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# Provision storage

Service level provisioning simplifies storage management by automating many of the tasks that are associated with provisioning storage.

This topic describes provisioning storage for open systems. See Provision storage for mainframe for a description of provisioning storage for mainframe.

With the release of HYPERMAX OS 5977, Unisphere introduces support for service level provisioning. Service level provisioning simplifies storage management by automating many of the tasks that are associated with provisioning storage.

Service level provisioning eliminates the need for storage administrators to manually assign physical resources to their applications. Instead, storage administrators specify the storage performance and capacity that is required for the application and let the system provision the workload appropriately.

By default, storage systems are preconfigured with a single Storage Resource Pool (SRP). The SRP contains all the hard disks on the system that is organized into disk groups by technology, capacity, rotational speed, and RAID protection type. Storage administrators can view all SRPs configured on the system, and the demand that storage groups are placing on them.

Storage systems are also preconfigured with several service levels and workloads. Storage administrators use the service levels and workloads to specify the performance objectives for the application they are provisioning.

When provisioning storage for an application, storage administrators assign the appropriate SRP, service level, and workload to the storage group containing the LUNs associated with the application.

Unisphere provides the following methods for provisioning storage:

Recommended: This method relies on wizards to step you through the provisioning process. It is best suited for novice and advanced users who do not require a high level of customization. Customization is the ability to create their own volumes, storage groups, and so on.

Advanced: This method, as its name implies, is for advanced users who want the ability to control every aspect of the provisioning process.

This section provides the high-level steps for each method, with links to the relevant help topics for more detail.

Regardless of the method you choose, once you have completed the process, a masking view has been created. In the masking view, the volumes in the storage group are masked to the host initiators and mapped to the ports in the port group.

Before you begin:

The storage system has been configured.

To provision storage (recommended procedure):

1. Create hosts Use the Create Host dialog box to group host initiators (HBAs).
2. The Provision Storage wizard Use the Provision Storage wizard, which steps you through the process of creating the storage group, port group, and masking view.

To provision storage (advanced procedure):

1. Create hosts Use the Create Host dialog box to group host initiators (HBAs).
2. Create volumes Create one or more volumes on the storage system.
3. Use the Create Storage Group dialog box to add the created volumes to a storage group, and associate the storage group with a storage resource pool, a service level, and a workload.
4. Create and modify port groups Group Fibre Channel and/or iSCSI front-end directors.
5. Create masking views Associate the host, storage group, and port group into a masking view.