white paper - improve your netapp storage efficiency_rev2.1_5937ef

8/13/2019 White Paper - Improve Your NetApp Storage Efficiency_Rev2.1_5937EF

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Copyright 2012 NTP Software 1

Improve NetApp Storage Efficiency with Directory

Based and Group-Based Quotas and Policie

White Pape

October 20

Managing storage cost-effectively has become one of the most important tasks for

todays organizations. However, it often seems like the only alternatives are all-or-

nothing and therefore too costly to implement. This white paper shows you how to

find the granularity and flexibility you need to manage your NetApp storage

systems effectively.


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Table of Contents

Executive Summary ............................................................................................................. 3

The Challenge ...................................................................................................................... 4Policy-Based Management ................................................................................................. 5

The Elements of a Storage Policy ........................................................................................ 6

Directory Quotas ................................................................................................................. 7

OK, Show Me! ..................................................................................................................... 8

Conclusion ......................................................................................................................... 11

About NTP Software ......................................................................................................... 12

NTP Software Professional Services ................................................................................. 12


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Executive Summary

With saving money being more important than ever before, we are all looking for new

and better ways to manage our file storage. According to industry analysts, storageremains the most expensive resource on most organizations networks and the need for

storage resources continues to increase by 40-50% a year. As part of these same survey

results, analysts tell us that unstructured data (file data) accounts for 80% or more of all

storage requirements in most companies.

What this means is that, if we want to improve the cost-effectiveness of our storage,

our management of file data is the place to start. By choosing NetApp as your host

platform, you have already taken an important step in implementing a cost-effective

solution. The purpose of this white paper is to help you increase the return on your

investment by showing you Best Practice techniques for managing the data stored on

your NetApp storage systems.


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FactMarc Staimer, one of

SearchStorage.coms

experts, points out in

a recent article that

the fully burdened

cost of a wasted

terabyte of primary

storage is now

$43,000 a year.

The Challenge

Without any policies to manage it, the storage on your

network becomes a dumping ground. Gartner Groupestimates that 20% to 40% of all the data stored on most

networks is junkit has no value to the business at all. But

dont blame the end-users; the lack of any governing

policies says to them that the resource should be treated as

though it is infinite and free.

Of course, we understand that this isnt the case, but it is

the policy infrastructure that we establish that carries the

message to our end-users. Without any policies, they never

get the message.

The message we need to send is that storage costs money and that protecting the

stored data costs even more money. Everyone can have as much as they need

provided that need is associated with their jobs and the needs of the business, not from

family photos and MP3s.

This means that we need to watch our users consumption (with Home Directory

thresholds) to ensure that it is reasonable, and so that we can intervene and offer

guidance when things exceed the norm. We also need to use storage management

policies (file screening) to help people understand the types of content that we view as

appropriate.


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Policy-Based Management

Before we dive into the specifics, it is worth taking a step back to look at Policy-Based

Management in general. When it comes to what we are here to talk about Directory-

Based and Group-Based Managementwe should be clear that what we are managing

is our user community, not storage.This is a very important concept that can easily be

missed.

The benefits of managing well will come in the form of better service and reduced total

cost of ownership (reduced TCO). However, efficient and cost-effective management

centers around how our policies are organized relative to the user community, not how

they relate to the storage infrastructure.

Furthermore, in managing users, your storage infrastructure should be transparent. You

shouldnt need to know where a users home directory resides; you simply want toknow that your policies will be applied in every case.

This is where the concept of managing by groups enters the picture. If you have 5,000

users and the technology is flexible enough, you can manage 5,000 user Home

Directories one-by-one, but why would you ever want to do that? At the same time,

each user and each Home Directory is different. You cant just apply a blanket policy to

all storage without exception. What we need is technology that allows us the ability to

create communities (groups) and that automatically maps the policies we create onto

the appropriate users.

Storage policies, be they quotas or something else, are Best Practice items and are most

cost-effectively managed by addressing users in groups, not one-by-one.


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The Elements of a Storage Policy

Implicitly, we have already talked about two of the elements of a storage management

policy: its scope over the resources (a directory) and its scope over the users (ActiveDirectory groups). It is important to recognize that all policies have the same four

dimensions, namely:

The Policy DefinitionWhat is this policy about? Is it a quota? A file blocking rule?etc.

Resource ScopeTo what portion of the storage resources does this policy apply?All of them? A specific users home directory? Just one single file?

User ScopeWhich users are subject to this policy? Which users are exempt? (TheMarketing Department may have a valid business need to store MP3 or video files,for example, while the Customer Service Department may not.)

ActionsWhat happens when a users action triggers a policy? Does the systemsend them a message? Are they denied? etc.

A Best Practice set of policies takes advantage of the ability to manipulate each of these

dimensions to derive the maximum benefit with the lowest ongoing costs. Policies, like

everything else, change over time. Todays music files are MP3s, but what comes next?

MP4s? A home directory quota today is commonly between 1 and 4 GB, yet this would

have been outrageously large five years ago. As time goes on, we dont want to be

updating 5,000 policies; we want as few objects to manage as makes sense.

Make everything as simple as possible, but not simpler.

- Albert Einstein

By using the flexibility in resource scope and user scope, we can make everything simple

and cost-effective to maintain, while not making it too simple namely, all or nothing

and therefore ineffective or uneconomic.


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Tip

Dont be the one who tells

the CEO that he or she cant

save files on the network. TheCEO has a home directory like

everyone else. Make sure you

have a VIP user group that is

exempt from certain storage

management policies. Home

directory quotas are a good

place to start.

Directory Quotas

For the majority of storage management policies, the most natural resource scope (the

point of attachment for the policy, if you will) is a directory. For most storage

administrators, this is the natural unit of management. (Dont forget thatwhat we are

really managing is users. Files do not create or change themselves. Users do it all.) NTP

Software File Management Essentials not only brings the ability to manage users by

directory to NetApp storage systems, but also allows you to understand what exists and

takes place on the system so that you can formulate

the most appropriate policies.

A volume is generally too large an object to manage as

a whole, and often it contains directories (shares) that

have little or nothing in common. Even if the volume

only contains user home directories, as we have

already discussed, not all users are equal from a policy

perspective (see sidebar).

A Best Practice strategy for managing home directories

is to allow the technology to apply your policies to the

individual directories while you focus on creating the

appropriate groups (storage user roles) within your

organization. Microsoft and Windows have already

provided us a paradigm for how to do this. We can map the role-based concept

Microsoft offers for security onto home directory quotasnamely, something along the

lines of: light user, normal user, power user, and exempt. What size gets associated with

each of these groups is up to you. Maybe you also want to include a zero entitlementa

class of users who are not allowed to save anything to the network (but who still need

home directories because this is where Windows and other applications store their state

and user preferences).

Lets look at how NTP Software File Management Essentials(FME)makes it easy to do

everything you need.


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Tip

NTP Software QFS, part of

File Management Essentials,

provides per-policy security

to facilitate scenarios such

as the one mentioned below

with the Finance

Department. A further

discussion of this is beyond

the scope of this paper, but

please refer to the NTP

Software QFS

User Manualfor more information.

OK, Show Me!

NTP Software File Management Essentials is designed

to provide you with maximum efficiency and flexibility

in managing your storage and your users. Additionally,

File Management Essentials helps you fully recognize

how your data is utilized in your system, therefore

allowing you to make more guided, careful decisions in

terms of policy formulation and enforcement.

Many organizations use NTP Software Quota File

Sentinel (QFS) to manage multiple systems

(sometimes distributed across the globe) from a single

seat. Others, for reasons of security, delegate the

administration of a single vFiler to a specific individual.

Whatever may be the right model for your

environment, NTP Software QFScan accommodate it.

However, a complete discussion of all the alternatives is beyond the scope of this paper.

Here, we will limit the discussion to what is a Best Practice for most companies.


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The image on the previous page shows the QFS policy overview. On the left side, you

see a hierarchy for a company, Galactic Getaways, that has facilities in two locations. To

minimize cost, the company has chosen a single seat management strategy, with one

exception.

The Finance users in the Boston office have convinced senior management that only

they should be allowed to set policies for their users. Finance has their own set of

policies that only they can administer (as seen in the overlaid image on page 8).

You can also see that the Marketing

Department is located in New York

and has policies that apply to a

business share that it has on the

Filer in New York.

Now lets take a detailed look at

one of the quota policies. First, welllook at one of the business share

quotas the Marketing Share

(image to the right). This is a

departmental, shared directory

where the Marketing Department

works collaboratively and stores all

of their finished products. It has a soft quota because users are never denied. Instead,

the quota provides for notification thresholds that signal management as the share

grows perhaps beyond what the Marketing Department has agreed to pay for.

Additionally, the thresholds are used to automatically move files to an archive orsecondary storage.

(Also, relative to managing the Marketing Share, recall our previous discussion about file

blocking. There would be no prohibition of MP3s, MPEGs, or other multi-media content

here. These are the types of objects a Marketing Department is paid to create.)

But what if you arent entirely sure which policies would be most helpful in improving

your storage efficiency? For example, what if Galactic Galaxies cannot describe the

breakdown of who uses what data, how much of that data they use, and how frequently

they use it? If you want to control something properly and efficiently, you have to

understand how it works and what it does before you set policies for it. This is where

NTP Software File Reporter can help. With automated, policy-based reporting acrossyour entire file data storage environment, NTP Software File Reporter can help you

achieve a better understanding of critical details about your storage. When joined with

QFS, this insight into your data allows you to enforce appropriate usage policies so that

you can preserve system performance and availability.


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Conclusion

Having chosen a cost-effective hardware platform NetApp storage systems to host

your storage, you also need the ability to manage flexibly and efficiently. NTP Software

File Management Essentials gives you this ability. With NTP Software QFS

, you can

manage multiple storage systems and thousands of users from one seat with a only

handful of policies, dramatically increasing the return on your investment. Additionally,

with NTP Software FR, you can formulate more efficient policies through a complete

understanding of what exists on your system. NTP Sofware File Management Essentials

saves your company time and money on administration with automatic, enterprise-wide

policy enforcement and monitoring that can be applied across storage platforms and file

types. File Management Essentials makes it easy to reduce costs while improving overall

system performance. Why not begin enjoying these benefits today?

Learn more about NTP Softwares products and our relationship with NetApp at

http://partners.ntpsoftware.com/netapp.
http://partners.ntpsoftware.com/netapphttp://partners.ntpsoftware.com/netapphttp://partners.ntpsoftware.com/netapp


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About NTP Software

NTP Software puts users in charge of their file data and is the only company providing

file data management solutions that deliver all of the enterprise-class features neededto understand, manage, monitor, and secure file data completely. NTP Software is a

global leader and has been chosen by the majority of Fortune 1000 companies and

thousands of customers in private and public sectors for providing leadership through

superior solutions, professional services, experience, and trusted advice. NTP Software

delivers a single solution across the entire data storage environment, from individual

files and users to an entire global enterprise across thousands of systems and sites. NTP

Software reduces the cost and complexity associated with the exponential growth of file

data and is located on the web at www.ntpsoftware.com.

NTP Software Professional ServicesNTP Softwares Professional Services offers consulting, training, and design services to

help customers with their storage management challenges. We have helped hundreds

of customers to implement cost-effective solutions for managing their storage

environments. Our services range from a simple assessment to in-depth financial

analyses.

For further assistance in creating the most cost-effective Storage Management

Infrastructure, please contact your NTP Software Representative at 800-226-2755 or

603-622-4400.


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The information contained in this document is believed to be accurate as of the date of

publication. Because NTP Software must constantly respond to changing market

conditions, what is here should not be interpreted as a commitment on the part of NTP

Software, and NTP Software cannot guarantee the accuracy of any information

presented after the date of publication.

This White Paper is for informational purposes only. NTP SOFTWARE MAKES NO

WARRANTIES, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, IN THIS DOCUMENT.

NTP Software and other marks are either registered trademarks or trademarks of NTP

Software in the United States and/or other countries. Other product and company

names mentioned herein may be the trademarks of their respective owners.

NTP Software products and technologies described in this document may be protected

by United States and/or international patents.

NTP Software

20A Northwest Blvd., #136

Nashua, NH 03063

Toll Free: 800-226-2755

International: 1-603-622-4400

Web Site:http://www.ntpsoftware.com

Copyright 2012 NTP Software. All rights reserved. All trademarks and registered

trademarks are the property of their respective owners. Doc# 5937EF
http://www.ntpsoftware.com/http://www.ntpsoftware.com/http://www.ntpsoftware.com/http://www.ntpsoftware.com/

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