Vmware storage policy oddness with Primera

[markinnz]

I think I might know why this is happening, but would like some more brains to have a look and thunk on it

I have created a storage policy in vCentre and applied it as the default to VVol container datastore, all pretty normal stuff.
However, when storage migrating VMs to that VVol container, and making sure it uses the "Datastore Default VM Storage Policy, a lot of the VMs are then out of compliance with the storage policy.
They have the correct policy associated with them, but only the "VM Home" and maybe one or two disks are compliant, the rest are noncompliant.
And it won't let me try and "Reapply VM storage policy" to the VM.

Storage policy rules look this :

Code: Select all

General
Name   Primera_Comp_Dedupe_SSD_R6
Description   HPE Primera A650 ()
Rule-set 1: HPE Primera
Placement
Storage Type   HPE Primera
Common Provisioning Group   SSD_R6_VVol
Snapshot Common Provisioning Group   SSD_R6_VVol
Thin Persistence   Enabled
Data Reduction   Enabled

Looking in SSMC and looking at an affected VM I can that some of its VMware VVols are Thin and some are DECO .. the "thin" ones being the noncompliant disks.

So my thunking is this ... if when the data was being migrated over from 3PAR to Primera, if the Primera thought the data was not suitable for dedupe+compression and instead moved it to a thin volume, would that then trigger vCentre to think the disk is noncompliant ?

If thats not it then, why the hell is not copying to the disk format I've specified ?

[markinnz]

Replying to my own post to answer it

If you have any VMware disks that are less than 16GiB then they will not be converted to DECO by the array, which will then mean the VM is "noncompliant" with the storage policy. Looks like some logic needs to be implemented between HPE and VMware so that vCentre is told it is OK rather than just show it as being wrong.

I won't be holding my breath for that feature request

[MammaGutt]

Replying to my own post to answer it

If you have any VMware disks that are less than 16GiB then they will not be converted to DECO by the array, which will then mean the VM is "noncompliant" with the storage policy. Looks like some logic needs to be implemented between HPE and VMware so that vCentre is told it is OK rather than just show it as being wrong.

I won't be holding my breath for that feature request

That sounds logical considering minimum volume size for deco volumes is 16GiB….

Wondering who needs to fix that graphical thing… Vmware or HPE. Both are probably saying it is working as intended.

[Haapala]

This is an issue that should be discussed with a technical representative from both HPE and VMware. It may be necessary to set up a meeting to discuss the issue and come up with a solution that addresses the logic issue between HPE and VMware. The goal should be to create a process that ensures VM disks are converted to DECO by the array, and that vCentre is told it is OK.