Introduction to SAN and NAS Storage

Topics Covered:

Benefits of Centralized Storage

NAS - Network Attached Storage

CIFS (SMB) Configuration

NFS Configuration

SAN - Fibre Channel

FCP and WWPN Addressing

SAN Protocols - Fibre Channel Overview

Fibre Channel: Zoning, LUN Masking, and Fabric Login

Fibre Channel: Redundancy and Multipathing

Fibre Channel and FCoE Configuration

SAN - iSCSI

iSCSI Configuration

SAN - Fibre Channel over Ethernet FCoE

 Benefits of Centralized Storage

1. More reliable backups: With a network storage system, you can control the backup schedule for all of your
business data, you can make backups an automatic process that happens according to the schedule that best
supports your company's business hours and you can ensure that all of your company's information is being backed
up.

2. Improved storage utilization: Unlike DAS, which allocates storage resources only to the computer it's attached
to, network storage provides a common pool of storage that can be shared by many servers and clients, no matter
what file system or operating system they run. This lets you allocate storage where users need it most, and it
eliminates unused storage on an underutilized server.

3. Simplified data recovery: After a virus attack or system failure, the last thing you want to do is scrounge for
backups. The centralized nature of network storage makes it easier to find the data you need to recover, either from
a single application or an entire server, and simpler to restore.

4. Centralized data storage and archiving: Data is more easily backed up from systems across the enterprise when
it's controlled via a single, centralized platform. Management is also reduced, and data availability is increased after
you've eliminated storage silos from your network.

5. Data protection: Your company's data is its most valuable resource. A network storage solution can protect it
from user error and malicious intent, theft, natural disasters and system failures.

6. Regulatory compliance: Thousands of governmental regulations, most notably SOX and HIPPA, mandate the way
certain types of data must be archived and for how long. A network storage system can help you archive your data
according to these requirements — namely for long-term integrity, availability and security — and some include
applications (such as IBM's LockVault compliance software) to further ease compliance-related tasks.

7. Simplified storage: Network storage lets you easily add new storage resources anywhere you need them across
the enterprise — you can plug in a new box or slot in new disks without ever powering down a server. This means
you can handle some storage admin tasks during normal business hours and, because most network storage
interfaces are browser based and easy to use, you can manage them from any console on the network.

8. Improved data availability: Every hour of network downtime can cost thousands of dollars in lost revenue, so the
faster you can restore your business data and applications, the less money you've lost. With a network storage
system that includes disk-based backup for your must critical data, you can restore your machines in just a matter
of minutes.
Network-attached storage (NAS)

Network-attached storage (NAS) is dedicated file storage that enables multiple users and heterogeneous client
devices to retrieve data from centralized disk capacity. Users on a local area network (LAN) access the shared storage
via a standard Ethernet connection. NAS devices typically do not have a keyboard or display and are configured and
managed with a browser-based utility. Each NAS resides on the LAN as an independent network node, defined by its
own unique Internet Protocol (IP) address.

What network-attached storage is used for

NAS enables users to collaborate and share data more effectively, particularly work teams that are remotely located
or in different time zones. A NAS connects to a wireless router, making it easy for distributed work environments to
access files and folders from any device connected to the network. Organizations commonly deploy a NAS
environment as the foundation for a personal or private cloud.

CIFS (SMB) Configuration

The Common Internet File System, or CIFS, Protocol is used by Windows and other operating systems to enable file
sharing on a network. Documentation for other operating systems often refers to CIFS; however, in a Windows
environment, it is usually referred to as the Server Message Block, or SMB, Protocol. This is because CIFS is a dialect
of the SMB protocols most commonly used in Windows networks. Because SMB/CIFS is enabled by default, you
should normally be able to configure it simply by enabling file sharing on a Windows computer.

NFS Configuration

Benefits of NFS:

 NFS allows local access to remote files.

 It uses standard client/server architecture for file sharing between all *nix based machines.
 With NFS it is not necessary that both machines run on the same OS.
 With the help of NFS we can configure centralized storage solutions.
 Users get their data irrespective of physical location.
 No manual refresh needed for new files.
 Newer version of NFS also supports acl, pseudo root mounts.
 Can be secured with Firewalls and Kerberos.

NFS Services

It’s a System V-launched service. The NFS server package includes three facilities, included in the portmap and nfs-
utils packages.

 portmap : It maps calls made from other machines to the correct RPC service (not required with NFSv4).
 nfs: It translates remote file sharing requests into requests on the local file system.
 rpc.mountd: This service is responsible for mounting and unmounting of file systems.

Important Files for NFS Configuration

 /etc/exports: It’s a main configuration file of NFS, all exported files and directories are defined in this file
at the NFS Server end.
 /etc/fstab: To mount a NFS directory on your system across the reboots, we need to make an entry in
/etc/fstab.
 /etc/sysconfig/nfs: Configuration file of NFS to control on which port rpc and other services are listening.
SAN - Fibre Channel

Fibre Channel technology is one SAN technology you can choose for your SMB. Fibre Channel is an extremely stable
mature layer-2 switching SAN technology, and the predominant SAN variant today in the enterprise. It preceded the
iSCSI standard by nine years, and the Fibre Channel protocol (FCP) is the only commercially utilized protocol on Fibre
Channel. FCP is the standard storage SCSI storage protocol wrapped in Fibre Channel frames.

FCP and WWPN Addressing

The Fibre Channel Protocol

FCP, the Fibre Channel Protocol, is used to send the SCSI commands over the Fibre Channel network. If your client
had a local hard drive, it would send SCSI commands to that local hard drive. With SAN, it’s sending the SCSI
commands, but over a network now.

Network Addressing – The WWN

Fibre Channel uses World Wide Names, WWNs, for its addressing. Both initiators and targets are assigned WWNs.
The WWNs are 8-byte addresses that are made up of 16 hexadecimal characters. Here’s an example:

21:00:00:e0:8b:05:05:04

There are two types of WWN address: The WWNN and the WWPN. They both use the same format and look the
same.
The WWNN World Wide Node Name

The World-Wide Node Name (WWNN) is assigned to a host in the storage network. The WWNN signifies that
individual host. The same WWNN can identify multiple network interfaces of a single network node. A host could
have multiple HBAs, or multiple ports in an HBA.

You might sometimes see the WWNN also being referenced as the NWWN, the Node World Wide Name. WWNN
and NWWN are the same thing, just two ways of saying it.

The WWPN World Wide Port Name

Our hosts also have World Wide Port Names, WWPNs. A different WWPN is assigned to every individual port on a
node. If we had a multi-port HBA in the same host, each port on that HBA would have a different WWPN. WWPNs
are the equivalent of MAC addresses in Ethernet. The WWPN is burned in by the manufacturer of that HBA, and it’s
guaranteed to be globally unique.

Just like WWNNs can also be known as NWWNs, WWPNs are also sometimes known as PWWNs. Again, it means the
same thing.
Both the initiator (the client) and the target (the storage system) are assigned WWNNs and WWPNs on their Fibre
Channel interfaces to enable them to communicate with each other.
We’re primarily concerned with the WWPNs, not the WWNN, when we’re configuring Fibre Channel networks.
 Introduction to Fibre Channel (FC) Protocol

FC protocol forms the fundamental construct of the FC SAN infrastructure. FC protocol predominantly is the
implementation of SCSI over an FC network. SCSI data is encapsulated and transported within FC frames.

SCSI over FC overcomes the distance and the scalability limitations associated with traditional direct-attached
storage. Storage devices attached to the FC SAN appear as locally attached devices to the operating system (OS) or
hypervisor running on the computer system.

FC Protocol defines the communication protocol in five layers:

FC-4 Layer: It is the uppermost layer in the FCP stack. This layer defines the application interfaces and the way Upper
Layer Protocols (ULPs) are mapped to the lower FC layers. The FC standard defines several protocols that can operate
on the FC-4 layer. Some of the protocols include SCSI, High Performance Parallel Interface (HIPPI) Framing Protocol,
ESCON, Asynchronous Transfer Mode (ATM), and IP.

FC-2 Layer: It provides FC addressing, structure, and organization of data (frames, sequences, and exchanges). It also
defines fabric services, classes of service, flow control, and routing.

FC-1 Layer: It defines how data is encoded prior to transmission and decoded upon receipt. At the transmitter node,
an 8-bit character is encoded into a 10-bit transmission character. This character is then transmitted to the receiver
node. At the receiver node, the 10-bit character is passed to the FC-1 layer, which decodes the 10-bit character into
the original 8-bit character. FC links, with a speed of 10 Gbps and above, use 64-bit to 66-bit encoding algorithm.
This layer also defines the transmission words such as FC frame delimiters, which identify the start and the end of a
frame and the primitive signals that indicate events at a transmitting port. In addition to these, the FC-1 layer
performs link initialization and error recovery.

FC-0 Layer: It is the lowest layer in the FCP stack. This layer defines the physical interface, media, and transmission
of bits. The FC-0 specification includes cables, connectors, and optical and electrical parameters for a variety of data
rates. The FC transmission can use both electrical and optical media.
Zoning

For security, zoning is configured on our Fibre Channel switches to control which Fibre Channel ports are allowed to
communicate with each other. We allow the ports on the client hosts (the initiators) to talk to the ports on the
storage system (the targets). Initiators are not allowed to communicate with each other over the Fibre Channel
network. This increases security and reduces traffic, which makes the Fibre Channel network more reliable and
stable.

LUN Masking

As well as configuring zoning on our switches, we also need to configure LUN masking on the storage system. It’s
critical that the right LUN is presented to the right host. If the wrong host was able to connect to a LUN then it would
be liable to corrupt it.

The zoning on the switches make sure that the servers can’t talk to each other, but they can talk to the storage. So
how do I make sure that they can’t connect to each other’s LUNs? That’s where LUN masking comes in

Fibre Channel Redundancy

Servers’ access to their storage will invariably be mission critical for the enterprise, so we’re not going to want to
have any single points of failure. Redundant Fibre Channel networks should be put in place, known as Fabric A and
Fabric B, or SAN A and SAN B. Each server and storage system host should be connected to both fabrics with
redundant HBA ports.

Fibre Channel switches distribute shared information to each other, such as domain IDs, the FCNS database, and
zoning. When we configure zoning in a fabric, we only need to do it on one switch, and it will then be automatically
distributed to the other switches from there. This makes things more convenient for us, but there’s also a potential
downside here as well, because if we make a misconfiguration it’s going to be replicated between all the switches in
the fabric. If an error in Fabric A was able to propagate to Fabric B, this would bring down both fabrics, and it would
drop the server’s connection to their storage. This would be disastrous.

Multipathing

Multipathing software on the initiator will choose the path or paths to take to the storage. All popular operating
systems (all flavors of Windows, Unix, Linux, VMware etc.) have multipathing software which supports active/active
or active/standby paths. The client will automatically fail over to an alternate path if the one it is using fails.

Considering our example where we had the two optimized paths and the two non-optimized paths, using our
multipathing software on the client we could choose to do active/active load balancing over both optimized paths,
or we could do active/standby, where we send the traffic over one of the optimized paths, and if it goes down we
fail over to the other optimized path.

Popular manufacturers for HBAs are Emulex and Qlogic, and they both have their own multipathing software which
is installed and configured on the client.
SAN - iSCSI

iSCSI is an industry standard protocol which allows sharing of block storage over Ethernet. It is a protocol for
communicating with I/O devices, chiefly storage devices. iSCSI is an IP-based standard for connecting data storage
devices over a network and moving data by carrying SCSI commands over IP networks. In simple words, iSCSI is an
interface for communication between initiator and target.

One may ask why iSCSI is recommended over other protocols. iSCSI is very cost efficient and can be easily understood
by any IT guy. iSCSI is a flexible protocol which can work within any environment. iSCSI does not require dedicated
cabling, it can be run over existing IP infrastructure. It can be deployed on local or wide area networks through the
use of Internet across distributed resources. Another reason iSCSI is widely used is because many operating systems
support iSCSI configuration.

iSCSI Configuration
iSCSI configuration can be performed on any platform. The configuration shown below is for a Linux environment
with Fedora 20 operating system.

Prerequisites for iSCSI configuration include:

 Create two Virtual Machines using Virtual Box. One is for Target and the other is for Initiator. Ensure that
both Target and Initiator can ping each other.
 Minimum RAM of 512MB and minimum disk size of 2GB for each VM.

iSCSI conformance testing

Conformance testing is a non-functional testing method which is used to validate whether iSCSI meets the
organization’s agreed standards. Conformance testing is performed to determine if iSCSI initiator and target meet
iSCSI standards. This can be done through the iSCSI test suite.

FCoE (Fibre Channel over Ethernet)

FCoE (Fibre Channel over Ethernet) is a storage protocol that enable Fibre Channel communications to run directly
over Ethernet. FCoE makes it possible to move Fibre Channel traffic across existing high-speed Ethernet
infrastructure and converges storage and IP protocols onto a single cable transport and interface.

The goal of FCoE is to consolidate input/output (I/O) and reduce switch complexity as well as to cut back on cable
and interface card counts. Adoption of FCoE been slow, however, due to a scarcity of end-to-end FCoE devices and
a reluctance on the part of many organizations to change the way they implement and manage their networks.

Traditionally, organizations have used Ethernet for TCP/IP networks and Fibre Channel for storage networks. Fibre
Channel supports high-speed data connections between computing devices that interconnect servers with shared
storage devices and between storage controllers and drives. FCoE shares Fibre Channel and Ethernet traffic on the
same physical cable or lets organizations separate Fibre Channel and Ethernet traffic on the same hardware.

FCoE uses a lossless Ethernet fabric and its own frame format. It retains Fibre Channel’s device communications but
substitutes high-speed Ethernet links for Fibre Channel links between devices.

FCoE works with standard Ethernet cards, cables and switches to handle Fibre Channel traffic at the data link layer,
using Ethernet frames to encapsulate, route, and transport FC frames across an Ethernet network from one switch
with Fibre Channel ports and attached devices to another, similarly equipped switch.

FCoE is often compared to iSCSI, an Internet Protocol(IP)-based storage networking standard.