An incremental and iterative approach to deploying your Storage Area Network (SAN), along with documentation about your new SAN environment, will help you quickly release your SAN into production.
Incremental Deployment
The most successful SAN rollouts are done incrementally. Moving one application platform or one server operating system onto the SAN at a time until you feel comfortable that each is working correctly is a best practice. If a problem does arise, incremental deployment helps quickly identify what action caused the problem, and limits your scope to one server or application platform versus your entire enterprise.
Create Documentation about Your New SAN
Detailed documentation will facilitate a quick deployment and be valuable in managing your production SAN after deployment. A final logical and physical diagram of your SAN provides a baseline for testing, illustrating the logical relationships between SAN components and the physical wiring of the components. Neatly organized and labeled cables as well as easy access to product manuals, software, and support contract information will all help in troubleshooting and managing your SAN in production.
The goal of documentation is to provide enough information for someone else to recreate your SAN, including:
- Diagrams: Logical and physical SAN diagrams, switch topology, host and storage connections
- Firmware: A listing of each device and firmware, plus saved copies of each device's firmware
- Switch Info: Each switch's configuration and other information
- Zoning and LUN Info: Your zoning and LUN configurations
- Scripts: Scripts you created and use
- Change Log: Details of any additions, changes, or deletions
It is a good idea to create a subset of your documentation that can be sent to your technical support vendor to aid in troubleshooting problems. Protect your company by removing sensitive information like server names, customer information, etc. This documentation subset should include your SAN topology with operating system version and patch level, HBA type and firmware/driver versions, storage types, etc. — basically everything you need to know before calling technical support (DOC).
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