Configuration Utility: Tasks

The Configuration Utility is a learning tool that helps guide you through the steps and prerequisite steps required to configure your system.

All of the functions in the Configuration Utility are in the Aperi GUI. However, the Configuration Utility provides you with information to help you decide what agents you need and which jobs to run to get the information you want. It provides links into the Aperi GUI to display reports, add agents, create jobs, create alerts, and so on. There is a new function, show managed devices, which provides a list of the managed devices (storage subsystems, switches, or tape libraries) managed by the CIM agent.

If you are a new user of Aperi, use the Configuration Utility to help you with the task of deciding what agents you need and which jobs to run to get the information you want.

If you are an experienced Aperi user, you can go to the GUI directly to perform all of the configuration tasks. However, you might also want to use the Configuration Utility to provide you with a quick summary review of your system.

Depending on what information you want to see and collect, you will go to a different tab in the Configuration Utility for information and configuration.

Some common Configuration Utility tasks are:
Managing servers
To manage your servers, follow these steps:
  1. Go to Aperi Storage Manager > Configuration Utility > Services.
  2. You will be able to see a list of the Data server, Device server, Data agents, CIM agents, in-band Fabric agents, and out-of-band Fabric agents. You will be able to add agents, start agents, and run discovery jobs.
Displaying availability reports
The Data Manager can show the availability of storage assets in your environment.
To collect storage asset information, follow these steps:
  1. Go to Aperi Storage Manager > Configuration Utility > Data Manager.
  2. You will be able to run ping jobs to collect information about the availability of storage assets in your environment.
Collecting statistics on the storage assets in your enterprise
To collect statistics on the storage assets in your enterprise, follow these steps:
  1. Go to Aperi Storage Manager > Configuration Utility > Data Manager.
  2. You will be able to run probe jobs to collect information about the storage assets.
Collecting statistics on the usage and trending of your actual storage consumption
To collect statistics on the usage and trending, follow these steps:
  1. Go to Aperi Storage Manager > Configuration Utility > Data Manager.
  2. You will be able to run scan jobs to collect information about storage usage.
Show managed devices
To show the managed devices (storage subsystems, switches or tape libraries) managed by the CIM agent, follow these steps:
  1. Go to Aperi Storage Manager > Configuration Utility > Services.
  2. Under the CIMOM section, click Show Managed Devices. A pop-up dialog box displays the managed devices.
Viewing and creating alert definitions for storage-related events
To view and create alerts for storage-related events, follow these steps:
  1. Go to Aperi Storage Manager > Configuration Utility > Data Manager.
  2. You will be able to view alerts and create new alert definitions.
Monitoring storage subsystems
All functions in Disk Manager require a CIM agent to be installed and configured to communicate with the storage devices that will be managed.
To monitor your storage subsystems, follow these steps:
  1. Go to Aperi Storage Manager > Configuration Utility > Disk Manager.
  2. You will be able to run a CIMOM discovery job, and create and run subsystem probe jobs.
Managing fabric reports and fabric zoning
You can have Fabric agents installed on machines in each fabric SAN that you will be managing, and out-of-band Fabric agents talking to each switch in the fabric SANs. Having both is a good practice. Out-of-band agents are required for Brocade (zoning information) and Cisco (VSAN information) switches. Zoning information is provided only by the Fabric agents for all switches except for Brocade.
To manage your fabrics and switches, follow these steps:
  1. Go to Aperi Storage Manager > Configuration Utility > Fabric Manager.
  2. You will be able to view the fabrics and switches managed by Aperi. You can also run fabric discovery and probe jobs. You can also change your zoning configuration for the fabric.
Creating alert definitions
You can create alert definitions to notify you of an alert condition so that you can take the appropriate action when a certain condition occurs on storage subsystems, fabrics, switches, or endpoint devices.
To create an alert definition, follow these steps:
  1. Go to Aperi Storage Manager > Configuration Utility > Disk Manager. The Alerting section lets you see the storage subsystem alerts and lets you create a storage subsystem alert definition.
  2. If you want to see the alerts for the fabric, go to the Fabric Manager page to the Alerting section. You will be able to create fabric, switch, and endpoint device alert definitions.
Managing tape library reports
A CIM agent needs to be installed and configured to collect information from the tape libraries. Once the CIMOM discovery job completes, you can create a tape library probe that will collect asset information (drives, media changers, I/O ports, cartridges, slots, and so forth).
To manage your tape library reports, follow these steps:
  1. Go to Aperi Storage Manager > Configuration Utility > Tape Manager.
  2. You will be able to display information about your tape library, run a CIMOM discovery job for your tape libraries, and run probe jobs for your tape libraries.