Category: Redfish

Scaling Management of Storage and Fabrics

Richelle Ahlvers
Composable disaggregated infrastructures (CDI) provide a promising solution to address the provisioning and computational efficiency limitations, as well as hardware and operating costs, of integrated, siloed, systems. But how do we solve these problems in an open, standards-based way? DMTF, SNIA, the OFA, and the CXL Consortium are working together to provide elements of the overall solution, with Redfish® and SNIA Swordfish™ manageability providing the standards-based interface. The OpenFabrics Alliance (OFA) is developing an OpenFabrics Management Framework (OFMF) designed for configuring fabric interconnects and managing composable disaggregated resources in dynamic HPC infrastructures using client-friendly abstractions. Want to learn more? Read More

Using SNIA Swordfish™ to Manage Storage on Your Network

Barry Kittner
Consider how we charge our phones: we can plug them into a computer’s USB port, into a wall outlet using a power adapter, or into an external/portable power bank. We can even place them on top of a Qi-enabled pad for wireless charging. None of these options are complicated, but we routinely charge our phones throughout the day and, thanks to USB and standardized charging interfaces, our decision boils down to what is available and convenient. Now consider how a storage administrator chooses to add storage capacity to a datacenter.  There are so many ways to do it:  Add one or more physical drives to a single server; add additional storage nodes to a software-defined storage cluster; add additional storage to a dedicated storage network device that provides storage to be used by other (data) servers. These options all require consideration as to the data protection methods utilized such as RAID or Erasure Coding, and the performance expectations these entail. Complicating matters further are the many different devices and standards to choose from, including traditional spinning HDDs, SSDs, Flash memory, optical drives, and Persistent Memory. Each storage instance can also be deployed as file, block, or object storage which can affect performance. Selection of the communication protocol such as iSCSI and FC/FCoE can limit scalability options. And finally, with some vendors adding the requirement of using their management paradigm to control these assets, it’s easy to see how these choices can be daunting. But… it doesn’t need to be so complicated! Read More

How SNIA Swordfish™ Expanded with NVMe® and NVMe-oF™

Linda Capcara
The SNIA Swordfish™ specification and ecosystem are growing in scope to include full enablement and alignment for NVMe® and NVMe-oF client workloads and use cases. By partnering with other industry-standard organizations including DMTF®, NVM Express, and OpenFabrics Alliance (OFA), SNIA’s Scalable Storage Management Technical Work Group has updated the Swordfish bundles from version 1.2.1 and later to cover an expanding range of NVMe and NVMe-oF functionality including NVMe device management and storage fabric technology management and administration. The Need Large-scale computing designs are increasingly multi-node and linked together through high-speed networks. These networks may be comprised of different types of technologies, fungible, and morphing. Over time, many different types of high-performance networking devices will evolve to participate in these modern, coupled-computing platforms. New fabric management capabilities, orchestration, and automation will be required to deploy, secure, and optimally maintain these high-speed networks. Read More

SNIA Swordfish™ – Your Questions Answered

Diane Marsili

The Storage Networking Industry Association’s (SNIA’s) Storage Management Initiative (SMI) took on the topic of SNIA Swordfish™ in a live webcast titled “Introduction to SNIA Swordfish™ – Scalable Storage Management.” The replay is available here. SNIA experts Richelle Ahlvers and Don Deel, responded to questions during the webcast. Here are those questions and responses:

Q. You talked about two different ways to add storage to Redfish – hosted service configuration and integrated service configuration. When would you use one configuration instead of the other?

A. The integrated services configuration was added to clarify support with direct attach configurations using Swordfish constructs. If you have a server that has a RAID card in it, and you want to have it use a more complex storage configuration – storage pools and some notion of class of service, you would use the integrated service configuration. The hosted service configuration is used to model non-direct attach configurations, such as external storage arrays, or file services.

Q. Another service configuration question. For a pure JBOD, which would be the preferred approach?

A. A JBOD configuration configuration could start with either configuration depending on whether it is a standalone system (HSC) or server-attached. If the JBOD has an embedded controller in an enclosure, it could be modeled using the HSC configuration.

Q. Are there provisions for adding custom data in the payloads that Swordfish support. Is there a method to add vendor specific parameters in the payload?

A. Previous standards did not have a good model for adding OEM specific data.

As a result, Redfish, and its extensions such as Swordfish, have ensured that there is a very clean place to add OEM data. Every schema supports OEM extensions in two places. There are OEM extensions for properties and also for OEM actions – a way to support functions that don’t map to REST.

Q. Is there any work related to NVMe over Fabric in development?

A. Both SNIA and the Distributed Management Task Force (DMTF – which developed Redfish) have been working on this. The DMTF’s Redfish Forum developed the base model for SAS/SATA and PCIe fabrics, which is being extended to include NVMe over Fabric. SNIA is also working on adding NVMe over Fabric device connections to their basic models to integrate the storage elements.

Q. I think of Redfish as talking to the Baseboard Management Controller (BMC). Where is Swordfish functionality located? Is it on the CPU running the OS or is it also out of band?

A. Where Swordfish is running will be determined by the implementation. An implementation can choose to run either in band or out of band. In most cases this will be consistent with implementations. If a vendor’s existing architecture supports out of band management, then their Swordfish implementation will also likely be out of band. Note that the Swordfish implementation may leverage existing Redfish instrumentation on integrated components in either case, but this is a completely vendor-specific choice.

Q. What is meant by endpoint?

A. Endpoints are an abstraction of a connection. They describe the connections without needing to define everything about the underlying hardware.

Q. Since JBODs fall within the domain of server hardware, can software RAID solutions take full advantage of Swordfish?

A. The software RAID solutions can absolutely take full advantage of Swordfish. Remember that Swordfish is a schema extension to Redfish for storage functionality; therefore, it doesn’t care what underlying hardware it is running on. Note that many different types of storage solutions today run on “server hardware” – SDS solutions, for example, have no custom hardware, and fall exclusively in this domain, yet are clearly storage solutions.

Q. Is Swordfish planning on staying an extension to Redfish? Does it have a goal of being integrated into Redfish specification at some point?

A. Yes, Swordfish plans to remain an extension to Redfish. There isn’t a reason to integrate it into Redfish, as it is already tightly coupled with Redfish; the schema are delivered publicly on the same site. The SNIA will continue to own Swordfish content separately from DMTF in order to take advantage of the focused attention of the large body of storage domain experts in SNIA. In order to allow the Redfish ecosystem to grow to its maximum potential as quickly as possible, DMTF is partnering with other organizations to add features such as storage and networking to the standard.

Q. Do you have to be a SNIA member to contribute to the open source work?

A. No. You do not have to be a SNIA member to contribute to the open source projects. You will, however, need to sign the SNIA Contributor License Agreement, available at snia.org/cla in order to release any contributions you make to the open source projects to SNIA to allow us to incorporate them back into the open source projects.

Q. Going through the specs for Redfish /Swordfish, I can see that only a few parameters of the schema are really mandatory to be supported by the vendor. Does that not break functionality where a client would be expecting data as per the entire schema?

A. The SSM TWG is working on the development of feature profiles, which will help clarify which functionality is required to be implemented for specific clients, applications, and use cases. In addition to the functionality requirements in the Swordfish specification, the profile definitions will help clarify to both clients and service implementations much more clearly what functionality is required to implement for their specific configurations.

Additional information on SNIA Swordfish is available at: www.snia.org/swordfish. This site contains resources including the latest specification, a Swordfish User Guide, a Swordfish Practical Guide, Swordfish mockups and more.

You can also join the Redfish Specification Forum to ask and answer questions about Swordfish!

SNIA Swordfish™ – Your Questions Answered

Diane Marsili

The Storage Networking Industry Association’s (SNIA’s) Storage Management Initiative (SMI) took on the topic of SNIA Swordfish™ in a live webcast titled “Introduction to SNIA Swordfish™ – Scalable Storage Management.” The replay is available here. SNIA experts Richelle Ahlvers and Don Deel, responded to questions during the webcast. Here are those questions and responses:

Q. You talked about two different ways to add storage to Redfish – hosted service configuration and integrated service configuration. When would you use one configuration instead of the other?

A. The integrated services configuration was added to clarify support with direct attach configurations using Swordfish constructs. If you have a server that has a RAID card in it, and you want to have it use a more complex storage configuration – storage pools and some notion of class of service, you would use the integrated service configuration. The hosted service configuration is used to model non-direct attach configurations, such as external storage arrays, or file services.

Q. Another service configuration question. For a pure JBOD, which would be the preferred approach?

A. A JBOD configuration configuration could start with either configuration depending on whether it is a standalone system (HSC) or server-attached. If the JBOD has an embedded controller in an enclosure, it could be modeled using the HSC configuration.

Q. Are there provisions for adding custom data in the payloads that Swordfish support. Is there a method to add vendor specific parameters in the payload?

A. Previous standards did not have a good model for adding OEM specific data.

As a result, Redfish, and its extensions such as Swordfish, have ensured that there is a very clean place to add OEM data. Every schema supports OEM extensions in two places. There are OEM extensions for properties and also for OEM actions – a way to support functions that don’t map to REST.

Q. Is there any work related to NVMe over Fabric in development?

A. Both SNIA and the Distributed Management Task Force (DMTF – which developed Redfish) have been working on this. The DMTF’s Redfish Forum developed the base model for SAS/SATA and PCIe fabrics, which is being extended to include NVMe over Fabric. SNIA is also working on adding NVMe over Fabric device connections to their basic models to integrate the storage elements.

Q. I think of Redfish as talking to the Baseboard Management Controller (BMC). Where is Swordfish functionality located? Is it on the CPU running the OS or is it also out of band?

A. Where Swordfish is running will be determined by the implementation. An implementation can choose to run either in band or out of band. In most cases this will be consistent with implementations. If a vendor’s existing architecture supports out of band management, then their Swordfish implementation will also likely be out of band. Note that the Swordfish implementation may leverage existing Redfish instrumentation on integrated components in either case, but this is a completely vendor-specific choice.

Q. What is meant by endpoint?

A. Endpoints are an abstraction of a connection. They describe the connections without needing to define everything about the underlying hardware.

Q. Since JBODs fall within the domain of server hardware, can software RAID solutions take full advantage of Swordfish?

A. The software RAID solutions can absolutely take full advantage of Swordfish. Remember that Swordfish is a schema extension to Redfish for storage functionality; therefore, it doesn’t care what underlying hardware it is running on. Note that many different types of storage solutions today run on “server hardware” – SDS solutions, for example, have no custom hardware, and fall exclusively in this domain, yet are clearly storage solutions.

Q. Is Swordfish planning on staying an extension to Redfish? Does it have a goal of being integrated into Redfish specification at some point?

A. Yes, Swordfish plans to remain an extension to Redfish. There isn’t a reason to integrate it into Redfish, as it is already tightly coupled with Redfish; the schema are delivered publicly on the same site. The SNIA will continue to own Swordfish content separately from DMTF in order to take advantage of the focused attention of the large body of storage domain experts in SNIA. In order to allow the Redfish ecosystem to grow to its maximum potential as quickly as possible, DMTF is partnering with other organizations to add features such as storage and networking to the standard.

Q. Do you have to be a SNIA member to contribute to the open source work?

A. No. You do not have to be a SNIA member to contribute to the open source projects. You will, however, need to sign the SNIA Contributor License Agreement, available at snia.org/cla in order to release any contributions you make to the open source projects to SNIA to allow us to incorporate them back into the open source projects.

Q. Going through the specs for Redfish /Swordfish, I can see that only a few parameters of the schema are really mandatory to be supported by the vendor. Does that not break functionality where a client would be expecting data as per the entire schema?

A. The SSM TWG is working on the development of feature profiles, which will help clarify which functionality is required to be implemented for specific clients, applications, and use cases. In addition to the functionality requirements in the Swordfish specification, the profile definitions will help clarify to both clients and service implementations much more clearly what functionality is required to implement for their specific configurations.

Additional information on SNIA Swordfish is available at: www.snia.org/swordfish. This site contains resources including the latest specification, a Swordfish User Guide, a Swordfish Practical Guide, Swordfish mockups and more.

You can also join the Redfish Specification Forum to ask and answer questions about Swordfish!

SNIA Swordfish™ – Your Questions Answered

Diane Marsili Leave a comment

The Storage Networking Industry Association’s (SNIA’s) Storage Management Initiative (SMI) took on the topic of SNIA Swordfish™ in a live webcast titled “Introduction to SNIA Swordfish™ – Scalable Storage Management.” The replay is available here. SNIA experts Richelle Ahlvers and Don Deel, responded to questions during the webcast. Here are those questions and responses:

Q. You talked about two different ways to add storage to Redfish – hosted service configuration and integrated service configuration. When would you use one configuration instead of the other?

A. The integrated services configuration was added to clarify support with direct attach configurations using Swordfish constructs. If you have a server that has a RAID card in it, and you want to have it use a more complex storage configuration – storage pools and some notion of class of service, you would use the integrated service configuration. The hosted service configuration is used to model non-direct attach configurations, such as external storage arrays, or file services. Read More

Object Drives Now Have a Management Standard

Alex McDonald
The growing popularity of object-based storage has resulted in the development of Ethernet-connected storage devices, also referred to as IP-Based Drives, that support object interfaces, and in some cases the ability to run applications on the drives themselves. These scale-out storage nodes consist of relatively inexpensive drive-sized enclosures with IP network connectivity, CPU, memory and storage. Read More

SNIA Swordfish is Swimming Fast – Catch Up Now!

SNIA Storage Management Blog

If you haven’t caught the updates on SNIA SwordfishTM lately, please read on because it’s swimming fast! The new SNIA specification offers a unified approach to managing storage and servers in environments like hyperscale and cloud infrastructures. SNIA’s Scalable Storage Management Technical Work Group (SSM TWG) just announced completion of Version 1.0.3. The new version reflects specification enhancements in multiple areas plus a User’s Guide, multiple new use cases and a new document section.

“Because SNIA Swordfish is an extension to DMTF’s (Distributed Management Task Force) open industry Redfish™ standard, it specifies the same RESTful interface and utilizes JavaScript Object Notation and Open Data Protocol to help customers integrate solutions within their existing tool chains,” said Don Deel, Chairman, SNIA Storage Management Initiative. “The SSM TWG members responsible for helping develop SNIA Swordfish represent many of the leading companies in the storage industry today, including Broadcom, Dell EMC, HPE, Intel, Microsoft, NetApp, Nimble Storage and VMware.”

You can also keep up with the latest Swordfish updates by continually visiting the SNIA Swordfish website. If you’re interested in helping shape the future of storage management by getting involved in the development of SNIA Swordfish, please e-mail storagemanagement@snia.org.

SNIA Swordfish is Swimming Fast – Catch Up Now!

Diane Marsili Leave a comment

If you haven’t caught the updates on SNIA SwordfishTM lately, please read on because it’s swimming fast! The new SNIA specification offers a unified approach to managing storage and servers in environments like hyperscale and cloud infrastructures. SNIA’s Scalable Storage Management Technical Work Group (SSM TWG) just announced completion of Version 1.0.3. The new version reflects specification enhancements in multiple areas plus a User’s Guide, multiple new use cases and a new document section.

“Because SNIA Swordfish is an extension to DMTF’s (Distributed Management Task Force) open industry Redfish™ standard, it specifies the same RESTful interface and utilizes JavaScript Object Notation and Open Data Protocol to help customers integrate solutions within their existing tool chains,” said Don Deel, Chairman, SNIA Storage Management Initiative. “The SSM TWG members responsible for helping develop SNIA Swordfish represent many of the leading companies in the storage industry today, including Broadcom, Dell EMC, HPE, Intel, Microsoft, NetApp, Nimble Storage and VMware.”

You can also keep up with the latest Swordfish updates by continually visiting the SNIA Swordfish website. If you’re interested in helping shape the future of storage management by getting involved in the development of SNIA Swordfish, please e-mail storagemanagement@snia.org.