Start the replication job by clicking on Jobs on the left pane and then right clicking on the job you want to start in the right page and choosing Run as shown in Figure 35.

Figure 35. Starting the replication Job manually



15. Replication Manager prompts you to select the replica that you wish to copy. Select the replica you want to copy and click OK.

16. Click Yes to proceed as shown in Figure 36.

Figure 36. Starting the job execution

Note: For information about automating pre- and post-cloning tasks through callout scripts for SAP-specific activities, refer to the EMC Intelligent Cloning for SAP Solutions on EMC’s online support website.



Phase 4: Determine the growth in the save device pool This phase describes how to monitor the storage growth as changes occur with the addition of SAP sales orders into the TimeFinder Snap system QA1 and TimeFinder Duplicate Snap system QA2. This includes the amount of data increase in both the save device pool and the SAP/Oracle database of these systems.

Loading data into SAP The validation team used SAP transaction LSMW to load data into the TimeFinder Snap-based system QA1 and TimeFinder Duplicate Snap-based system QA2. To accomplish this task:

1. Recreate the TimeFinder Snap-based SAP system QA1 using the transaction LSMW to load 30,000 sales orders three times. Calculate the amount of data increase in the database using an Oracle command.

2. Determine the amount of data increase in the save device pool using the EMC Solutions Enabler command line interface (SYMCLI).

Monitoring the data change To check the amount of data increase in save device pool:

1. Refresh the TimeFinder Snap-based SAP system QA1 and TimeFinder Duplicate Snap-based system QA2.

2. Recreate the TimeFinder Snap-based SAP system QA1 and load 30,000 sales orders three times

3. Record the database size of the SAP system QA1, excluding the tablespace PSAPUNDO, and calculate its increase after each load using the following oracle SQL script:

SQL> Select sum(bytes)/1024/1024/1024 as "GB" from dba_segments where tablespace_name <> 'PSAPUNDO';

4. Record each save device pool size and calculate the increase in its size after each load using the following SYMCLI command:

# symsnap -sid <sid> list –savedev

5. Recreate the new TimeFinder Duplicate Snap-based system QA2 based on the TimeFinder Snap system QA1 using the EMC Replication Manager job.

6. Repeat Steps 3 and 4 twice.



Note: EMC Replication Manager 5.3.1 (or later) supports monitoring the Symmetrix default save device pool (Snap pool). EMC recommends using custom save device pools to isolate its utilization from the default save pool. You can use the Symmetrix Management Console (SMC) to create and activate customized save device pools. The customized save pool needs to be active, and have at least one enabled device in the pool for RM to recognize it. EMC Replication Manager makes it easier for you to manage the default and customized save device pool utilization. The EMC Replication Manager Management Console can monitor the default save pool as shown in Figure 37. Customized device pools are supported in Replication Manager 5.3.1 or later.

Figure 37. Monitoring the default save pool



Phase 5: Verify the dependency between the TimeFinder Duplicate Snap and the TimeFinder Snap This phase confirms that the TimeFinder Duplicate Snap is independent of its source TimeFinder Snap. A TimeFinder Duplicate Snap remains unaffected when the source TimeFinder Snap is deleted as shown in Figure 38.

Figure 38. Verifying the TimeFinder Duplicate Snap’s independence from its source

Delete the TimeFinder Snap-replicas DE1 and QA1 to confirm that TimeFinder Duplicate Snap systems DE2 and QA2 are not affected by performing the following steps:

1. Login to the TimeFinder Snap-based SAP system and run the command stopsap with the SAP administrator user <sid>adm account.

2. Login to the EMC Replication Manager Management Console and select the relevant application set (SAP-GOLD in our example).

3. Select the latest successful replica time for the DE1 replica (VM1-to-VM2), right-click on the time, and choose unmount to unmount the TimeFinder Snap replica.



4. After unmounting the replica, right-click again on the latest successful replica time and select Delete, as shown in Figure 39, to delete the Snap replica.

Figure 39. Deleting the snap replica

5. Log into the TimeFinder Duplicate Snap-based SAP systems DE2 and QA2 to verify that the SAP systems are still up and running.

6. Log into the TimeFinder Duplicate Snap-based SAP system DE2, create a new transport request, release it, and transport it to the QA2 system.

7. Load 10,000 sales orders into the QA2 system using the SAP transaction LSMW.

Note: Deleting the TimeFinder Snap-based SAP system will not affect the TimeFinder Duplicate Snap-based SAP system.



Restoring a TimeFinder Duplicate Snap-based SAP system to another system This section describes how to restore a TimeFinder Duplicate Snap-based SAP system to standard devices using the SYMCLI Restore command.

In some cases, the customer wants to preserve the changes made in the EMC TimeFinder Duplicate Snap or Snap systems, or repurpose the systems for load testing. EMC provides the functionality to restore the Duplicate Snap or Snap system to any location in the storage with standard devices. These standard devices would then be used to support another SAP system containing the changes made in the TimeFinder Snaps or Duplicate Snap systems.

This section describes, at a high level, how to restore the TimeFinder Duplicate Snap SAP-based system to another SAP system with standard device using SYMCLI commands with the following steps:

1. Install a new SAP system as the target system. The standard devices must be provisioned by the storage administrator to store the Oracle database and they must be of the same size and device emulation type as the source (TimeFinder clone) SAP database devices.

2. Use the SYMCLI commands syminq or sympd list on the TimeFinder Snap or Duplicate Snap-based SAP system to map all VDEVs and standard devices being used by the TimeFinder Snap/Duplicate Snap-based SAP system, and then use the pvscan command to show the relevant volume group information. You can also use the symsnap list command to list all of the TimeFinder Snap sessions.

3. Run the SYMCLI command symsnap –sid <sid> -full restore to restore the data in the TimeFinder Duplicate Snap VDEVs to another standard device. For more detailed information on all the considerations, procedures, and syntax refer the document entitled “EMC Solution Enabler Symmetrix CLI Version 7.2 Command Reference” (Part number 300-012-069 REV A01)

4. Adjust the SAP and database environment parameters if the target system SID is different from the TimeFinder Duplicate Snap system.

5. Start the target SAP system to check the data consistency.

Note: You can perform a full restore from a VDEV to another device as long as the target device has the same size and emulation type as the source device. Map all the virtual devices for the SAP system based on the TimeFinder Snap or Duplicate Snap that you are trying to copy to be able to restore all of the data from one system to the other. For more details on restoring data, see the document entitled “Solutions Enabler Symmetrix TimeFinder Family CLI Version 7.2 Product Guide,” (P/N 300-000-876) on page 85.

http://powerlink.emc.com/km/live1/en_US/Offering_Technical/Technical_Documentation/300-000-876_a13.pdf?mtcs=ZXZlbnRUeXBlPUttQ2xpY2tTZWFyY2hSZXN1bHRzRXZlbnQsZG9jdW1lbnRJZD0wOTAxNDA2NjgwNGUzMGZmLGRhdGFTb3VyY2U9RENUTV9lbl9VU18w�

http://powerlink.emc.com/km/live1/en_US/Offering_Technical/Technical_Documentation/300-000-876_a13.pdf?mtcs=ZXZlbnRUeXBlPUttQ2xpY2tTZWFyY2hSZXN1bHRzRXZlbnQsZG9jdW1lbnRJZD0wOTAxNDA2NjgwNGUzMGZmLGRhdGFTb3VyY2U9RENUTV9lbl9VU18w�



Test results

Overview This section describes the results captured from the testing and validation performed on the SAP landscape for each test phase and compares those results in the graphs and tables below. The validation team ran the entire suite of tests multiple times and presented the average test results.

Time savings Table 6 displays the amount of time required to set up the SAP systems with EMC’s different storage technologies.

Table 6. Setting up the storage technologies

SAP System ID EMC Technology Duration

RE2 TimeFinder clone 90 minutes

DE1 TimeFinder Snap 6 to 7 minutes

QA1 TimeFinder Snap 6 to 7 minutes

DE2 TimeFinder Duplicate Snap 6 to 7 minutes

QA2 TimeFinder Duplicate Snap 6 to 7 minutes

Table 6 shows that EMC Replication Manager took approximately 90 minutes to clone an SAP system using Symmetrix TimeFinder clone technology and only 6 to 7 minutes to copy an SAP system using TimeFinder Snaps and TimeFinder Duplicate Snaps containing the same data.



The time saved when using TimeFinder Snap and Duplicate Snap is shown in Figure 40.

Figure 40. Time saved with TimeFinder Snap and Duplicate Snap

Storage savings Table 7 shows that the storage size used by each SAP system using TimeFinder clone technology.

Table 7. Storage size requirements using TimeFinder clone technology

RE2-Gold DE1 QA1 DE2 QA2 Total storage size

852 (GB) 852 (GB) 852 (GB) 852 (GB) 852 (GB) 4,260 (GB)



Table 8 shows the actual space used by the systems and by the save device pool using TimeFinder Snap technology.

Table 8. Actual space in GB used by the systems and save device pool

Activity

(changed tracks)

SAP System RE2 Gold (GB)

SAP System DE1 (GB)

SAP System QA1 (GB)

SAP System DE2 (GB)

SAP System QA2 (GB)

Space used in save device pool (GB)

Saved space**

TimeFinder Snaps DE1 & QA1 creation from Gold (Clone)

852 3.35 3.35 0 0 6.70 66.40%

SAP SPs Installation on TimeFinder Snaps QA1 and DE1

852 15.86 12.85 0 0 27.91 65.57%

TimeFinder Duplicate Snaps DE2 and QA2 creation

852 16.45 13.89 16.42 13.88 30.48 79.28%

Loading data with LSMW into TimeFinder Snap QA1

852 16.93 16.42 16.74 14.29 38.76 79.09%

SAP SPs Install on TimeFinder Snap DE1 and Duplicate Snap QA2

852 16.94 17.03 19.33 19.64 51.02 78.80%

Deleting TimeFinder Duplicate Snaps DE1 and QA1 and loading data into TimeFinder Dupl. Snap QA2

852 0 0 19.62 20.56 39.20 65.13%

Note: The results in Table 8 are based on test phases 2 and 3. The TimeFinder Duplicate Snap copy is independent from its source TimeFinder Snap and its pointers to the source’s standard device and save device pool. Therefore, when creating the TimeFinder Duplicate Snaps for the SAP systems DE2 and QA2 from DE1 and QA1 (third row), the actual used space in the save device pool did not increase. The TimeFinder Snap and Duplicate Snap sizes in the save device pool changes based on the changes processed in the separate SAP systems. The space savings can vary based on the volume of changes performed on the TimeFinder Snap or Duplicate Snap-based SAP systems. TimeFinder Snaps and Duplicate Snaps provided savings in the required storage space in all of the scenarios tested.

**The saved space column shows the percentage compared to five system clones. The formula is:

1 - * (RE2 Gold real storage size + savepool) / (RE2 Gold real storage size * number of systems)



Figure 41 shows the storage space savings with TimeFinder/Snap and Duplicate Snap technologies.

Figure 41. Storage space savings using EMC TimeFinder Snap/Duplicate Snap

In the test phases shown in Figure 40, approximately 66 percent of the storage space is saved when using two TimeFinder Snap-based systems, and 79 percent is saved when using two TimeFinder Snap-based systems and two TimeFinder Duplicate Snap-based systems. You can see that the more TimeFinder Snap or Duplicate Snap systems that are deployed in the solution, the more storage space is saved when compared to TimeFinder clones.

These results are based on the volume of changes and the size of the SAP environments tested and validated in our lab. The results may vary with different sized SAP systems, volume of changes per system, and the number of systems deployed based on TimeFinder Snap and TimeFinder Duplicate Snap technologies.



While creating the TimeFinder Snaps and TimeFinder Duplicate Snaps, the Symmetrix VMAX copies the whole data block from the source to the save device pool when the first write request is made, therefore, the growth of the save device pool is typically greater than the growth of the database. In this test phase, as shown in Table 9, the growth of the save device pool is about three times the database’s increment.

Table 9. Actual database and save device pool increase for each cycle

Cycle Total database increase (GB) Save device pool increase (GB)

1 5.45 (TimeFinder Snap and Duplicate Snap-based systems)

14.06


10.75


12.75

According to EMC’s best practices, a TimeFinder Snap does not require more than 20 percent of the source volume’s capacity in the save device pool.

Important: Using SAP systems based on TimeFinder Snaps or TimeFinder Duplicate Snaps can reduce the storage space requirements up to 80 percent overall compared to TimeFinder clone technology, even if the growth of the save device pool is faster than the database. The save pool grows only when changes are made in the TimeFinder Snaps or Duplicate Snaps. Refer to the TimeFinder documentation for more information.



Conclusion

This paper describes how to significantly reduce storage consumption using EMC TimeFinder Duplicate Snap technology rather than clone technology. The more you deploy Snaps or Duplicate Snaps, the more storage savings you will achieve compared to TimeFinder clones. This solution provides the following benefits:

• Cost savings—TimeFinder Duplicate Snaps dramatically reduce the space requirements. Up to 60 percent of the storage space requirements is reduced when compared to TimeFinder clones.

• Time savings –Deploying TimeFinder Snap or Duplicate Snap replicas is much faster than deploying clones. For example, a 90-minute TimeFinder clone creation was reduced to seven minutes (a 92 percent reduction) when creating a TimeFinder Snap or Duplicate Snap.

• Greater flexibility

The TimeFinder Snap and Duplicate Snap replicas are independent from each other. The Duplicate Snap system is not affected after deleting the TimeFinder Snap system and the TimeFinder Snap system is not affected if the TimeFinder Duplicate Snap is deleted.

You can also fully restore the TimeFinder Duplicate Snap-based SAP system to a new SAP system based on a standard device if needed.

Replication Manager simplifies and automates the SAP System Copy process, enabling the new TimeFinder Duplicate Snap technology.



References

White papers For additional information, see the following white papers.

• New Features in EMC Enginuity 5875 for Open System Environments (EMC White Paper) http://powerlink.emc.com/km/live1/en_US/Offering_Technical/White_Paper/h8092-features-enginuity-open-systems-wp.pdf

• Storage Tiering for VMware Environments Deployed on EMC Symmetrix VMAX with Enginuity 5875 (EMC White Paper) http://powerlink.emc.com/km/live1/en_US/Offering_Technical/White_Paper/h8101-storage-tiering-vmware-vmax-wp.pdf)

• EMC Tiered Storage for SAP: A New Way to Optimize with Use Cases for EMC Symmetrix VMAX and Virtual LUN – Applied Technology (EMC White Paper) http://powerlink.emc.com/km/live1/en_US/Offering_Technical/White_Paper/h6628-tiered-storage-sap-vmax-fast-vlun-wp.pdf)

• Enginuity – the EMC Symmetrix Storage Operating Environment – A Detailed Review (EMC White Paper) http://powerlink.emc.com/km/live1/en_US/Offering_Technical/White_Paper/c1033-enginuity-operating-envir-symmetrix-wp.pdf )

• Increase Efficiency for SAP Landscapes with EMC Symmetrix FAST VP—An Architectural Overview (EMC White Paper available on Powerlink) (http://powerlink.emc.com/km/live1/en_US/Offering_Technical/White_Paper/h8159-sap-vmax-fast-vp-wp.pdf )

Product documentation For additional information, see the following product documents:

• EMC Replication Manager Version 5.3.2 Administrator’s Guide – Part Number: 300-012-084

• EMC Replication Manager Version 5.3.2 Product Guide – Part Number: 300-012-083

(http://powerlink.emc.com/km/live1/en_US/Offering_Technical/Technical_Documentation/300-012-084.pdf)

• EMC Symmetrix TimeFinder Product Guide – Part Number 300-011719 (

(http://powerlink.emc.com/km/live1/en_US/Offering_Technical/Technical_Documentation/300-012-083.pdf)

http://powerlink.emc.com/km/live1/en_US/Offering_Technical/Technical_Documentation/300-011-719.pdf)

• Installation Guide: SAP ERP 6.0 – EHP4 Ready ABAP on Linux: Oracle Based on SAP NetWeaver 7.0 Including Enhancement Package 1

• EMC Solution Enabler Symmetrix CLI Version 7.2 Command Reference http://powerlink.emc.com/km/live1/en_US/Offering_Technical/Technical_Documentation/300-012-069.pdf)

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