From the earliest versions of vCenter Operations to the current vRealize Operations incarnation, we have been offering a multitude of capabilities to help IT administrators effectively manage, troubleshoot and simplify their infrastructure. One of the most powerful of these capabilities is the ‘Analysis Badge.’
Analysis Badges can be used to provide ‘at-a-glance’ views in numerous forms, including anomalous behavior, capacity usage, performance and more. In this blog post, we will leverage the Blue Medora Management Pack for NetApp Storage to demonstrate some of the capabilities of vRealize Operations Analysis Badges. This Management Pack for NetApp Storage incorporates the capabilities of the analysis badge to help administrators gain a deep level of visibility into their NetApp storage. These insights help admins to remediate any upcoming issues and accurately plan for future growth.
Figure 1: The NetApp Management Pack Storage Topology Dashboard
Three of the most useful Analysis Badges are:
- Capacity Remaining Badge
- Reclaimable Capacity Badge
- Workload Badge
While there are multiple scenarios in which these badges can be useful, one of the most useful is the ability to prevent potential storage overcommit problems.
‘Capacity Remaining’ Badges
Using insights gained from the Capacity Remaining badge with regard to NetApp storage, an administrator can drill down from the system level into the underlying aggregates, LUNs and volumes. From there, the administrator will be able to isolate specific objects that are running short on capacity. Now the administrator can create a plan on how to deal with the limited capacity before anyone in the organization is affected. The administrator can even isolate the issue to a specific virtual machine.
Figure 2: Capacity Remaining badges showing areas of concern at multiple levels
‘Reclaimable Capacity’ Badges
Using the Reclaimable Capacity badge, an administrator can immediately view which objects can be easily used to offset the storage shortages. Just as before, the administrator has visibility from the system level through the stack, all the way to individual virtual machines.
Figure 3: An example of a healthy system with no reclaimable capacity beyond the threshold
‘Workload’ Badges
Under ideal circumstances administrators would be able to use Workload badges to solve all storage problems before they start. However, in the real world, problems will arise. Fortunately, vRealize Operations Analysis Badges are not only used to prevent issues, but to troubleshoot problems as well.
Figure 4 – An example of a NetApp System with extremely high storage utilization
Using the Workload badge for analysis, an administrator can see which objects have the highest utilization. Then, following the previously established pattern, the administrator can link from the alert all the way to the offending virtual machine.
These examples are just a few possible uses for Analysis Badges within vRealize Operations. All the in-depth analytics, which previously consumed a vast amount of an administrator’s time, can now be obtained inside of vRealize Operations with only a few clicks.
