1. VMware Virtual SAN
Managing Storage with Virtual SAN Policies
Rawlinson Rivera, VCDX
Principal Architect | Storage and Availability

2. The Software-Defined Data Center
Transform storage
by aligning it with
app demands
Management
tools give way
to automation

3. Transform Storage The Way Virtualization Transformed Compute
vSphere
Virtualize Storage
• Abstract and aggregate into flexible
VM-centric pools of capacity
Automate
• Automate the deliver of storage
service levels across all storage tiers
All-SSD
Hybrid
X86 servers

4. Customers Face Several Challenges with Storage Today
Device-centric Silos
✖ Static classes of service
✖ Rigid provisioning
✖ Lack of granular control
✖ Frequent data migrations
✖ Time consuming processes
✖ Lack of automation
✖ Slow reaction to request
Complex Processes
VI
Admin
Storage
Admin
App
Admin
✖ Not commodity
✖ Low utilization
✖ Overprovisioning
Specialized Expensive HW

5. Virtual SAN
Virtual SAN Puts The App In Charge
Simpler and Automated Storage Management Through Application-centric Approach
Today
1. Pre-define storage configurations
2. Pre-allocate static bins
3. Expose pre-allocated bins
4. Select appropriate bin
5. Consume from pre-allocated bin
1. Define storage policy
2. Apply policy at VM creation
Virtual SAN
Shared Datastore
Resource and data service are
automatically provisioned and
maintained.
✖ Overprovisioning
(Better safe than sorry!)
✖ Wasted resources, wasted time
✖ Frequent data migrations
! No overprovisioning
! Less resources, less time
! Easy to change
Today

6. A New Approach is Needed: Software-Defined Storage
New Control Plane
From Hardware-
centric to App-centric
New Data Plane
From Specialized to
Industry Standard
Hardware
Software-Defined StorageStorage Today
• Policy-driven automation
• Common across arrays
• Dynamic control
• Server SAN
• Flash accelerated
• Distributed

7. Storage Policy-Based Mgmt.
Control Plane
Data Plane
Storage Policy Based Mgmt. Virtual
Volumes
VVOL-enabled SAN / NAS
APIs
Control Plane
Data Plane
What’s New In The vSphere 6.0 Release
……
Virtual SAN 6.0
! All-Flash architecture
! 2x greater scalability
! 4x greater with All-
Flash; 2x performance
with Hybrid
! Virtual SAN Snapshots
and Clones
Radically Simple
Hypervisor-Converged
Storage for VMs
vSphere Virtual Volumes
! Virtualizes SAN/NAS
devices
! Uses native array
capabilities
! VM-level operations
! Included with vSphere
Management & Integration
Framework for External
Storage
HDDSSD HDDSSD HDDSSD
Virtual SAN
Hypervisor-converged
SDS Stack
External Storage
App-Centric Automation

8. Virtual SAN Simplifies And Automates Storage Management
Per VM Storage Service Levels From a Single Self-tuning Datastore
Storage Policy-Based Management
Virtual SAN
Shared Datastore
vSphere + Virtual SAN
SLAs
Software Automates
Control of Service Levels
No more LUNs/Volumes!
Policies Set Based
on Application Needs
Capacity
Performance
Availability
Per VM
Storage Policies

9. Storage Policy-Based Management:
vSphere
Storage Policy-Based Mgmt
Virtual SAN
Capacity
Performance
Availability
2 Failures to tolerate
Object Space
Reservation 10 GB
Flash Read Cache
10 %
• Intelligent storage
placement at scale
• Dynamic adjustments in
real time
• Automated policy
enforcement
App-centric Control Plane That Across
Storage Tiers

10. Storage Capabilities and VM Storage Policies
• Storage Capabilities – are array based features and
data services specifications that capture storage
requirements that can be satisfied by a storage arrays
advertised as capabilities.
• Storage capabilities define what an array can offer to
storage containers as opposed to what the VM
requires.
• Arrays Storage Capabilities are advertises to vSphere
through the Vendor Provider and VASA APIs
• In vSphere Storage Capabilities are consumed via
VM Storage Policy constructs.
SPBM
object
manager
virtual disk
Datastore
Profile
VM Storage Policy
vSphere VM Storage Policy Management Framework
Storage Capabilities for Storage Array
Access
Capacity
Published Capabilities
Snapshot
Replication
Deduplication
QoS
Virtual Datastore

11. Storage Policy-based Management Framework
• Virtual SAN leverages a storage policy framework in conjunction with VASA API’s to expose
storage characteristics to vCenter.
• SPBM is a storage policy framework built into vSphere that enables VM-centric policy driven
provisioning.
– Storage Capabilities
• Underlying storage and its capabilities are surfaces to vCenter.
– Virtual Machine Storage Requirements
• Requirements can only be used against available capabilities.
– VM Storage Policies
• VM Storage Policies is a component of the vSphere Storage Policy-based management framework (SPBM)
• Construct that stores virtual machine’s storage provisioning requirements based on storage capabilities.

12. Storage
Policy
Wizard
SPBM
object
VSAN object manager
virtual disk
VSAN objects may be
(1) mirrored across hosts &
(2) striped across disks/hosts to meet VM
storage profile policies
Datastore
Profile
Virtual SAN SPBM Object Provisioning Mechanism

13. VM Storage Policies
• VM Storage Policies are accessible from vSphere Web Client Home screen.

14. Virtual SAN Capabilities
• Virtual SAN currently surfaces five unique storage capabilities to vCenter.

15. Virtual SAN Capabilities
• Virtual SAN storage capabilities values

16. Virtual Machine Provisioning Operations
• All VM provisioning operation include access to VM Storage Policies

17. Virtual Machine Provisioning Operations
• If the Virtual SAN Datastore understands the capabilities in the VM Storage Policy, it will be
displayed as a matching resource.

18. Virtual Machine Provisioning Operations
– If the VSAN Datastore can satisfy the VM Storage
Policy, the VM Summary tab will display the VM as
compliant.
– If not, due to failures, or the force provisioning
capability, the VM will be shown as non-compliant.

19. Virtual Machine Policy Management
• Modify VM performance, capacity, and availability requirements without downtime.

20. Virtual SAN Usability Improvements
• What-if-APIs (Scenarios)
• Adding functionality to visualize Virtual SAN datastore resource utilization when
a VM Storage Policy is created or edited.
– Creating Policies
– Reapplying a Policy

21. Default Storage Policies
• A Virtual SAN Default Profile is automatically created in SPBM when VSAN is enabled on a
cluster.
– Default Profiles are utilized by any VM created without an explicit SPBM profile assigned.
– vSphere admins to designate a preferred VM Storage Policy as the preferred default policy for the Virtual SAN
cluster.

22. • vCenter can manage multiple vsanDatastores with different sets of requirements.
• Each vsanDatastore can have a different default profile assigned.
Default Storage Policies
vSphere + Virtual SAN
Hard disksHard disks
SSD SSD Hard disksSSD
…
vSphere + Virtual SAN
Hard disksHard disks
SSD SSD Hard disksSSD
…
vCenter Server
VSAN
default
policy
BCA
default
policy

23. Number of Failures to Tolerate
• Number of failures to tolerate
– Defines the number of hosts, disk or network failures a storage object can tolerate. For “n” failures
tolerated, “n+1” copies of the object are created and “2n+1” host contributing storage are required.
vsan network
vmdkvmdk witness
esxi-01 esxi-02 esxi-03 esxi-04
~50% of I/O ~50% of I/O
Virtual SAN Policy: “Number of failures to tolerate = 1”
raid-1

24. Number of Disk Stripes Per Object
• Number of disk stripes per object
– The number of HDDs across which each replica of a storage object is distributed. Higher values
may result in better performance.
vsan network
stripe-2b witness
esxi-01 esxi-02 esxi-03 esxi-04
stripe-1b
stripe-1a stripe-2a
raid-0raid-0
VSAN Policy: “Number of failures to tolerate = 1” + “Stripe Width =2”
raid-1

25. Virtual SAN Storage Capabilities
• Force provisioning
– if yes, the object will be provisioned even is the policy specified in the storage policy is not
satisfiable with the resources currently available.
• Flash read cache reservation (%)
– Flash capacity reserved as read cache for the storage object. Specified as a percentage of logical
size of the object.
• Object space reservation (%)
– Percentage of the logical size of the storage object that will be reserved (thick provisioned) upon
VM provisioning. The rest of the storage object is thin provisioned.

26. Storage Policy Based Management (SPBM)

27. The Next Generation Data Center
Operating Model from VMware
Policy Driven: Software-Defined Storage Agility with Control

28. vSphere
Enabling Self-service Consumption
Storage Policy Based Mgmt. Storage Policy Based Mgmt.
Storage Policy Based Mgmt.
Virtual Volumes
Storage
VMFS
…
HDDSSD
…
HDDSSD HDDSSD
Virtual SAN
Virtual Datastore
SAN NAS
Cloud And Management AutomationvRealize
Automation Center
OpenStack
SAN NAS

29. !
!
!
Rawlinson Rivera
@PunchingClouds
#
THANK YOU

30. Recommended Next Steps
• VMware Virtual SAN Online Hands-on Lab
• Keep up with the latest VMware activity
http://blogs.vmware.com/smb
• Learn why customers choose VMware
www.vmware.com/go/customers
• Invest in your future - VMware Training and Certification
On-Demand courses - www.vmware.com/go/VSAN-On-Demand