Itzikr's Blog

VMworld 2018, XtremIO Integration with CloudIQ

We are excited to announce that XtremIO has been integrated to CloudIQ.

CloudIQ is the Software as a Service (SaaS) platform offered by Dell EMC that allows customers to manage all of their EMC arrays in a single pane of management. A Dell EMC customer needs to simply log into the CloudIQ application, and he will automatically be presented with an Overview of all of the Dell EMC arrays deployed. CloudIQ currently supports Unity, SC, XtremIO and PowerMAX. CloudIQ is a SaaS application, and as such, no software needs to be installed at the customer site. The fact is SaaS based also means that its keep updating itself with new features that you the customer will benefit from, the moment they are out. The initial rollout for XtremIO customers will start in September 2018 and as mentioned above, it will continue to update itself with new metrics in each release, this is also your opportunity to let us know if you like it and if you would like to see more metrics to be surfaced via it’s portal.

The CloudIQ Storage Analytics Foundation

PCF provides a production ready application container runtime, fully automated service deployments and the security controls required to enable modern application development using Microservices architectures, containers, CI/CD and DevOps.

The PCF offers developers a production-ready application container runtime and fully automated service deployments. Meanwhile, operations teams can sleep easier with the visibility and control made possible by platform-enforced policies and automated lifecycle management.

Portal Security

CloudIQ provides each customer an independent secure portal, and ensures that customers will only be able to see their own data via CloudIQ.

CloudIQ access requires that each user has a valid Dell EMC support account.

Each user can only see those systems in CloudIQ which are part of that user’s site access as per configuration in Dell EMC Service Center.

Cloud Hosting Infrastructure

CloudIQ is hosted on Dell EMC infrastructure which is Highly Available, Fault Tolerant, and guarantees a 4-hour Disaster Recovery SLA.

Because it is web-based, CloudIQ is accessible anytime, anywhere.

CloudIQ delivers several key values to customers:

• Reduce Total Cost of Ownership: CloudIQ provides an easy single pane of glass from which you can monitor your Unity and SC systems, all from the web so you can access anytime, anywhere.
  
• Expedite Time to Value: Because it is deployed from the EMC Cloud, customers can simply log into their CloudIQ account and immediately access this valuable information. There is nothing to set up, no licenses, no burdens.
  
• Drive Business Value: CloudIQ’s Proactive Health Score provides an easy way to identify and understand potential vulnerabilities in the storage environment. With these proactive and targeted guidelines, the result is a more robust and reliable storage environment, resulting in higher uptime and optimized performance and capacity.
  

Cloud IQ takes Storage System Support to a whole new level, by delivering:

• An Operational Dashboard – for Proactive Monitoring, and Alerting
  
• Predictive Analytics – to help both with short-term Risk Avoidance and longer-term Capacity and Performance Planning
  
• A Proactive Healthscore – providing Proactive Support + Recommended Remediation
  

Proactively Monitoring Storage Health

CloudIQ is proactively running Health Checks in these 5 categories:

• System Health – checking for faulty components, such as unreliable cables, or fans
  
• Configuration – this is where CloudIQ adds the “IQ” by understanding the context for a given component – such as whether a failed drive is an unused spare, or active in a RAID 5 configuration
  
• Capacity – CloudIQ is actively monitoring capacity issues that could result in DU – such as Pools that are both Oversubscribed and also approaching Full
  
• Performance – CloudIQ will actively monitor for potential performance issues, such as when your CPUs are running at high rates, and will also identify if there is an imbalance, so that you can shift workloads for better balance
  
• Data Protection – CloudIQ is monitoring your Data Protection policies, to ensure your data is protected as expected – both replication RPOs and also Snapshot policies for scheduling and retention
  

Once logged in, customers can view XtremIO clusters from different perspectives:

• Configuration View – a summary view of the key metrics of the XtremIO cluster configuration
  
• Health View – CloudIQ offers a consistent health score mechanism across all Dell EMC arrays. From this perspective, customers can easily identify which arrays are healthy, and which arrays have issues that require attention.
  
• Performance View – key performance metrics are displayed per each XtremIO cluster
  
• Capacity View – capacity and savings numbers are displayed for all the XtremIO clusters
  

If more information is required, the user can easily drill down into the cluster details. More details are then shown regarding each of the functional areas (Configuration, Health, Capacity, Performance) described above.

CloudIQ Analytics with Machine Learning

• Predictive Analytics – Seasonal Decomposition of Time Series by Loess (STL)
  
• • Capacity – Predict time to full for Storage Pools
    
• • Performance – Performance anomaly at System, Pool, and Object level
    
• Root Cause Investigation
  
• • Hierarchical, partitional & fuzzy time-series clustering algorithms
    
• Known Issue Identification, e.g.
  
• • KB article – iSCSI subnet address requirements
    
• • TSA – Defer OE Upgrade if customer has VVOLs with Snapshots
    

ETA content – CIFS/SMB File System vulnerability on a specific code version

you can also watch Susan Sharpe showing CloudIQ during TFD

VM Awareness

A repeating ask from XtremIO customers has been to integrate with vCenter and provide information regarding the Virtual Machines (VMs) that are stored on the XtremIO Cluster. Now with XtremIO being integrated with the CloudIQ platform, all CloudIQ features can easily be implemented for XtremIO.

Coming soon, XtremIO will display information on all of the VMs stored on the XtremIO Cluster. In addition, when selecting a specific Volume, CloudIQ will provide a list of all of the VMs that are stored on that particular Volume.

CloudIQ – There’s An App for That

We’re also very excited about our new mobile app. Even without a mobile app, CloudIQ makes it simple for anyone with a browser to connect to cloudiq.dellemc.com and understand their storage health. But now we’ve storage health even more accessible with a new mobile app available for iPhone and Android. This will be available in the next month and can show your storage health across all your connected systems – right from the palm of your hand.

Conclusion

XtremIO joining the CloudIQ platform is exciting in multiple facets:

• By simply entering the CloudIQ URL, customers have access to all key metrics of XtremIO clusters. No local installations are required.
  
• The storage admin is provided a cockpit view of all of his Dell EMC storage array, offering a single plan of management
  
• CloudIQ features (for example VM Awareness) are easily implemented by XtremIO, increasing the amount and velocity of XtremIO feature development.
  

CloudIQ integration with XtremIO will be available in September 2018

A link to the original PR can be found here

https://blog.dellemc.com/en-us/cloudiq-powermax-vmax-sc-series-xtremio-instantly-view-dell-emc-storage-health/