NetApp ONTAP

Introduction

ONTAP has evolved from NetApp’s original operating system. It is most popular and widely-deployed operating system.

The different platforms that it can run on now are FAS, AFF, ONTAP Select, Cloud Volumes ONTAP, and NetApp Private Storage.

The different platforms run on hardware or virtual machine, and on premises or in the cloud.

NetApp ONTAP Architecture:

Cluster, Cluster Nodes and Disks

An ONTAP cluster can be as small as a single node cluster. Running a single node cluster means actually losing the access to data if the node fails. Simply it is not redundant.

To be redundant we can add another node to the existing cluster to form a HA-Pair. The two nodes which are connected in HA-Pair share a single disk. If we run a HA-Pair then we will have HA-Interconnect. This HA-Interconnect mirrors the NVRAM between these two nodes. So if one of the node fails then the other node can take over the aggregates of the failed node. Thus, there will be no loss of data even if one of the node fails. We have a network called Cluster Interconnect. The Cluster Interconnect is used for heartbeat configuration management and volume data between the cluster nodes.

A cluster node can be scaled out by connecting one or more HA-Pairs to the same cluster. Each HA-pair should be connected to Cluster Interconnect and each HA-pair contains individual HA_Interconnect.

Based on the protocols we use the maximum number of HA-Pairs and can be configured as follows:

• NAS : 12 HA-Pairs (24 Nodes)
• SAN : 6 HA-Pairs (12 Nodes)

Aggregates, Volumes and SVMs

Client data and configuration data in ONTAP is stored in volumes, and volumes are always a part of an aggregate. Aggregate is a collection of disks. Each node contains only one root aggregate, but we can have multiple data aggregates per node. In the case of node failure the surviving node will take over the aggregates of the failed node by default. In case of single HA-Pair the aggregates will be given back automatically after the failed node is up and running again.

There is a very important volume called root volume typically named as vol0, which is located in root aggregate. This volume is a node volume which contains cluster configurations and log files. So every node contains a volume named vol0.

A cluster always runs virtual machines. SVMs are logical representation of one of four types. They are:

1. System Type (Cluster SVM) : We have only one such type of SVM in the cluster. This SVM is used to manage the cluster Inter-Connect interfaces.

2. Node Type (Node SVM) : Each node in the cluster is represented as a node SVM.

3. Admin Type (Cluster Management SVM) : Usually connect to this type of SVM when we want to manage the cluster. Basically it represents the cluster.

4. Data Type : Depending on the number of nodes and protocols we use we can have upto a maximum of 1000 SVMs of this type. These type of SVMs are used to represent data towards our NAS and SAN clients. The data of the SVMs is stored in volumes. All the volumes belonging to a particular data SVM are a part of namespace of that particular SVM. Therefore, the namespace of a data SVM contains all of its data volumes. A data SVM contains exactly one root volume. This is a very small volume of 1GB commonly used to manage data volumes. This root volume should never contain data and the only information available from the root volume is junction paths of the connected data volumes. In a NAS environment the volumes have to be managed, otherwise they are not accessible by the clients.

LUNs and QTrees

A LUN is the logical representation of storage in a storage area network (SAN). In ONTAP, a LUN is located within a volume. Optionally, it can be located within a Qtree in a volume.

A Qtree is a logically defined file system that can exist as a special subdirectory of the root directory within a FlexVol volume or a FlexGroup volume.

Resource Hierarchy:

NetApp Cluster
— Cluster Nodes
    — Aggregates
    — Storage Ports
    — Ethernet Ports
      — Logical Interfaces(LIF’s)
    — FCP Adapters
      — FC Interfaces
— Storage Virtual Machine/SVM
    — Storage Volumes
        — Storage Luns
        — QTrees
— Disks
    — Shelves
Metro Cluster
    — Metro Cluster Nodes

Prerequisites

The OpsRamp Gateway must be installed.

To check the TLS status:

SSH username@hostname
system services web show

If TLS is not enabled: tls.enable on

Example output:

External Web Services: true
               Status: online
   HTTP Protocol Port: 80
  HTTPS Protocol Port: 443
        TLSv1 Enabled: true
        SSLv3 Enabled: true
        SSLv2 Enabled: true

Configure and install the integration

1. Go to Setup > Integrations and Apps.
2. Click + ADD on the INSTALLED APP page. The ADD APP page displays all the available applications along with the newly created application with the version.
   Notes:
   • If there are already installed applications, it will redirect to the INSTALLED APPS page, where all the installed applications are displayed.
   • If there are no installed applications, it will navigate to the ADD APP page.
   • You can even search for the application using the search option available. Also you can use the All Categories option to search.

3. Click ADD in the NetApp ONTAP application.
4. In the Configurations page, click + ADD. The Add Configuration page appears.
5. Enter the below mentioned BASIC INFORMATION

Notes:

• By default the Is Secure checkbox is selected.
• App Failure Notifications: if turned on, you will be notified in case of an application failure that is, Connectivity Exception, Authentication Exception.

6. In the RESOURCE TYPE section, select:

   • ALL: All the existing and future resources will be discovered.
   • SELECT: You can select one or multiple resources to be discovered.

7. In the DISCOVERY SCHEDULE section, select Recurrence Pattern to add one of the following patterns:

   • Minutes
   • Hourly
   • Daily
   • Weekly
   • Monthly

8. Click ADD.

9. Now the configuration is saved and displayed on the configurations page after you save it.
   Note: From the same page, you may Edit and Remove the created configuration.

10. Click NEXT

11. In the Installation page, select an existing registered gateway profile, and click FINISH.

The application is now installed and displayed on the Installed Integration page. Use the search field to find the installed application.

Modify the Configuration

• See Modify an Installed Integration or Application article.

  Note: Select the NetAPP ONTAP application.

View the NetApp ONTAP details

The discovered resource(s) are displayed in Infrastructure > Resources > Storage > NetApp Cluster, with Native Resource Type as NetApp Cluster. You can navigate to the Attributes tab to view the discovery details, and Metrics tab to view the metric details for NetApp ONTAP.

View resource metrics

To confirm NetApp-ONTAP monitoring, review the following:

• Metric graphs: A graph is plotted for each metric that is enabled in the configuration.
• Alerts: Alerts are generated for metrics that are configured as defined for integration.

Supported Metrics

Risks, Limitations & Assumptions

• Application can handle Critical/Recovery failure notifications for below two cases when user enables App Failure Notifications in configuration
  • Connectivity Exception
  • Authentication Exception
• Application will not send any duplicate/repeat failure alert notification until the already existing critical alert is recovered.
• Using metrics for monitoring the resources and generating alerts when the threshold values are breached.
• Application cannot control monitoring pause/resume actions based on above alerts.
• Since a single NetApp Cluster may contain thousands of resources. At the time of Monitoring we are facing performance issues.
• The api rate limit is 20 (At a point of time we can make 20 api calls only with the cluster).
• No support of showing activity log and applied time.
• No support for the option to get Latest snapshot metric.

References

ONTAP API Response