Smarter Computing and Workload Optimized Infrastructure for IBM i

Today's guest blogger is well-known speaker and IBM i expert, Alison Butterill, IBM i Product Manager.

 

Steve and I have been talking with many clients recently about the IBM Smarter Computing initiative and why IBM i is such a perfect platform for implementing smarter computing projects. It was as the result of some of those conversations that I asked to write a guest blog for Steve.

Many IBM i customers do not recognize Smarter Computing as something that pertains to i as much as, if not more than, to other computing platforms. Smarter Computing is not the playground of just large customers. Smarter Computing means just that – smarter ways of using technology. There is no specific mandate and our i customers make decisions every day about what makes computing smarter for their company and for their customers.

First of all, there are 3 main themes under the broader umbrella called Smarter Computing. The first, data and analytics, was discussed by Steve in a previous blog.

The second and the focus of my discussion is workload optimized infrastructure or tuned to a task. And the third is cloud and the requirements for implementing both public and private clouds. The video for the second theme was recently released. You can find it at bit.ly/IBMiWorkloadOptimized.

As I said, I want to talk about Workload Optimized Infrastructure, using some description and an example.

What differentiates a system that is “tuned for the task”? There are several technology components that make up optimization. Things like performance, consolidation, integration, virtualization, exploiting capabilities of the hardware are just a few of the features that make a system able to handle a specific workload more effectively.

Many of those optimization technologies are built into IBM i – virtualization, reliability and so on. One client who is using these capabilities is Multivac, a packaging equipment manufacturer, from Germany. They have been on a long journey to update their infrastructure, optimizing it to run their manufacturing business more effectively and more efficiently.

In 2003, Multivac examined their existing technology solutions and determined that they needed improvement. They chose a phased plan of action based on “the desire to reduce costs, by optimizing the IT infrastructure and reducing the total cost of ownership and operation for its business-critical applications”.

The next step was to choose the solution. Consolidating their applications into one ERP package and putting it onto a single IBM i server would significantly reduce overhead, and energy consumption, and staffing thereby saving money. Their Lotus Notes collaboration software has moved to the IBM i environment enhancing availability and reliability for their Notes users. They continue to add technology to their infrastructure including adding a PowerHA solution, using High Availability Solutions Manager and Cross Site Mirroring. They have added a SAN solution, externalizing their drives and an IBM SAN Volume Controller (SVC).

Multivac is committed to ongoing reviews of their technology and their computing environment. Smarter computing to Multivac is using their technology and their computing environment to the fullest extent possible.

Exploiting the technology that they had, adding key components to satisfy business requirement such as virtualization and availability is what Smarter Computing means to Multivac. You can go to the IBM i website and read their full story. 

Workload Optimized Infrastructure means many things to many people. What does it mean in your company?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Redbooks and More - Latest IBM i information

The IBM team has been busy producing and/or extensively revising a number of books and papers that contain valuable information about IBM i and its related products.

As I have told almost every audience since last fall, our Technology Refresh strategy involves delivering new capabilities between releases, and this means we need to find methods of getting information about those new capabilities into the hands of our customers. One of those methods is the IBM i portion of the developerWorks site, which I have talked about before. Another method is the well-respected set of Redbooks publications, and lesser-known, but just as valuable Redpapers and Webdocs.

To produce these documents, IBMers from around the world become authors. Usually, these authors are people who work very directly with customers in their “day jobs” but they set aside several weeks to focus on learning how to use the new capabilities we’ve announced. They talk directly with the developers and architects of these functions, and then they sit down to bring the advancements into the real world, explaining in their writing how to take advantage of them. In fact, the final three items on the list – the Webdocs – are programming examples that show how to do specific functions we expect will be helpful to many clients. 

Without further ado, here is the list of recently created or updated IBM i information.

1.  IBM i 7.1 Technical Overview Including Technology Refresh Updates -November 2011   (Redbook)

http://www.redbooks.ibm.com/redpieces/abstracts/sg247858.html?Open

2.  PowerHA SystemMirror for IBM i Cookbook   (Redbook)

http://www.redbooks.ibm.com/redpieces/abstracts/sg247994.html?Open

3. Creating IBM i Client Partitions Using Virtual Partition Manager (Redpaper)  

http://www.redbooks.ibm.com/abstracts/redp4806.html?Open

4. Uncovering Application Runtime Expert - IBM i 7.1 (Redpaper)

http://www.redbooks.ibm.com/abstracts/redp4805.html?Open

5.  New Watch for Event Function for IBM i 7.1: How to Take Advantage of QSYSMSG Message Queue (Webdoc)

http://www.redbooks.ibm.com/abstracts/tips0839.html?Open

6. Retrieve the Network Configuration of the System Manager Attached to Your Server From an IBM i Command Line (Webdoc)

http://www.redbooks.ibm.com/abstracts/tips0840.html?Open

7. How to Determine the Amount of Memory Used By the System Firmware From the IBM i Command Line (Webdoc)

http://www.redbooks.ibm.com/abstracts/tips0841.html?Open

 

The IBM i 7.1 Redbook contains information on the new capabilities we’ve added with Technology Refreshes 1, 2 and 3. For example, it has a discussion of “Suspend/Resume” – the ability to put an IBM i partition to sleep and wake it up again later, which was provided in TR2. The ability to use Virtual Partition Manager to create up to four IBM i partitions, available with TR3 is also covered briefly, but the Redpaper on doing that function contains the specific “how to” information.

 

The PowerHA Redbook: this book replaces an older version, and is in direct reaction to the success of the product and the needs of new PowerHA users. The first version of the Redbook was heavily focused on the concepts, but lacked the kind of “step by step” information many clients wanted from a Redbook.   This time, the team focused its work specifically on helping PowerHA users get up to speed quickly.  I think they did a good job.

Until next time, I hope you have set aside some time to read a good book. Or two.

 

 

Twitter: #ibmi #powerha @Steve_Will_IBMi 

 

PowerHA SystemMirror for IBM i – Latest Announcements

Last blog, I talked about Image Management. Another significant IBM i announcement IBM made in October is related to our high-availability product, PowerHA SystemMirror.

PowerHA and the related topic of independent ASPs have been covered in this blog before, but if you don’t remember reading about them, I suggest taking a few moments and going back to those links.

The October 2011 announcement for PowerHA was significant for our customers in the midmarket, and for those customers who want an easier interface for planning and executing their high-availability strategy using PowerHA.

PowerHA SystemMirror for i now supports replication through the Storwize V7000 or SVC copy services technology via the IBM PowerHA SystemMirror for i Enhancements PRPQ. Many midmarket customers have been wanting a SAN option that fits their IT budgets and which can also be used by PowerHA for its various mirroring options. They now have that option.

Another important addition to the PowerHA product that ships with the PRPQ is a new Graphical User Interface (GUI). This new interface makes configuration of the PowerHA environment easy to use and intuitive. It allows users to easily determine the status of their high-availability environment and to drill down to any problems that might exist.

Finally, the enhancements in the PRPQ also include a new "command line only" support to create an independent auxiliary storage pool (IASP) and configure geographic mirroring, which has been a requirement of customers who want to create scripts that bypass GUI interfaces.

The functions I’ve described are available with the following prerequisites:

• 5799-HAS IBM PowerHA SystemMirror for i Enhancements 
• 5770-HAS IBM PowerHA SystemMirror for i 7.1 
• SF99707 Technology Refresh PTF Group, Level 3 or higher 
• SI44148

 

 

Twitter: #ibmi #powerha @Steve_Will_IBMi