Gravity of AIX: August 2010

Welcome to the World of IBM Virtualization

"Everything can be virtualized except the reality!!!"

The main idea behind creating this blog is to provide profound insight into managing IT infrastructure running primarily on IBM AIX and the below technologies as well.

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1. Tivoli Storage Manager

2. HACMP (POWERHA)

3. VCS (Veritas Cluster Service)

4. Oracle on AIX

5. SAP (R/3, Enterprise portal, CRM, BW) on AIX

6. Informatica on AIX

7. Websphere on AIX

I'll also provide tips, techniques and best practices followed in configuring IBM VIO servers and Virtual IO client LPARS (logical partitions) and present it in a comprehensible way for system architects and AIX beginners.

Enjoy reading my posts and have intellectual fun.

Sunday, August 29, 2010

Introduction to POWERVM

Some of the growing challenges for the companies in managing IT infrastructure include cutting down or sharing server resources (such as CPU, memory, IO) reducing power cooling cost and reducing server rack unit space. IBM POWERVM technology which was introduced in POWER6 systems helps in consolidating servers by virtualizing CPU, memory and IO adapter resources. It helps in managing servers efficiently by improving performance and availability of the servers.

CPU Virtualization is achieved through technology called micropartitioning which was introduced in POWER5 systems. Micropartitioning is the process in which a physical CPU can be segmented and shared across multiple logical partitions (LPAR). Memory sharing is achieved through Active Memory Sharing (AMS) setup between VIO and LPARs. For AMS, POWERVM Enterprise edition is needed. IO adapter can be virtualized using Virtual I/O servers (VIO) by creating and configuring the following:

1. Virtual SCSI adapter for virtualizing local or SAN drives.

2. Shared Ethernet Adapter for virtualizing ethernet adapters.

3. NPIV (N-Port ID Virtualization) for virtualizing HBA (Host Bus Adapters).

I'll talk about the steps involved in creating and configuring these virtual adapters in the upcoming posts.