In a flash, HALO 2013 can boost efficiency of cloud architectures
Connecting state and local government leaders
Nimbus Data's software offers cloud architects moving to all-flash data centers advanced analytics, an open API and management tools for mobile.
Agencies that convert their data centers to flash drives will quickly find improvements in speed, cooling costs and reliability. But just plugging in new hardware is only half the battle. Truly streamlining data center operations requires monitoring tools to make sure that flash is providing the biggest bang for the buck.
Nimbus Data Systems’ HALO 2013 software targets the unique needs of public and private cloud architects looking to build all-flash memory infrastructures. As the latest enhancement to Nimbus Data’s storage operating system, it provides powerful analytics to gauge the performance and efficiency of Nimbus Data flash memory arrays.
A new REST (Representational State Transfer)-based API gives administrators full access to all Nimbus features and statistics, facilitating storage management in large multi-vendor data centers.
The new release adds real-time and historical monitoring and reporting capabilities. Over 200 metrics are tracked, including flash endurance, capacity utilization, latency, power consumption, deduplication rates and overall system health. Customers can view detailed port, host, and session-level statistics, easily navigating back in time to observe trends as well as hone in on specific data points at fine-grain intervals.
A Web interface lets users create customized dashboards highlighting key areas of interest, and built-in benchmarking creates input/output operations/sec and throughput workloads to validate system performance. All statistics are stored in an industry-standard RRD format, enabling customers to use Nimbus tools as well as third-party charting software to view the results.
With HALO 2013’s REST-based API, users can integrate the administration and monitoring of Nimbus flash memory arrays into the rest of their data center infrastructure. Through the API, users can perform every function available, from provisioning iSCSI, Fibre Channel, Infiniband and NFS datastores, to measuring deduplication and creating snapshots. The API captures all available statistics to feed into existing management software and analytics tools. Nimbus Data’s HALO API lets anyone build application-specific plug-ins, even full management software, eliminating costly license fees and proprietary single-vendor software.
Nimbus Data’s storage platforms are also feature mobile management, enabling real-time streaming of important system performance, utilization, and health information directly to Apple iOS and Google Android-based devices, the company said.
Available for free on the Apple iTunes Store and Google Play store, the HALO Mobile app leverages the API to allow users to monitor system events, view dynamic live charts, and much more, all SSL-encrypted for maximum security. HALO Mobile brings IT administrators closer to their infrastructure, even as data centers become more remote, larger and more complex, to improve service levels and reduce complexity.
HALO 2013 is free of charge to all existing Nimbus Data customers with active support contracts. To obtain this update, visit the Nimbus Skyline portal.