Storage Technology Fundamentals with Hands on Labs

Audience: Providing overview of Storage Technology to engineers, administrators and IT professionals (including executives who need to make storage related decisions) who are new to the storage technology domain in a platform and vendor agnostic manner

Prerequisites: Basic understanding of Computer Architecture and Networking

Delivery Method: Classroom Training and Hands on Labs

Audience Size: Not more than 15 attendees

Duration: 3 Days

Course Content:

Day 1 Day 2
Module 1: Storage Technology Overview
  • Basics of disk storage, block storage, RAID
  • Hardware and software components from the storage stack
  • No single point of failure configurations
  • Quick overview of LVM, file-system, simple cluster
  • Introduction to SAN (Storage Area Network) and NAS (Network Attached Storage)
  • Introduction to Storage Array Architecture and Functionality
Module 2: SCSI Architecture Model and Protocol
  • SCSI evolution – SCSI-1, SCSI-2, SCSI-3
  • Overview of SCSI-3 layered architecture model
  • SCSI basic concepts
  • SCSI Remote Procedure Call Model (requirements from a transport layer protocol)
Module 3: SANs Overview
  • Comparing iSCSI and Fibre Channel SANs
  • Practical Considerations in implementing SANs
Module 4: Introduction to Virtualization
  • Defining/describing virtualization
  • Brief overview of server virtualization
  • SNIA (Storage Networking Industry Association) Storage Aggregation Model
  • Examples of and discussion about different layers of storage virtualization
Module 5: Snapshots and Remote Replication
  • Concept of Snapshot as a point in time copy
  • Different snapshot approaches/mechanisms
  • Application consistency related issues with snapshots and how they are resolved
  • Overview of Remote Replication
Module 6: Introduction to Information Lifecycle Management, Backup and Data Protection Technologies
  • Definition/description of ILM, drivers for ILM
  • RTO (Recovery Time Objective) and RPO (Recovery Point Objective) – Concepts
  • Important considerations for a data-storage strategy
  • Brief overview of some ILM related technologies
  • Introduction to Backup
Day3 - Hands on Labs
  • Tools: VMware Server Based Virtual Machines running on PCs networked on a LAN, Ubuntu Linux, iSCSI Enterprise Target, open-iscsi initiator for Linux, Wireshark protocol analyzer, sg_utils, scu (scsi utility), iometer, Windows iSCSI initiator
  • Configuring storage using RAID and LVM technologies
  • Presenting iSCSI Logical Units, Initiator Access Control (LUN Masking)
  • Creating and presenting snapshots
  • Performing Device Discovery from Windows, capturing protocol trace using Wireshark, protocol trace analysis for commands sent by the initiator (CDB level) and corresponding responses from the target
  • Accessing the target from Linux initiator
  • Use of sg_utils and scu from Linux and Windows to perform various CDB level operations
  • Using iometer for performance baseline and load testing

(C) 2008-09 Sound Paradigm Software Engineering Services Pvt. Ltd.
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