Dynamic Multi-Pathing in the Virtual I/O server (VIOS) and Veritas InfoScale products in the logical partition (LPAR)


Dynamic Multi-Pathing in the Virtual I/O server (VIOS) and Veritas InfoScale products in the logical partition (LPAR)
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Using Dynamic Multi-Pathing (DMP) in the VIOS in combination with Storage Foundation and High Availability (SFHA) in the LPAR provides storage management functionality for LPAR resources and storage visibility in the VIOS.

Using DMP in the VIOS provides:

Centralized multi-pathing functionality
Active/passive array high performance failover
Centralized storage path management
Fast proactive failover
Event notification

Using SFHA in the LPAR provides:

Enhanced database performance
SmartIO for caching data on Solid State Drives (SSDs)
Point-in-time copy features for data back-up, recovery, and processing
Options for setting policies to optimize storage
Methods for migrating data easily and reliably
Replication support
High availability and disaster recovery for the applications

Figure: DMP in the VIOS and SFHA in the LPAR

The following clustering configurations are supported:

LPAR to LPAR clustering and failover for application availability.

VCS runs in the LPARs forming a cluster, and provides high availability of the applications running in the LPAR.

See Cluster Server in the logical partition (LPAR).
LPAR to LPAR Clustering and Fail-over for LPAR (virtual machine) availability.

VCS runs in one LPAR on each physical server, known as the management LPAR. The management LPAR behaves as a control point, and provides high-availability to the other LPARs running on the same physical server. The management LPAR views the LPARs that it manages as virtual machines but does not have visibility into the applications on the managed LPARs.

You can create a cluster of the management LPARs on more than one physical server to provide failover of the managed LPARs on the different physical servers.

See VCS in the management LPAR.

For more information on SFHA features, see the Storage Foundation Cluster File System High Availability Administrator's Guide.

For more information on SmartIO, see the Veritas InfoScale SmartIO for Solid-State Drives Solutions Guide.

For more information on DMP features, see the Dynamic Multi-Pathing Administrator's Guide.