The idea of not actively and thoroughly monitoring a data centre is laughable. And nearly every data centre has been managed and monitored since its inception. However, over time the demands, technology and financial realities have changed and so the demands on monitoring are changing as well.
Many of these changes have been gradual or evolutionary and as such have not created the kind of 'events' that would cause data centre management to immediately consider the monitoring impact. The bulk of these changes are driven by the movement of new classes of products into the data centre, and/or the activities that surround supporting these new products.
Yet, the reasons for increasing the amount and type of data centre monitoring is not limited solely to the introduction of new hardware into the data centre; there are other reasons that demand increased oversight that are due to non-hardware or product issues. The most prevalent of these include:
* Minimise the human interface: the single most common cause of unplanned downtime is human error in the data centre.
* Increased physical and logical monitoring: necessary to ascertain what processes or activities are most likely to cause downtime and how they need to be fixed to limit that specific cause of downtime.
* Audit and compliance activity tracking: a more and more important function in data centre monitoring.
A single system, multiple roles
Besides offering a comprehensive infrastructure and environmental monitoring and alerting solution, the system should ideally also provide services for processing input from various sources; graphical views of the monitored infrastructure from a central or multiple points; monitor any database either via rules or by interrogation; and monitor operating system services, programmes, logs and events.
DataNet's EnviroRac MKIV solution offers a cost-effective, scaleable and on-demand infrastructure that accelerates deployment and allows you to invest in a secure and movable data centre infrastructure that is sufficient to meet today's and tomorrow's demands (Figure 1). After evaluating traditional designs against the top challenges of IT managers, the company have proactively engineered the EnviroRac MKIV to provide the utmost flexibility through innovative and a fully-integrated design approach and ISO9001-compliant manufacturing, deployment and customisability.
Some of the salient features include: 38U or 47U enclosures, in single, double, triple or quad configurations; 300 mm slack racks; plenum rear doors; integrated 18000BTU cooling plant. A further feature is a system controller with: FM200-based double knock fire control sub-system; multitiered pin verified and non-static password managed access control; GSM and IP based network centric and realtime monitoring, camera surveillance (still and video) and real-time reporting.
Benefits of the MKIV include:
* Single- double-, triple- or quad units would house servers, core switches, routers and central cabling system, negating the need to purchase additional server racks (additional saving).
* Due to the reduced footprint, a dedicated room is not a pre-requisite at the location.
* Reduced construction (unit can be constructed, shipped, installed and commissioned on site within a fraction of the time associated with a traditional data centre).
* On site installation reduced to a maximum of 8 hours.
* Absolute standardisation.
* Increased functionality with GSM and IP-based network centric monitoring unit - this will directly reduce the load on the IT department as the unit acts as a trusted onsite observer 24/7. The unit monitors local environmental conditions, such as access to equipment and equipment status. This product is designed to give you the lead-time to act before your systems are impacted.
* Has the same, as well as additional functionality as that of the common data centre.
* Becomes a movable asset as opposed to fixed property (relocation).
* Spares and support locally available.
The EnviroRAMM system controller
The system controller consist of two components, a touch screen access panel and the EnviroRAMM (remote access monitoring module) unit, that has been designed for comprehensive event, alarm and message management within IT and business environments, combined with automated reporting of out-of-line situations to support personnel or other systems management applications. The main objective of EnviroRAMM is to maintain high availability of critical systems and components whilst minimising operational costs.
The EnviroRAMM addresses the following application areas and ensures systems are operational in a wide variety of production environments:
* Facility and environmental monitoring.
* Network and telecommunications monitoring.
* Server, systems and application monitoring.
* Automated alerting and reporting.
* Extended messaging for systems management products.
* Integration of diverse systems and enterprise management systems.
Besides offering a comprehensive infrastructure and environmental monitoring and alerting solution, EnviroRAMM provides, amongst others, the following additional facilities.
Types of input that are processed include: e-mail (SMTP); SNMP; ASCII Text Files; SMS messages; alarm activity; time period rule state changes; message delivery; user defined input; standby groups and rosters with automated roster rotation; bi-directional SMS messaging including the ability to send abbreviated commands to remotely restart critical services; full audit trails; graphical views of the monitored infrastructure from a central point or multiple points; physical environment; SMS chat where, for example, a group of engineers discuss a technical solution remotely.
The key challenge in managing complex and time-critical situations is that when things go wrong, action can be taken as quickly as possible. This implies the need for a feedback control system that detects problems, informs those involved and escalates the issue if no action is taken. The EnviroRAMM system has been specially developed to address these requirements.
Environmental monitoring
EnviroRAMM monitors physical conditions within its domain: The airconditioning system(s) and cooling plant; the UPS system(s); mains Power feed(s); the fire suppression system; humidity; the door contacts; the cabinet environmental conditions; record when things go wrong; establish who must be informed; record what actions have taken place; automatically escalate the problem to the next level of management; full audit trail of all events.
Helpdesks and problem management systems
The EnviroRAMM suite integrates with existing Enterprise Management Systems such as Unicenter, Tivoli, HP OpenView, and others. Further, interfaces exist for Remedy, Heat, Tivoli's offering and Service Desk from Computer Associates.
Existing client-owned tools can be consolidated into the RARS (remote access reporting system) Central Console for a single view of the enterprise so that advantage can be taken of the powerful alerting, messaging and audit trail facilities available.
Messaging and standby management
The product offers comprehensive facilities for the delivery of messages to mobile phones, electronic mail and other management systems. Standby personnel can be defined to the system via the RARS console for specific categories of alarms with defined escalation procedures in order that the correct people are informed when problems occur.
Standby duty can be programmed in advance based on automatic rotation rules or rosters. The management of standby can be devolved to department heads using desktop client programs with appropriate visibility being controlled in the context of the department only.
The messaging application supports multiple route message delivery eliminating points of failure producing a highly reliable message delivery mechanism. Bi-directional communication with mobile phone technology provides an easy-to-use mechanism for tacit acknowledgement of receipt of critical messages.
Transmitting alarm messages
The EnviroRAMM Events Analyser builds up the appropriate alert/alarm messages to be sent out and then distributes them based on the Time Period rules and the definition of who needs to be contacted under the specific conditions.
There are facilities for defining different types of messaging services eg electronic mail, SMS, pagers, computer to computer, etc. If there is no appropriate response after the specified time, the Events Analyser will generate its own messages to escalate the problem to the next level in the organisational hierarchy that has been defined to the system.
Note that the details of the message (who it was sent to and when, content) will be logged, so that there is a full 'audit trail' of actions taken. Also, all sensors and alarms are continuously monitored and details are written to an EnviroRAMM log file.
Camera activation on cabinet entry
Perimeter and enclosure security is further enhanced through an integrated camera system that records still photographs together with event details to the system event log for further analyses.
In conclusion
The key challenge in managing complex and time-critical situations is that when things go wrong, action must be taken as quickly as is possible. This implies the need for a feedback control system that detects problems, informs those involved and escalates the issue if no action is taken. The EnviroRac and EnviroRAMM system has been specially developed to address these requirements.
DataNet is a focused independent infrastructure distribution company providing leading-edge structured cabling solutions, 19" racking systems and purpose-built electronic enclosures to the network installer market.
For more information contact Datanet, +27 (0)11 990 6000.
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