Things to Consider when Looking for SAN Storage

Over the last few months I've been working with my team and others to design our next generation of SAN storage for my company. Sounds simple, right? Sure. I've got a bridge in Brooklyn for sale too.

So how do you go about designing what your next storage system should be? This answer should be different for almost everyone. Let me share the process that I've recently gone through.

When I started my job in April of 2011, I was given the task of evaluating each system and its related components so that we could have a baseline "inventory" of what my group does. We'll call this my "Systems Service Catalog".  This was very enlightening for me, as I was operating in a completely different environment than I had with my previous job. Anyway, based on creating this document, several needs were discovered, with storage being one of them.

So, having determined storage was an issue that would need to be addressed in the coming fiscal year, I began to do a few things:

1. Held meetings to discuss and understand how we were currently using our storage
2. Discussed with the team what we WANTED to do with our storage environment
3. The team documented what the "pain points" were with the existing storage
4. Met with executive leadership to determine business requirements as it related to any system that had data or otherwise utilized our SAN (Virtual Machines for example)
5. Asked executive leadership to determine what their SLA's were for the systems and applications that utilized the SAN (i.e., if this particular system is unavailable for 4 hours, is that a problem for you?)
6. Attempted (and still attempting) to determine retention requirements for each system and medium that utilizes the SAN (how long do we keep video, documents, log files, etc.)

From here, I began to gather all the information from these meetings and discussions to arrive at an acceptable storage solution that was sized to be able to grow and had adequate amounts of tiered storage.

Some things I learned along the way...

It's certainly much easier to go to vendor and just say, "Hey, I want highly available storage for 2 data centers so that I can replicate my data between the two and not have to worry too much if one data center dies. Oh, and I want my down time to be no more than 15 minutes. Whatcha got for that?" and just wait for them to send me a great and wonderful quote.

Sorry, that won't fly here...

So here's what I learned:

1. Tell your vendor explicitly what you would like to have and what you must have and have them ITEMIZE your quotes so you can easily take them out
2.  Make sure the vendor understands which items are options and requirements if you are building a budgetary quote. Removing some items can raise your costs.
3. Understand your business requirements for storage. I don't know about you, but it isn't the IT department's job to create most business requirements. My job is to deliver the appropriate solutions based on their needs.
4. Policies regarding retention of files and video are essential. If you know you need to keep 30 days of video for all or some of your video surveillance, that will certainly change how much storage you need to plan for. 
5. Know what your SLA's are or RTS (return to service) requirements are. If you don't need 24x7x365 availability and can handle a few hours of downtime, then don't spend the money on that functionality. It will save you a lot of money!

In the end, I was able to get a mid-range system spec'd out that has the capability to be changed into a highly available system and add more storage fairly easily. Now, all I have to do is convince those that create the budgets that this is what they need. Always fun!

Venturing into QR Codes

Something new, for me at least, came across my desk yesterday. QR codes. I've seen them and used them, but haven't really ever taken the time to learn more than that. Well, now I will have an opportunity to learn about the other side of the QR puzzle.

My work has several different displays of art that are available for patrons to view as they await their planes. The idea is to present these QR codes by the artworks to give the visitors detailed information about the piece and its author.

As I've been doing research regarding these codes, I believe that we'll be able to use them for much more. As an airport, we technically are considered a shopping mall, albeit with a little extra security. All of our tenants have different products and needs. With the usage of these codes, we can create a loyalty type program that our tenants can opt into and have the ability to offer passengers discounts, detailed information on their products or coupons.

I'm not yet sure where we'll truly be going with this, but it'll sure be an interesting journey. I'm looking forward to it, and as I learn more and figure out more about what we will do with these, I'll write more about it. Till then, happy reading!

Virtualization in an Airport

Every day in my (mostly)  new job, I see more ways and needs for virtualization. Working within an airport environment, I deal with hundreds of displays for flight information, gates, advertising and so on. All of these do make and have made excellent virtual desktop candidates.

As I learn more about the aviation environment, I'm beginning to see even more areas where we can test and use virtualization. There does tend to be one barrier that we encounter more often than not: vendors who either don't understand or who don't want to understand and move to a virtual world. Many of these possible virtual candidates range from baggage handling to ticketing to central energy plant machines. However, when you mention virtual to many of these system designers they either say, "What's that?", tell you, "We think it can be but we don't really know", or just flat out say, "No, we don't do virtual." Frustrating to say the least.

So, what am I doing about it? Well, for starters, my basic philosophy has always been, nothing is off the table until it can be proven that it won't work. Simple. Let's try it out, either with the vendor or in spite of the vendor (take care here--you don't want to upset the vendor). So, for the vendors who say they don't do virtual, we set up a test environment and test within the IT group first. Next, we do a limited end user roll out--for an extended period. This can be 3-4 months or more. Finally, we'll get the vendor involved and ask them to come in and see what we've done, and hopefully get their blessing. If we get the blessing, we'll do a full roll out. If we don't, we'll discuss with other management and talk to the vendors more to judge what type of support we can expect if we should continue to roll out the virtualization anyway.

Some may say that 3-4 months isn't that much of an extended period to test. Others may say that it's too long. We don't have a set amount of time for these end user tests. We let the results guide us. If something works, we stick with it and ask the user to push it more, preferably until it breaks.And, we do this more than once to make sure it wasn't an accident or something else that broke it. By doing this, we get a better understanding of what we truly can and cannot do.

If something doesn't work, we step back and try to determine what the cause may be and how to fix it. Sometimes this means stripping out pieces of the OS that aren't needed to make a leaner running machine. Other times it means adjusting the resources available to the machine, such as CPU and memory. Then there are the actual applications running on the machine. How are they being used? Is this the standard way to use it? Can we modify the user behavior slightly to help make it work without the user being inconvenienced? As I said earlier, nothing is off the table until we have shown it can't and won't work.

As I write this today, we are currently testing the limits of our VMWare infrastructure with a couple of our systems. We're testing a video solution that is currently setup to stream 14 live feeds to its video viewer and alarm monitoring software all the while driving two monitors. Another item we're testing is the ability to run a software package provided by our LCD screen manufacturer that will allow us to communicate with these screens via the DVI cable and turn the screens off and on (energy savings and screen life extension!). Both of these are things that most people would say that virtualization isn't a good candidate for. But hey, unlessI see it not work for my self, it can be done.

iPhone App Review: ToonPAINT

The basic premise behind ToonPAINT is to take a photograph, either from your Photo Library on your iPhone (or iPod Touch), or from a new snapshot taken from within the ToonPAINT app and create a cartoon-like image of your picture. Once you have a photo loaded, ToonPAINT does it's magic.

After it's initial rendering of your photo, you can set about tweaking the details to your heart's content. There are two main settings that allow you to control what the final output of your photo will be, "basic" and "advanced" modes. Basic mode gives you 3 main options for You can control what ToonPAINT calls "coherence". In other words, how much the image is distorted from it's original look. The size of the value chosen determines how comprehensible the final product is. You can also control what they call edge length, which determines how all of the lines in the photo are connected to each other. I played around with the different combinations and came up with many different looks for the same photo.


Once you create the base look of the photo that you want, you can then add color to the picture using the color "splats". I found adding color to be somewhat tedious at times. It was difficult to precisely add color to small areas of the photographs, even when I had zoomed in as far as I could. This aside, I was still able to add color to the photos and the imprecision did not bother me as much once I had zoomed out to the original size.

Overall, this is a fun app to play with, and at $1.99 the power of this app makes this a steal.

ToonPAINT is an iPhone app by Toon-FX LCC.

Apple, iOS4, and iPhone 4

Okay. Let’s talk Apple and iPhone. Until now, I’ve not said anything. Just watching and listening. I find it amazing from both sides how out of proportion everything is getting. So, to all of you. STOP IT. I’m tired of hearing the whining about the iPhone 4 antenna problem and how Steve Jobs is ruining Apple. I’m sick of those who just flat out defend Apple and that Apple can do no wrong. YOU ARE BOTH WRONG.

Let’s face it, Apple is a major corporation and it is doing the best it has ever done. So, all those Apple haters are now pissed off because this company is doing great. Apple is now the “evil empire” because they desire to maintain control over the products THEY own. All the Apple fan boys are singing Apple’s praises incessantly.

What exactly is the problem here? Frankly, it is Apple’s success. People on both sides of the isle are working everything Apple does into a frenzy, the press is overhyping EVERYTHING Apple does (or doesn’t do). Is Apple perfect? Uh, not by a long shot. Is every product created by Apple the best thing ever made? Not hardly (remember the Newton or the hockey puck mouse?).

iOS and the App Store

So what if Apple wants to retain control over their iPhone iOS environment? Frankly, I don’t care. I’m a techie. I like to take apart computers, find out how software works and, yes, I own an iPhone and and iMac. It doesn’t bother me that Apple wants its developers to use a particular program to write code for their iPhone. If you as a developer don’t want to do that, then go somewhere else. I want my iPhone to run its apps and not crash. I don't want to worry about unsavory apps on my phone. I have used too many products that just don’t work well because the developers don’t follow guidelines setup by manufacturers.

Is the iPhone app store approval process working? Maybe, maybe not. Yes, some apps go through and shouldn’t. Some apps get blocked and shouldn’t. This is perhaps the biggest issue that I, as a consumer and a techie, have with Apple. I appreciate they they try to vet their apps and that I don’t have to worry about malware on my phone. My phone is one place that I don’t want to worry about those issues, as much as possible.

I wish Apple would be more upfront with why apps are accepted or rejected with their developers. Yes, there are some apps I would like to see approved,but lack of those apps isn’t a deal breaker for me, and I would bet for most users, it isn’t for them either. The fact remains: Apple owns the App Store and it is their right to allow any content they deem appropriate. It is their right to enforce strict regulations on how apps interact with their code. So, if restricting developers to XCode gives me, the consumer who is buying the apps, a better user experience, I don’t care what the restrictions are for the developers. Develop a good app, price it properly (doesn’t have to be free or .99) and do what it should, there’s a good chance I’ll buy it if it is useful to me.

iPhone 4

I don’t yet have an iPhone 4. I have held one and tested one. I have seen the antenna bars problem. Yet, I still plan on getting an iPhone.

Why? Simply because, even with the dropping bars problem, the phone still works better than the 3Gs that I have now. The phone that I have been able to test doesn’t get any worse reception or drop any more calls than I do now with my 3Gs. I think Apple’s explanation of the over reporting of bars is plausible.

I also think their handling of the situation has been terrible. Seriously--hold it differently? Bad PR move Apple. Just say, “Ok. I’m sorry some of you are seeing visibly fewer bars when you hold the phone in a certain way. Because of this, anyone who feels this is a problem can get a free case.” That should shut some people up.

Now, at the same time, people put too much faith in how many bars we have (blame the AT&T commercials, “More bars in more places”). Think about it. The phone reception is a digital signal. 1’s and 0’s. On or off. So what does that mean? Either you have a signal or you don’t. Digital signals will have some error correction when packets begin to get lost, but if you have a crappy signal already, there’s only so much error correction that can be done.

So, say what you want. Apple is not the evil empire. They are just getting more scrutiny now because of their success. Apple is also not your best friend. They are a corporation that makes high quality products and sometimes sacrifices function for form. This is not a new thing from Apple. They have almost always done this. So, buyer beware. When you buy the first iteration of ANY product, you run the risk of having to deal with possible design flaws or software issues that come with the privilege of being an early adopter. If you don’t like their product or business practices, you have other options. Exercise your rights and stop whining.