SYSTEM AND METHOD FOR STORAGE MANAGEMENT

• US 20090144518A1
• Filed: 08/18/2008
• Published: 06/04/2009
• Est. Priority Date: 08/23/2007
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: UBS Business Solutions AG (UBS Ag)
• Original Assignee: UBS Ag
• Inventors: MCMULLAN, Alex, LEWIS, Brian, LUNT, Jonathan, MULBERRY, Peter, VINCENT, Gary, BARKER, Martin
• Granted Patent: US 8,209,410 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 711/171
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/328 Computer systems status display G06F11/327 takes precedence
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/3485 for I/O devices
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/0605 by facilitating the interaction with a user or administrator
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/0608 Saving storage space on storage systems
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/0653 Monitoring storage devices or systems
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/067 Distributed or networked storage systems, e.g. storage area networks [SAN], network attached storage [NAS]

Abstract

A system and method for monitoring the storage estate of an organization using an interactive website that is configured to produce and display a novel set of key performance indicators (KPIs) related to the storage estate, including KPIs related to data collected from at least one of storage area network data and network attached storage data. In one embodiment, the novel set of KPIs includes one or more of protection efficiency, application efficiency, and snapshot overhead, where protection efficiency is calculated as a ratio of logical addressable data storage volume to total physical volume of data storage for storage area network data of the organization, application efficiency is calculated as a fraction of disk storage allocated to end user devices that is actually used by the end user devices for storage area network data, and snapshot overhead is calculated as a ratio of a volume of storage allocated for replicated copies of data to allocated storage for network attached storage data.

Claims

1. A system for management of a storage estate of an organization, comprising:

a storage management data repository configured to receive periodic updates from one or more servers or applications coupled to the storage estate; and

a web reporting tool configured to periodically process data from the storage management data repository, the web reporting tool configured to provide one or more reports related to the storage estate in a format accessible through a web interface provided to authorized users, the one or more reports including a key performance indicator (KPI) report,

wherein the KPI report comprises one of a SAN KPI report and a NAS KPI report,

wherein the SAN KPI report comprises a display of one or more SAN KPIs related to storage area network (SAN) data of the organization,

wherein the NAS KPI report comprises a display of one or more NAS KPIs related to network attached storage (NAS),

wherein at least one SAN KPI comprises one or more of;

protection efficiency calculated as a ratio of logical addressable data storage volume to total physical volume of data storage for storage area network data of the organization, and

application efficiency calculated as a fraction of disk storage allocated to end user devices that is actually used by the end user devices,

wherein at least one NAS KPI comprises snapshot overhead calculated as a ratio of a volume of storage allocated for replicated copies of data to allocated storage.

2. The system of claim 1, wherein the KPI report comprises a graphical display of current data related to a plurality of storage categories, each storage category comprising one of a subset of storage area network storage and a subset of network attached storage.

3. The system of claim 2, wherein the plurality of storage categories are displayed as a series of histograms that each comprises one or more sub-histograms corresponding to respective storage sub-categories, the histograms being arranged in a storage capacity hierarchy,

wherein a first storage category comprises a first total storage capacity and includes a plurality of sub-categories that together comprise the first total storage capacity of the first storage category, and a second storage category comprises a second total storage capacity,

wherein a relationship between the first and second storage categories is that the second total storage capacity is equivalent to a total storage capacity of a sub-category of the first category,

wherein the relationship between the first and second storage categories is repeated for one or more additional storage categories successive to the second storage category.

4. The system of claim 3, wherein each storage category comprises a category of storage area network storage,

wherein the plurality of storage categories comprises physical storage, logical storage, allocated storage, claimed storage, storage consumption, and storage usage,

wherein physical storage denotes total actual storage capacity of the storage area network,

wherein logical storage denotes a subset of physical storage that is configured and formatted storage,

wherein allocated storage denotes a subset of logical storage that is addressable,

wherein claimed storage denotes a subset of allocated storage that is allocated to host devices,

wherein storage consumption denotes a subset of claimed storage that has been claimed by a host device,

wherein storage usage denotes a subset of consumption storage a subset of storage consumption that has been claimed by a host device;

and

wherein one or more KPIs is displayed in graphical form by highlighting components of the KPI, each component comprising a histogram or sub-histogram corresponding to a respective displayed storage category or sub-category.

5. The system of claim 3, wherein each storage category comprises a category of network attached storage,

wherein the plurality of storage categories comprise physical storage, logical storage, and storage usage,

wherein physical storage denotes total actual storage capacity of the storage area network,

wherein logical storage denotes a subset of physical storage that is configured and formatted storage,

wherein storage usage denotes a subset of logical storage that is one of allocated and written to and allocated and not written to, and

wherein one or more KPIs is displayed in graphical form by highlighting components of the KPI, each component comprising a histogram or sub-histogram corresponding to a respective displayed storage category or sub-category.

6. The system of claim 1, wherein the one or more servers comprise a plurality of servers, each server configured to receive information from a subset of the storage estate, the subset arranged according to one or more of a geographical location, a type of storage, a type of business, and a city, wherein the one or more reports further comprise a capacity report, an application report, and a database report.

7. A method for managing a storage estate of an organization, comprising:

regularly retrieving information related to the storage estate at one or more servers;

forwarding periodically the retrieved information from the one or more servers on to a data repository;

processing the periodically forwarded data in the data repository on a regular basis to provide processed information related to categories of the storage estate; and

providing one or more reports related to the storage estate in a format accessible through a web interface provided to authorized users, the one or more reports including a key performance indicator (KPI) report,

wherein the KPI report comprises one of a SAN KPI report and a NAS KPI report,

wherein the SAN KPI report comprises a display of one or more KPIs related to storage area network (SAN) data of the organization,

wherein the NAS KPI report comprises a display of one or more KPIs related to network attached storage (NAS),

wherein at least one SAN KPI comprises one or more of;

protection efficiency calculated as a ratio of logical addressable data storage volume to total physical volume of data storage for storage area network data of the organization, and

application efficiency calculated as a fraction of disk storage allocated to end user devices that is actually used by the end user devices,

wherein at least one NAS KPI comprises snapshot overhead calculated as a ratio of a volume of storage allocated for replicated copies of data to allocated storage.

8. The method of claim 7, wherein the KPI report comprises a graphical display of current data related to a plurality of storage categories, each storage category comprising one of a subset of storage area network storage and a subset of network attached storage.

9. The method of claim 8, wherein the plurality of storage categories are displayed as a series of histograms that each comprises one or more sub-histograms corresponding to respective storage sub-categories, the histograms being arranged in a storage capacity hierarchy,

wherein a first storage category comprises a first total storage capacity and includes a plurality of sub-categories that together comprise the first total storage capacity of the first storage category, and a second storage category comprises a second total storage capacity,

wherein a relationship between the first and second storage categories is that the second total storage capacity is equivalent to a total storage capacity of a sub-category of the first category, and

wherein the relationship between the first and second storage categories is repeated for one or more additional storage categories successive to the second storage category.

10. The method of claim 9, wherein each storage category comprises a category of storage area network storage, wherein the plurality of storage categories comprises physical storage, logical storage, allocated storage, claimed storage, storage consumption, and storage usage,

wherein physical storage denotes total actual storage capacity of the storage area network,

wherein logical storage denotes a subset of physical storage that is configured and formatted storage,

wherein allocated storage denotes a subset of logical storage that is addressable,

wherein claimed storage denotes a subset of allocated storage that is allocated to host devices,

wherein storage consumption denotes a subset of claimed storage that has been claimed by a host device,

wherein storage usage denotes a subset of consumption storage a subset of storage consumption that has been claimed by a host device;

and

wherein one or more KPIs is displayed in graphical form by highlighting components of the KPI, each component comprising a histogram or sub-histogram corresponding to a respective displayed storage category or sub-category.

11. The method of claim 9, wherein each storage category comprises a category of network attached storage,

wherein the plurality of storage categories comprise physical storage, logical storage, and storage usage,

wherein physical storage denotes total actual storage capacity of the storage area network, wherein logical storage denotes a subset of physical storage that is configured and formatted storage,

wherein storage usage denotes a subset of logical storage that is one of allocated and written to and allocated and not written to, and

wherein one or more KPIs is displayed in graphical form by highlighting components of the KPI, each component comprising a histogram or sub-histogram corresponding to a respective displayed storage category or sub-category.

12. The method of claim 7, wherein the one or more servers comprise a plurality of servers, each server configured to receive information from a subset of the storage estate, each subset arranged according to one or more of a geographical location, a type of storage, a type of business, a time interval, and a city;

wherein the KPI report is user configurable,

wherein one or more fields are provided in a user-accessible web format for user tailoring of the KPI report in accordance with user selection of information from the one or more subsets of the storage estate.

13. A method for managing a storage estate of an organization, comprising:

retrieving periodically a first set of information related to the storage estate at one or more servers;

processing the periodically retrieved information to depict a storage volume associated with each of a plurality of categories of the storage estate; and

identifying to a user a set of storage estate components for attention by providing at a web interface a set of key performance indicators (KPIs) related to the categories of the storage estate,

wherein the set of KPIs comprises a display of one or more KPIs related to one of a set of storage area network (SAN) KPIs and a set of network attached storage (NAS) KPIs,

wherein the set of SAN KPIs comprises a display of one or more KPIs related to SAN data of the organization,

wherein the set of NAS KPIs comprises a display of one or more KPIs related to NAS data,

wherein at least one SAN KPI comprises one or more of;

protection efficiency calculated as a ratio of logical addressable data storage volume to total physical volume of data storage for storage area network data of the organization, and

application efficiency calculated as a fraction of disk storage allocated to end user devices that is actually used by the end user devices,

wherein at least one NAS KPI comprises snapshot overhead calculated as a ratio of a volume of storage allocated for replicated copies of data to allocated storage.

14. The method of claim 13, further comprising, prior to the providing the set of KPIs, regularly retrieving information related to the storage estate at one or more servers linked to components of the storage estate;

and processing the regularly retrieved information on a regular basis to produce regularly updated performance data related to the storage estate.

15. The method of claim 13, wherein the set of KPIs comprises a graphical display of current data related to a plurality of storage categories, each storage category comprising one of a subset of storage area network storage and a subset of network attached storage.

16. The method of claim 13, wherein the identifying the set of storage estate components is further based upon mapping of costs of components of the storage estate.

17. A method for managing a storage estate of an organization, comprising:

collecting historical performance data of the storage estate based at least in part on a set of key performance indicators (KPIs) related to storage data of the organization,

wherein the set of KPIs comprises a display of one or more KPIs related to one of a set of storage area network (SAN) KPIs and a set of network attached storage (NAS) KPIs,

wherein the set of SAN KPIs comprises a display of one or more SAN KPIs,

wherein the set of NAS KPIs comprises a display of one or more NAS KPIs,

wherein at least one SAN KPI comprises one or more of;

protection efficiency calculated as a ratio of logical addressable data storage volume to total physical volume of data storage for storage area network data of the organization, and

application efficiency calculated as a fraction of disk storage allocated to end user devices that is actually used by the end user devices,

wherein at least one NAS KPI comprises snapshot overhead calculated as a ratio of a volume of storage allocated for replicated copies of data to allocated storage.

18. The method of claim 17, wherein the set of key performance indicators is provided in conjunction with a graphical display of historical performance data of the storage estate related to a plurality of storage categories, each storage category comprising one of a subset of storage area network storage and a subset of network attached storage.

19. The method of claim 18, wherein the plurality of storage categories is displayed as a series of histograms that each comprises one or more sub-histograms corresponding to respective storage sub-categories, the histograms being arranged in a storage capacity hierarchy,

wherein a first storage category comprises a first total storage capacity and includes a plurality of sub-categories that together comprise the first total storage capacity of the first storage category, and a second storage category comprises a second total storage capacity,

wherein a relationship between the first and second storage categories is that the second storage capacity is equivalent to a total storage capacity of a sub-category of the first category, and

wherein the relationship between the first and second storage categories is repeated for one or more additional storage categories successive to the second storage category.

20. The method of claim 19, wherein each component of a key performance indicator is graphically highlighted as a histogram or sub-histogram.