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Compression Acceleration support in Hitachi Ops Center v10.8.0, CCI, and Storage Navigator

By Dipta Kundu posted 12-20-2021 10:16

  

Contents

  • Introduction to Compression Acceleration
  • Compression Acceleration support in Hitachi Ops Center (10.8.0) suite
  • Support in Hitachi Ops Center Administrator 10.8.0.22402
  • Support in Hitachi Ops Center API Configuration Manager 10.8.0
  • Support in Hitachi Ops Center Analyzer 10.8.0-01
  • Compression Acceleration support in Command Control Interface (CCI) and Storage Navigator

Introduction

Compression Acceleration is achieved with the help of a hardware component called an accelerator compression module. With the launch of the new VSP 5600 models, the data compression and decompression functionalities can now be offloaded to the compression

accelerator module. The ASIC module is the specific component that assists the microcode with data compression and decompression.

The compression accelerator module algorithm is more efficient than the existing software compression performed by the VSP 5500 controllers and by offloading the compression and decompression functions, the compression accelerator module reduces the use of the micro processing units in the VSP 5600 models.

To implement accelerated compression in the VSP 5600 units, two backup modules (BKMFs, also referred as fan modules) are replaced by accelerator compression modules on each controller.

Figure 1: BKMFs are replaced by compression accelerator module (ACLF)

Figure 1: BKMFs are replaced by compression accelerator module (ACLF)

Compression Acceleration support in Hitachi Ops Center (v10.8.0)

Hitachi Ops Center 10.8.0 supports compression acceleration.

This blog highlights the specific v10.8.0 Ops Center product features related to compression acceleration as follows:

  • Hitachi Ops Center Administrator 10.8.0.22402
  • Hitachi Ops Center Analyzer 10.8.0-01
  • Hitachi Ops Center API Configuration Manager 10.8.0

NOTE: Currently, Hitachi Ops Center Protector and Hitachi Ops Center Automator do not include anything related to compression acceleration. The generic provisioning services in Automator do not support compression acceleration, so Automator was not a part of these tests.

Compression acceleration support was validated on a Hitachi Virtual Storage Platform (VSP) 5600H storage system (Storage Virtualization Operating System (SVOS) 9.8.0).

Support in Hitachi Ops Center Administrator 10.8.0.22402

In the Ops Center Administrator v10.8.0 UI, the compression acceleration enabled status is reflected in the following locations:

  1. In the Storage System detail page, compression acceleration support information shows as “Available”.
  2. In the Volume table, a new column displays the compression acceleration information.


NOTE: 
By default, compression acceleration is not shown in the Volumes section under Storage system.  To view the information, you must go to the column settings and select the checkbox as follows:

Figure 2: Column settings for compression acceleration

Test Procedure:

A VSP 5600H storage system running SVOS 9.8.0 was discovered in the Administrator v10.8.0 instance.

  • In the Storage System detail page, compression acceleration support information is shown as:
    • COMPRESSION ACCELERATION: AVAILABLE
Figure 3: Storage System detail page showing: COMPRESSION ACCELERATION: AVAILABLE
  • In the Volume table, a new column is added for compression acceleration as follows:
Figure 4: Compression Acceleration column for Volume table
Figure 5: Volume level view for Compression Acceleration

Support in Hitachi Ops Center API Configuration Manager v10.8.0

When using API Configuration Manager, the new compression acceleration feature can be used at the LDEV level for accomplishing enhanced compression performance, compared to the earlier SVOS compression.

Test Procedure:

A VSP 5600H storage system running SVOS 9.8.0 was registered in the API Configuration Manager v10.8.0 instance. We verified compression acceleration support in the following ways:

    • Get the status of the module in storage, installed in the DKC or not.
    • Enable or disable compression acceleration at LDEV level.
    • Get the status of compression accelerated at LDEV level.
    • Compare pre-compression acceleration and post- compression acceleration ratio to understand the efficiency of ACLF.
  • Get the status of the compression accelerator module in the storage system, installed in DKC or not.
Figure 6: Status of the compression accelerator module in storage through an API query

Note: In the response, the value of the attribute “isCompressionAccelerationAvailable” indicates the status, true indicates installed, and false indicates not installed.

  • Enable or disable compression acceleration at the LDEV level.
Figure 7: Create an LDEV with compression acceleration

NOTE: The value of the parameter “isCompressionAccelerationEnabled=true” indicates that compression acceleration is enabled and false indicates disabled. By default, compression acceleration is enabled for a volume when the data reduction mode is set to either “Compression” or “Compression and Deduplication”.

  • Get the compression acceleration status at the LDEV level.

API query to get the compression acceleration status at the LDEV level: curl -v -H "Accept:application/json" -H "Content-Type:application/json" -u maintenance:raid-maintenance -X GET

http://172.23.91.55:23450/ConfigurationManager/v1/objects/storages/900000040007/ldevs/19

NOTE: The IP is used as an example and must be substituted with an actual IP when the API query is used

Output:

Figure 8: Status of compression acceleration at the LDEV level

NOTE: “compressionAccelerationStatus: ENABLED” means compression acceleration is enabled at the LDEV level and DISABLED means not enabled.

  • Compare the re-compression acceleration and post- compression acceleration ratio to understand the compression acceleration efficiency.

Overall storage level efficiency when compression acceleration was disabled, but software compression was enabled:

Figure 9: Pre-acceleration compression ratio

Overall storage level efficiency when compression acceleration was enabled:

Figure 10: Post-compression acceleration ratio

Comparison of overall storage level efficiency:

Figure 11: Comparison between pre-compression acceleration and post-compression acceleration

Observation: The main goal of introducing the ACLF module is reduce the workload of the MP by offloading the compression to the compression accelerator module so that improved performance is accomplished, which is shown through our tests and related data.

Support in for Compression Acceleration in Hitachi Ops Center Analyzer 10.8.0-01

In the Ops Center Analyzer detailed view server UI, a new column was added that will display at an LDEV level if compression acceleration is enabled.

Test Procedure:

Setting up the environment to view the compression accelerated status for the VSP 5600H storage system in the Ops Center Analyzer, consists of the following:

  • Set up the RAID agent with access type 1 (“CMD+SVP”).
  • Add the storage instance to the Probe UI with CM-REST integration. Without CM-REST integration, the status is not displayed.
  • Verify that the CCI version is later than 01-65-03/04.

Accelerated compression status is shown in the “Adaptive Data Reduction” report in Ops Center Analyzer detailed view with a new column named “Accelerated Compression Enabled”.

Figure 11: Accelerated Compression Enabled status shown as “true” for the volume that has compression acceleration enabled 

Compression Acceleration support in Command Control Interface (CCI) and Storage Navigator

Command Control Interface (CCI)

On an LDEV level, CCI shows the status of COMPRESSION ACCELERATION as ENABLED or DISABLED.

CCI command to get the details about an LDEV: raidcom get ldev -ldev_id 19 -I650

Output:

Figure 12: For LDEV ID 19, COMPRESSION ACCELERATION and STATUS is shown as ENABLED 

Storage Navigator:

In Storage Navigator, a new column named “Compression Acceleration” was added under Logical Devices.

NOTE: By default, Compression Acceleration does not show up under Logical Devices.  To view the column, you must go to the column settings and select the checkbox as follows:

Figure 12: Column settings to enable viewing of Compression Acceleration

At the LDEV level, Compression Acceleration is shown as Enabled or Disabled

Figure 13: Compression Acceleration is shown as Enabled

Overall Saving effect from Storage Navigator

Figure 14: Overall Capacity savings

Summary

Specific product features related to Compression Acceleration has been tested successfully in the lab and documented in this blog focusing on Hitachi Ops Center (10.8.0) suite (Hitachi Ops Center Administrator 10.8.0.22402, Hitachi Ops Center API Configuration Manager 10.8.0, Hitachi Ops Center Analyzer 10.8.0-01) and Command Control Interface (CCI) and Storage Navigator.

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Comments

05-04-2022 11:43

Great

04-25-2022 12:00

Thanks

04-18-2022 12:15

good one!!! Thanks..