toasters

toasters@lists.teaparty.net

13531 discussions

RE: NetAppCertTest
by Mike Sphar 11 May '01

11 May '01

Hey, maybe we're using the wrong model. Maybe instead of certifications, we should earn patches like the boy scouts. Then I could work on earning my database patch, my performance tuning patch, etc. It's just crazy enough to work! :) -- Mike Sphar - Sr Systems Administrator - Engineering Support Services - Remedy Corporation BOFH, GWP, MCP, MCP+I, MCSE, BFD -----Original Message----- From: Honeycutt, Michael [mailto:MichaelHoneycutt@NC.SLR.com] Sent: Friday, May 11, 2001 11:47 AM To: 'Mike Sphar'; 'toasters(a)mathworks.com' Subject: RE: NetAppCertTest I concur that the problem of "Paper MCSE's" damages the credibility of real world experts that hold the same title. On the other hand, making the tests impossible to pass without knowing everything there is to know about a product is just as bad. I do think that NetApp needs to branch the test out to offer specific tests with area of relivance as in database vs. straight file serving. Any comments NetApp education people?? -----Original Message----- From: Mike Sphar [mailto:mikey@Remedy.COM] Sent: Friday, May 11, 2001 2:32 PM To: 'toasters(a)mathworks.com' Subject: RE: NetAppCertTest This just reflects a concern I have with certifications in general. A certification that can be obtained with nothing but training and studying and no real-world experience is of questionable value to me. Likewise, a certification that a person with extensive real-world experience can't obtain is also of questionable value. I agree that perhaps there should be multiple different certifications. The filers are just so adaptable that it's impractical to think someone should be an expert on every possible thing they can do. I might administer a hundred filers but never have a need to put a database on one. Likewise I might never need to serve anything but CIFS. It might make the certifications more meaningful to say that for example a given administrator is certified for NFS, CIFS, Databases, HTTP, Security, Networking, etc. You probably don't want the list to be too long, but the idea would be to try to reflect the common real-world uses of the filer. It could even still be just the one single test. Except that rather than giving a single pass/fail certification, the applicant would be scored in each category and granted certifications in each area for which they showed expertise. I honestly appreciate that Netapp's test are more complicated than simple multiple-choice. It shows me that they're making some attempt to prevent the "Paper MCSE" type of situation, which is good. -- Mike Sphar - Sr Systems Administrator - Engineering Support Services - Remedy Corporation BOFH, GWP, MCP, MCP+I, MCSE, BFD -----Original Message----- From: Honeycutt, Michael [mailto:MichaelHoneycutt@NC.SLR.com] Sent: Friday, May 11, 2001 11:14 AM To: 'Mike Sphar'; 'toasters(a)mathworks.com' Subject: RE: NetAppCertTest Yes. There are questions on disk/volume concepts, clustering, how to implement with Oracle/Sql, how to implement with Exchange, name resolution, mixing disks in volumes (IE - disk size, zoning), and so on and so on. The point is, NetApp needs to seriously reconsider the format of these tests. They are very poorly designed. The first 10-15 questions are multiple choice, the next 15-25 were open ended on clustering of all things, next 10-15 were multiple choice again, and then the rest of the test ended with open ended questions. If NetApp is going to make the test so difficult that only their own employees are going to pass, then they need to remove its availability to its customers. If they are going to leave it public, they need to make it so that normal admins have at least a small hope that they can pass it without sitting on a horse shoe. Another problem is the lack of direction given on what the contents of the test. If you want to pass this test, you WILL have to memorize every possible function of the filer. If you think about it, this test should be set up as a core that deals directly with how the filer is set up and basic file serving functions and have electives for the second part. Not everyone uses these filers as Oracle database containers. But then again, thats just my opinion, I could be wrong. -----Original Message----- From: Mike Sphar [mailto:mikey@Remedy.COM] Sent: Friday, May 11, 2001 1:51 PM To: 'toasters(a)mathworks.com' Subject: RE: NetAppCertTest What? Nothing on clustering? That's one of the reasons I haven't though about taking the tests. I've been maintaining filers for about 4 years, but I've never had any official training classes, and I'm very unlikely to get budget for training because after all, I've been maintaining them for 4 years. I assumed that the Netapp tests would be sort of like the Sun Solaris tests, where even if you'd been an administrator for 10+ years you still wouldn't be able to answer the NIS+ questions unless you had worked in one of those rare locations that used NIS+ or had taken all of Sun's classes. My environment has never utilized clustering, so I figured I'd fail simply on the basis of that. So how likely is a person who already has several years of administration experience to pass these certification tests without needing to attend special training? -- Mike Sphar - Sr Systems Administrator - Engineering Support Services - Remedy Corporation BOFH, GWP, MCP, MCP+I, MCSE, BFD -----Original Message----- From: Fairchild, Peter [mailto:Peter.Fairchild@netapp.com] Sent: Friday, May 11, 2001 8:24 AM To: 'Honeycutt, Michael'; 'toasters(a)mathworks.com' Subject: RE: NetAppCertTest There are three 1 hour tests **The Hardware Test covers the 700 and 800 series filers, FC7-9 and DS14 storage shelves, the basics of racking and connecting them, and a bit on back up technology. **The General Knowledge Test looks at elements of Unix and NT, networking, DOT 5.x & 6.x (Normal Commands only), and some break/fix scenarios. **The Configuration Test examines just that: Can you configure a filer, storage shelf, and basic back up system? Volumes, qtrees, quotas, security styles, VIFs, snapshots, autosupport, OS upgrade, dump/restore, etc. Nothing tricky in these tests. Just the fundamentals. Tricky comes at the Professional level where troubleshooting and performance tuning come into play. How to prepare? Take the Hardware and ONTAP System Administration classes and DO THE LABS. Keep up with the NOW site and toasters (you guys are a great source of material ;->) and you should have no problem. Oh, and there is a grid covering all of the above in greater detail on the NOW site. Peter W. Fairchild Technical Certification Program Manager Educational Services NetworkAppliance, Inc. Desk (408) 822-3320 Cell (408) 877-1596 -----Original Message----- From: Honeycutt, Michael [mailto:MichaelHoneycutt@NC.SLR.com] Sent: Friday, May 11, 2001 5:23 AM To: 'toasters(a)mathworks.com' Subject: NetAppCertTest Has anyone taken the NetApp Associate cert test since the move to Sylvan Prometric? If so, can you give me a hint to what kind of questions are asked. Thanks. Michael Honeycutt MCSE/A+ NT/Exchange Engineer IBM Global Services

1 0

RE: NetAppCertTest
by Honeycutt, Michael 11 May '01

11 May '01

Fundamental? I just took the first test, and they have made it very hard for anyone that does not work for NetApp to pass this test. In my opinion, you should not offer this cert to customers. -----Original Message----- From: Fairchild, Peter [mailto:Peter.Fairchild@netapp.com] Sent: Friday, May 11, 2001 11:24 AM To: Honeycutt, Michael; 'toasters(a)mathworks.com' Subject: RE: NetAppCertTest There are three 1 hour tests **The Hardware Test covers the 700 and 800 series filers, FC7-9 and DS14 storage shelves, the basics of racking and connecting them, and a bit on back up technology. **The General Knowledge Test looks at elements of Unix and NT, networking, DOT 5.x & 6.x (Normal Commands only), and some break/fix scenarios. **The Configuration Test examines just that: Can you configure a filer, storage shelf, and basic back up system? Volumes, qtrees, quotas, security styles, VIFs, snapshots, autosupport, OS upgrade, dump/restore, etc. Nothing tricky in these tests. Just the fundamentals. Tricky comes at the Professional level where troubleshooting and performance tuning come into play. How to prepare? Take the Hardware and ONTAP System Administration classes and DO THE LABS. Keep up with the NOW site and toasters (you guys are a great source of material ;->) and you should have no problem. Oh, and there is a grid covering all of the above in greater detail on the NOW site. Peter W. Fairchild Technical Certification Program Manager Educational Services NetworkAppliance, Inc. Desk (408) 822-3320 Cell (408) 877-1596 -----Original Message----- From: Honeycutt, Michael [mailto:MichaelHoneycutt@NC.SLR.com] Sent: Friday, May 11, 2001 5:23 AM To: 'toasters(a)mathworks.com' Subject: NetAppCertTest Has anyone taken the NetApp Associate cert test since the move to Sylvan Prometric? If so, can you give me a hint to what kind of questions are asked. Thanks. Michael Honeycutt MCSE/A+ NT/Exchange Engineer IBM Global Services

2 1

RE: NetAppCertTest
by Honeycutt, Michael 11 May '01

11 May '01

I concur that the problem of "Paper MCSE's" damages the credibility of real world experts that hold the same title. On the other hand, making the tests impossible to pass without knowing everything there is to know about a product is just as bad. I do think that NetApp needs to branch the test out to offer specific tests with area of relivance as in database vs. straight file serving. Any comments NetApp education people?? -----Original Message----- From: Mike Sphar [mailto:mikey@Remedy.COM] Sent: Friday, May 11, 2001 2:32 PM To: 'toasters(a)mathworks.com' Subject: RE: NetAppCertTest This just reflects a concern I have with certifications in general. A certification that can be obtained with nothing but training and studying and no real-world experience is of questionable value to me. Likewise, a certification that a person with extensive real-world experience can't obtain is also of questionable value. I agree that perhaps there should be multiple different certifications. The filers are just so adaptable that it's impractical to think someone should be an expert on every possible thing they can do. I might administer a hundred filers but never have a need to put a database on one. Likewise I might never need to serve anything but CIFS. It might make the certifications more meaningful to say that for example a given administrator is certified for NFS, CIFS, Databases, HTTP, Security, Networking, etc. You probably don't want the list to be too long, but the idea would be to try to reflect the common real-world uses of the filer. It could even still be just the one single test. Except that rather than giving a single pass/fail certification, the applicant would be scored in each category and granted certifications in each area for which they showed expertise. I honestly appreciate that Netapp's test are more complicated than simple multiple-choice. It shows me that they're making some attempt to prevent the "Paper MCSE" type of situation, which is good. -- Mike Sphar - Sr Systems Administrator - Engineering Support Services - Remedy Corporation BOFH, GWP, MCP, MCP+I, MCSE, BFD -----Original Message----- From: Honeycutt, Michael [mailto:MichaelHoneycutt@NC.SLR.com] Sent: Friday, May 11, 2001 11:14 AM To: 'Mike Sphar'; 'toasters(a)mathworks.com' Subject: RE: NetAppCertTest Yes. There are questions on disk/volume concepts, clustering, how to implement with Oracle/Sql, how to implement with Exchange, name resolution, mixing disks in volumes (IE - disk size, zoning), and so on and so on. The point is, NetApp needs to seriously reconsider the format of these tests. They are very poorly designed. The first 10-15 questions are multiple choice, the next 15-25 were open ended on clustering of all things, next 10-15 were multiple choice again, and then the rest of the test ended with open ended questions. If NetApp is going to make the test so difficult that only their own employees are going to pass, then they need to remove its availability to its customers. If they are going to leave it public, they need to make it so that normal admins have at least a small hope that they can pass it without sitting on a horse shoe. Another problem is the lack of direction given on what the contents of the test. If you want to pass this test, you WILL have to memorize every possible function of the filer. If you think about it, this test should be set up as a core that deals directly with how the filer is set up and basic file serving functions and have electives for the second part. Not everyone uses these filers as Oracle database containers. But then again, thats just my opinion, I could be wrong. -----Original Message----- From: Mike Sphar [mailto:mikey@Remedy.COM] Sent: Friday, May 11, 2001 1:51 PM To: 'toasters(a)mathworks.com' Subject: RE: NetAppCertTest What? Nothing on clustering? That's one of the reasons I haven't though about taking the tests. I've been maintaining filers for about 4 years, but I've never had any official training classes, and I'm very unlikely to get budget for training because after all, I've been maintaining them for 4 years. I assumed that the Netapp tests would be sort of like the Sun Solaris tests, where even if you'd been an administrator for 10+ years you still wouldn't be able to answer the NIS+ questions unless you had worked in one of those rare locations that used NIS+ or had taken all of Sun's classes. My environment has never utilized clustering, so I figured I'd fail simply on the basis of that. So how likely is a person who already has several years of administration experience to pass these certification tests without needing to attend special training? -- Mike Sphar - Sr Systems Administrator - Engineering Support Services - Remedy Corporation BOFH, GWP, MCP, MCP+I, MCSE, BFD -----Original Message----- From: Fairchild, Peter [mailto:Peter.Fairchild@netapp.com] Sent: Friday, May 11, 2001 8:24 AM To: 'Honeycutt, Michael'; 'toasters(a)mathworks.com' Subject: RE: NetAppCertTest There are three 1 hour tests **The Hardware Test covers the 700 and 800 series filers, FC7-9 and DS14 storage shelves, the basics of racking and connecting them, and a bit on back up technology. **The General Knowledge Test looks at elements of Unix and NT, networking, DOT 5.x & 6.x (Normal Commands only), and some break/fix scenarios. **The Configuration Test examines just that: Can you configure a filer, storage shelf, and basic back up system? Volumes, qtrees, quotas, security styles, VIFs, snapshots, autosupport, OS upgrade, dump/restore, etc. Nothing tricky in these tests. Just the fundamentals. Tricky comes at the Professional level where troubleshooting and performance tuning come into play. How to prepare? Take the Hardware and ONTAP System Administration classes and DO THE LABS. Keep up with the NOW site and toasters (you guys are a great source of material ;->) and you should have no problem. Oh, and there is a grid covering all of the above in greater detail on the NOW site. Peter W. Fairchild Technical Certification Program Manager Educational Services NetworkAppliance, Inc. Desk (408) 822-3320 Cell (408) 877-1596 -----Original Message----- From: Honeycutt, Michael [mailto:MichaelHoneycutt@NC.SLR.com] Sent: Friday, May 11, 2001 5:23 AM To: 'toasters(a)mathworks.com' Subject: NetAppCertTest Has anyone taken the NetApp Associate cert test since the move to Sylvan Prometric? If so, can you give me a hint to what kind of questions are asked. Thanks. Michael Honeycutt MCSE/A+ NT/Exchange Engineer IBM Global Services

1 0

RE: NetAppCertTest
by Mike Sphar 11 May '01

11 May '01

This just reflects a concern I have with certifications in general. A certification that can be obtained with nothing but training and studying and no real-world experience is of questionable value to me. Likewise, a certification that a person with extensive real-world experience can't obtain is also of questionable value. I agree that perhaps there should be multiple different certifications. The filers are just so adaptable that it's impractical to think someone should be an expert on every possible thing they can do. I might administer a hundred filers but never have a need to put a database on one. Likewise I might never need to serve anything but CIFS. It might make the certifications more meaningful to say that for example a given administrator is certified for NFS, CIFS, Databases, HTTP, Security, Networking, etc. You probably don't want the list to be too long, but the idea would be to try to reflect the common real-world uses of the filer. It could even still be just the one single test. Except that rather than giving a single pass/fail certification, the applicant would be scored in each category and granted certifications in each area for which they showed expertise. I honestly appreciate that Netapp's test are more complicated than simple multiple-choice. It shows me that they're making some attempt to prevent the "Paper MCSE" type of situation, which is good. -- Mike Sphar - Sr Systems Administrator - Engineering Support Services - Remedy Corporation BOFH, GWP, MCP, MCP+I, MCSE, BFD -----Original Message----- From: Honeycutt, Michael [mailto:MichaelHoneycutt@NC.SLR.com] Sent: Friday, May 11, 2001 11:14 AM To: 'Mike Sphar'; 'toasters(a)mathworks.com' Subject: RE: NetAppCertTest Yes. There are questions on disk/volume concepts, clustering, how to implement with Oracle/Sql, how to implement with Exchange, name resolution, mixing disks in volumes (IE - disk size, zoning), and so on and so on. The point is, NetApp needs to seriously reconsider the format of these tests. They are very poorly designed. The first 10-15 questions are multiple choice, the next 15-25 were open ended on clustering of all things, next 10-15 were multiple choice again, and then the rest of the test ended with open ended questions. If NetApp is going to make the test so difficult that only their own employees are going to pass, then they need to remove its availability to its customers. If they are going to leave it public, they need to make it so that normal admins have at least a small hope that they can pass it without sitting on a horse shoe. Another problem is the lack of direction given on what the contents of the test. If you want to pass this test, you WILL have to memorize every possible function of the filer. If you think about it, this test should be set up as a core that deals directly with how the filer is set up and basic file serving functions and have electives for the second part. Not everyone uses these filers as Oracle database containers. But then again, thats just my opinion, I could be wrong. -----Original Message----- From: Mike Sphar [mailto:mikey@Remedy.COM] Sent: Friday, May 11, 2001 1:51 PM To: 'toasters(a)mathworks.com' Subject: RE: NetAppCertTest What? Nothing on clustering? That's one of the reasons I haven't though about taking the tests. I've been maintaining filers for about 4 years, but I've never had any official training classes, and I'm very unlikely to get budget for training because after all, I've been maintaining them for 4 years. I assumed that the Netapp tests would be sort of like the Sun Solaris tests, where even if you'd been an administrator for 10+ years you still wouldn't be able to answer the NIS+ questions unless you had worked in one of those rare locations that used NIS+ or had taken all of Sun's classes. My environment has never utilized clustering, so I figured I'd fail simply on the basis of that. So how likely is a person who already has several years of administration experience to pass these certification tests without needing to attend special training? -- Mike Sphar - Sr Systems Administrator - Engineering Support Services - Remedy Corporation BOFH, GWP, MCP, MCP+I, MCSE, BFD -----Original Message----- From: Fairchild, Peter [mailto:Peter.Fairchild@netapp.com] Sent: Friday, May 11, 2001 8:24 AM To: 'Honeycutt, Michael'; 'toasters(a)mathworks.com' Subject: RE: NetAppCertTest There are three 1 hour tests **The Hardware Test covers the 700 and 800 series filers, FC7-9 and DS14 storage shelves, the basics of racking and connecting them, and a bit on back up technology. **The General Knowledge Test looks at elements of Unix and NT, networking, DOT 5.x & 6.x (Normal Commands only), and some break/fix scenarios. **The Configuration Test examines just that: Can you configure a filer, storage shelf, and basic back up system? Volumes, qtrees, quotas, security styles, VIFs, snapshots, autosupport, OS upgrade, dump/restore, etc. Nothing tricky in these tests. Just the fundamentals. Tricky comes at the Professional level where troubleshooting and performance tuning come into play. How to prepare? Take the Hardware and ONTAP System Administration classes and DO THE LABS. Keep up with the NOW site and toasters (you guys are a great source of material ;->) and you should have no problem. Oh, and there is a grid covering all of the above in greater detail on the NOW site. Peter W. Fairchild Technical Certification Program Manager Educational Services NetworkAppliance, Inc. Desk (408) 822-3320 Cell (408) 877-1596 -----Original Message----- From: Honeycutt, Michael [mailto:MichaelHoneycutt@NC.SLR.com] Sent: Friday, May 11, 2001 5:23 AM To: 'toasters(a)mathworks.com' Subject: NetAppCertTest Has anyone taken the NetApp Associate cert test since the move to Sylvan Prometric? If so, can you give me a hint to what kind of questions are asked. Thanks. Michael Honeycutt MCSE/A+ NT/Exchange Engineer IBM Global Services

1 0

RE: NetAppCertTest
by Honeycutt, Michael 11 May '01

11 May '01

Yes. There are questions on disk/volume concepts, clustering, how to implement with Oracle/Sql, how to implement with Exchange, name resolution, mixing disks in volumes (IE - disk size, zoning), and so on and so on. The point is, NetApp needs to seriously reconsider the format of these tests. They are very poorly designed. The first 10-15 questions are multiple choice, the next 15-25 were open ended on clustering of all things, next 10-15 were multiple choice again, and then the rest of the test ended with open ended questions. If NetApp is going to make the test so difficult that only their own employees are going to pass, then they need to remove its availability to its customers. If they are going to leave it public, they need to make it so that normal admins have at least a small hope that they can pass it without sitting on a horse shoe. Another problem is the lack of direction given on what the contents of the test. If you want to pass this test, you WILL have to memorize every possible function of the filer. If you think about it, this test should be set up as a core that deals directly with how the filer is set up and basic file serving functions and have electives for the second part. Not everyone uses these filers as Oracle database containers. But then again, thats just my opinion, I could be wrong. -----Original Message----- From: Mike Sphar [mailto:mikey@Remedy.COM] Sent: Friday, May 11, 2001 1:51 PM To: 'toasters(a)mathworks.com' Subject: RE: NetAppCertTest What? Nothing on clustering? That's one of the reasons I haven't though about taking the tests. I've been maintaining filers for about 4 years, but I've never had any official training classes, and I'm very unlikely to get budget for training because after all, I've been maintaining them for 4 years. I assumed that the Netapp tests would be sort of like the Sun Solaris tests, where even if you'd been an administrator for 10+ years you still wouldn't be able to answer the NIS+ questions unless you had worked in one of those rare locations that used NIS+ or had taken all of Sun's classes. My environment has never utilized clustering, so I figured I'd fail simply on the basis of that. So how likely is a person who already has several years of administration experience to pass these certification tests without needing to attend special training? -- Mike Sphar - Sr Systems Administrator - Engineering Support Services - Remedy Corporation BOFH, GWP, MCP, MCP+I, MCSE, BFD -----Original Message----- From: Fairchild, Peter [mailto:Peter.Fairchild@netapp.com] Sent: Friday, May 11, 2001 8:24 AM To: 'Honeycutt, Michael'; 'toasters(a)mathworks.com' Subject: RE: NetAppCertTest There are three 1 hour tests **The Hardware Test covers the 700 and 800 series filers, FC7-9 and DS14 storage shelves, the basics of racking and connecting them, and a bit on back up technology. **The General Knowledge Test looks at elements of Unix and NT, networking, DOT 5.x & 6.x (Normal Commands only), and some break/fix scenarios. **The Configuration Test examines just that: Can you configure a filer, storage shelf, and basic back up system? Volumes, qtrees, quotas, security styles, VIFs, snapshots, autosupport, OS upgrade, dump/restore, etc. Nothing tricky in these tests. Just the fundamentals. Tricky comes at the Professional level where troubleshooting and performance tuning come into play. How to prepare? Take the Hardware and ONTAP System Administration classes and DO THE LABS. Keep up with the NOW site and toasters (you guys are a great source of material ;->) and you should have no problem. Oh, and there is a grid covering all of the above in greater detail on the NOW site. Peter W. Fairchild Technical Certification Program Manager Educational Services NetworkAppliance, Inc. Desk (408) 822-3320 Cell (408) 877-1596 -----Original Message----- From: Honeycutt, Michael [mailto:MichaelHoneycutt@NC.SLR.com] Sent: Friday, May 11, 2001 5:23 AM To: 'toasters(a)mathworks.com' Subject: NetAppCertTest Has anyone taken the NetApp Associate cert test since the move to Sylvan Prometric? If so, can you give me a hint to what kind of questions are asked. Thanks. Michael Honeycutt MCSE/A+ NT/Exchange Engineer IBM Global Services

1 0

RE: NetAppCertTest
by Mike Sphar 11 May '01

11 May '01

What? Nothing on clustering? That's one of the reasons I haven't though about taking the tests. I've been maintaining filers for about 4 years, but I've never had any official training classes, and I'm very unlikely to get budget for training because after all, I've been maintaining them for 4 years. I assumed that the Netapp tests would be sort of like the Sun Solaris tests, where even if you'd been an administrator for 10+ years you still wouldn't be able to answer the NIS+ questions unless you had worked in one of those rare locations that used NIS+ or had taken all of Sun's classes. My environment has never utilized clustering, so I figured I'd fail simply on the basis of that. So how likely is a person who already has several years of administration experience to pass these certification tests without needing to attend special training? -- Mike Sphar - Sr Systems Administrator - Engineering Support Services - Remedy Corporation BOFH, GWP, MCP, MCP+I, MCSE, BFD -----Original Message----- From: Fairchild, Peter [mailto:Peter.Fairchild@netapp.com] Sent: Friday, May 11, 2001 8:24 AM To: 'Honeycutt, Michael'; 'toasters(a)mathworks.com' Subject: RE: NetAppCertTest There are three 1 hour tests **The Hardware Test covers the 700 and 800 series filers, FC7-9 and DS14 storage shelves, the basics of racking and connecting them, and a bit on back up technology. **The General Knowledge Test looks at elements of Unix and NT, networking, DOT 5.x & 6.x (Normal Commands only), and some break/fix scenarios. **The Configuration Test examines just that: Can you configure a filer, storage shelf, and basic back up system? Volumes, qtrees, quotas, security styles, VIFs, snapshots, autosupport, OS upgrade, dump/restore, etc. Nothing tricky in these tests. Just the fundamentals. Tricky comes at the Professional level where troubleshooting and performance tuning come into play. How to prepare? Take the Hardware and ONTAP System Administration classes and DO THE LABS. Keep up with the NOW site and toasters (you guys are a great source of material ;->) and you should have no problem. Oh, and there is a grid covering all of the above in greater detail on the NOW site. Peter W. Fairchild Technical Certification Program Manager Educational Services NetworkAppliance, Inc. Desk (408) 822-3320 Cell (408) 877-1596 -----Original Message----- From: Honeycutt, Michael [mailto:MichaelHoneycutt@NC.SLR.com] Sent: Friday, May 11, 2001 5:23 AM To: 'toasters(a)mathworks.com' Subject: NetAppCertTest Has anyone taken the NetApp Associate cert test since the move to Sylvan Prometric? If so, can you give me a hint to what kind of questions are asked. Thanks. Michael Honeycutt MCSE/A+ NT/Exchange Engineer IBM Global Services

1 0

RE: ONTAP 6.x snapshots
by Fox, Adam 11 May '01

11 May '01

No one had to sell their soul. We just re-wrote how snapshots are done in 6.x. This re-write changes how the blockmap file is generated and give lots of benfits. 1. REALLY fast snapshots, even on 1+ TB volumes! 2. 31 Snapshots per volume rather than 20. The blockmap file was the limiting factor 3. SIGNIFICANTLY less overhead for SnapMirror. The blockmap file of the volume must be moved over during a SnapMirror transfer. The old pre-6 blockmap file was 1/1024 of the volume size. So if you had a 1TB volume, your blockmap size was 1GB. This has been cut by I believe (don't quota me exactly on this) by a factor of 16 or 32, thus speeding up SnapMirrors as well, espcecially small incremental SnapMirror transfers. You may have heard about the "Split Blockmap"? This is the re-write I describe above. Enjoy! -- Adam Fox NetApp Professional Services, NC adamfox(a)netapp.com > -----Original Message----- > From: Todd C. Merrill [mailto:tmerrill@mathworks.com] > Sent: Thursday, May 10, 2001 8:57 AM > To: toasters(a)mathworks.com > Subject: ONTAP 6.x snapshots > > > > To balance my karma on this list, after yesterday's "floppy shuffle" > thread.... > > # time rsh F840-filer-running-6.1 'snap create vol0 test' > creating snapshot... > 0.01u 0.02s 0:00.28 10.7% > > 28-hundredths of a second wall-clock time, including loading > and executing > rsh and building and taking down the TCP/IP connection?! > > Whose soul had to be sold to make the new snapshot work so fast? > > Until next time... > > The Mathworks, Inc. 508-647-7000 x7792 > 3 Apple Hill Drive, Natick, MA 01760-2098 508-647-7001 FAX > tmerrill(a)mathworks.com > http://www.mathworks.com > --- >

3 2

RE: EMC IP4700 vs NetApp F740 (philosophical/OT)
by Martin Hughes 11 May '01

11 May '01

>Did they prove that or just claim it. I can claim my car goes 150 mph and >gets 60 miles per gallon. That doesn't make it true and doesn't make me >credible just because I claimed it and refute when someone else says that it >doesn't. This mindset is beginning to worry me a little. I expect a certain amount of sales banter and exaggeration. I can live with some promotion of one companies product and trashing of another by a company sales rep (although the degree to which direct comparisons are made through advertising surprises me - e.g. this liquid plumber is better than that one because we've done tests so don't buy that product as it's crap). But to sit down with a technical person from one organisation and ask specific technical questions on their company's product and apparently get lied to from not asking the exact specific question/misinformed is going a little beyond the pale. Are we heading towards the situation where a buyer needs to get products in on eval from rival companies each time because they cannot trust the technical claims of the vendors? Couldn't our time be better used rather than each company going over the same ground at every technology jump or new product? To take the example above, if someone claimed that their car did 150mph and 60mpg, but then told me when I asked them directly that was only on a downhill slope of 45 degrees on a specific road in the middle of Germany and they actually get about 110mph on a flat road and 25-30 mpg during Interstate driving, I can deal with that. From what I've experienced, it seems to be akin to asking if a car is petrol, being told it is and then finding out I have to fill it with diesel to get it to work. This may well be because I'm a stranger in a strange land (an Irishman in Houston) but is this normal business practise here? I'd be interested in how everyone else sees this. Regards Martin Enterprise Storage/Enterprise Server Group <mailto:martin.hughes@halliburton.com> cellphone: +1 713 303 9214 office: +1 281 871 4124 -----Original Message----- From: Ferd Berfl [mailto:ferd_berfl@yahoo.com] Sent: Thursday, May 10, 2001 12:30 PM To: Martin Hughes; toasters(a)mathworks.com Subject: RE: EMC IP4700 vs NetApp F740 Did they prove that or just claim it. I can claim my car goes 150 mph and gets 60 miles per gallon. That doesn't make it true and doesn't make me credible just because I claimed it and refute when someone else says that it doesn't. > -----Original Message----- > From: owner-dl-toasters(a)netapp.com > [mailto:owner-dl-toasters@netapp.com]On Behalf Of Martin Hughes > Sent: Thursday, May 10, 2001 9:45 AM > To: toasters(a)mathworks.com > Subject: RE: EMC IP4700 vs NetApp F740 > > > >Your description of how the IP4700's Snapshot copy-on-write > mechanism works > >is right on. The original data is copied to a new location and the new > data > >is written to the original block. Yes this compromises performance. Yes > >you have to allocate physical disk space to accomplish this. No > you cannot > >shrink the amount of disk space you have allocated for this > process if you > >find that it is too much. > > > Hmm, not according to a demo we had from EMC week before last. I grilled > them pretty hard on that and they claimed that they updated the inode file > only and did not copy blocks to another location. > > Well, we have an eval unit coming in next week and I'll do some testing. > > Regards > > Martin > Enterprise Storage/Enterprise Server Group > <mailto:martin.hughes@halliburton.com> > cellphone: +1 713 303 9214 > office: +1 281 871 4124 > > _________________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Get your free @yahoo.com address at http://mail.yahoo.com

3 2

Re: more fun with quotas
by Tom Reingold 11 May '01

11 May '01

I believe it is not necessary to have quota trees in order to have quotas. But it is highly advisable. I highly recommend putting all user home directories in quota trees. If you don't want to make false barriers, put all the users in a single quota tree. This will prevent a disaster. It's possible to have a disaster (well maybe the word is too strong) if your filer fills up. If it fills up, you could truncate an essential file such as /etc/passwd. If the quota tree(s) add up to slightly less than the entire volume, then users will never fill up the filer. Unfortunately, if existing directories are NOT in a quota tree, you have to move them into one. This can be extremely time consuming. I don't know a way around this. You may have to have a night where the filer is unavailable to users while you make the move(s).

3 2

RE: NetAppCertTest
by Fairchild, Peter 11 May '01

11 May '01

There are three 1 hour tests **The Hardware Test covers the 700 and 800 series filers, FC7-9 and DS14 storage shelves, the basics of racking and connecting them, and a bit on back up technology. **The General Knowledge Test looks at elements of Unix and NT, networking, DOT 5.x & 6.x (Normal Commands only), and some break/fix scenarios. **The Configuration Test examines just that: Can you configure a filer, storage shelf, and basic back up system? Volumes, qtrees, quotas, security styles, VIFs, snapshots, autosupport, OS upgrade, dump/restore, etc. Nothing tricky in these tests. Just the fundamentals. Tricky comes at the Professional level where troubleshooting and performance tuning come into play. How to prepare? Take the Hardware and ONTAP System Administration classes and DO THE LABS. Keep up with the NOW site and toasters (you guys are a great source of material ;->) and you should have no problem. Oh, and there is a grid covering all of the above in greater detail on the NOW site. Peter W. Fairchild Technical Certification Program Manager Educational Services NetworkAppliance, Inc. Desk (408) 822-3320 Cell (408) 877-1596 -----Original Message----- From: Honeycutt, Michael [mailto:MichaelHoneycutt@NC.SLR.com] Sent: Friday, May 11, 2001 5:23 AM To: 'toasters(a)mathworks.com' Subject: NetAppCertTest Has anyone taken the NetApp Associate cert test since the move to Sylvan Prometric? If so, can you give me a hint to what kind of questions are asked. Thanks. Michael Honeycutt MCSE/A+ NT/Exchange Engineer IBM Global Services

1 0

Question on quotas...
by Allen, Pat 11 May '01

11 May '01

Hi all, I'm in the process of migrating our user accounts from one F740 to another; both are running 6.0.1R3. On the existing F740, I had a separate volume for the user home directories but I want to keep these in the root volume on my new filer. So I created a qtree (with Unix security style) in my /vol/vol0 volume named users. My quotas file looks like: * user@/vol/vol0 - - * user@/vol/vol0/users 500M - # User Quota My understanding from the documentation indicates that you can put a quota on a qtree - the man pages for the quotas file even shows an example. What I'm finding is that the 500M quota is being applied to the entire /vol/vol0 volume rather than just the users qtree. This is not what I want since I'll have other qtrees there as well and I don't want files in the other qtrees to impact the home directory limit. Does anybody have any suggestions??? On a similar subject, I'm finding that my user mapping isn't working as I would expect. When I copy files from a Windows client to my home directory, all the files end up being owned by root. Obviously, this screws up my quotas. The user name in the NT domain always matches the user name in the NIS domain. This occurs on both the old and the new filer; I even have an explicit mapping configured in usermap.cfg on the old filer. Any suggestions on what is going on? --- Pat Allen (pat(a)mbari.org) Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute (MBARI) 7700 Sandholdt Rd, Moss Landing, CA 95039 (voice) 831-775-1724; (fax) 831-775-1620

1 0

NetAppCertTest
by Honeycutt, Michael 11 May '01

11 May '01

Has anyone taken the NetApp Associate cert test since the move to Sylvan Prometric? If so, can you give me a hint to what kind of questions are asked. Thanks. Michael Honeycutt MCSE/A+ NT/Exchange Engineer IBM Global Services

1 0

RE: CLEARING an option setting
by Traitel, Eyal 11 May '01

11 May '01

This is not true. Sorry for mistake. ------------------------------------------------------------------ eTraitel - I'm the new eBuzzword around !!! ------------------------------------------------------------------ Filer Escalation Engineer CNA, MCSE, CSA, LCA, NetApp CA Network Appliance BV Hoofddorp, The Netherlands Office: +31 23 567 9685 Cellular: +31 6 5497 2568 ------------------------------------------------------------------ Get answers NOW! - NetApp On the Web - http://now.netapp.com ------------------------------------------------------------------ -----Original Message----- From: Traitel, Eyal [mailto:eyal@netapp.com] Sent: Friday, May 11, 2001 12:40 AM To: 'Frank Cusack'; toasters(a)mathworks.com Subject: RE: CLEARING an option setting You should be able to use options nis.servers "" Eyal. ------------------------------------------------------------------ eTraitel - I'm the new eBuzzword around !!! ------------------------------------------------------------------ Filer Escalation Engineer CNA, MCSE, CSA, LCA, NetApp CA Network Appliance BV Hoofddorp, The Netherlands Office: +31 23 567 9685 Cellular: +31 6 5497 2568 ------------------------------------------------------------------ Get answers NOW! - NetApp On the Web - http://now.netapp.com ------------------------------------------------------------------ -----Original Message----- From: Frank Cusack [mailto:frank@google.com] Sent: Thursday, May 10, 2001 9:02 PM To: toasters(a)mathworks.com Subject: CLEARING an option setting How can I do this? I'd like to do something like unoption nis.servers so that there is a blank or no setting associated with an option. Is it safe to edit the registry file to to this? thx /fc

1 0

RE: CLEARING an option setting
by Bond, Andrew 11 May '01

11 May '01

Barry's suggestion is the correct way (although it's 'options' rather than 'option'). Please do not try to edit the registry. Regards, Andrew Bond Consulting Systems Engineer Network Appliance UK > -----Original Message----- > From: Barry Lustig [mailto:barry@lustig.com] > Sent: 11 May 2001 06:38 > To: Frank Cusack > Cc: toasters(a)mathworks.com > Subject: Re: CLEARING an option setting > > > Frank Cusack wrote: > > > > How can I do this? > > > > I'd like to do something like > > > > unoption nis.servers > > > Try option nis.servers "" > > barry >

1 0

RE: CLEARING an option setting
by Traitel, Eyal 11 May '01

11 May '01

You should be able to use options nis.servers "" Eyal. ------------------------------------------------------------------ eTraitel - I'm the new eBuzzword around !!! ------------------------------------------------------------------ Filer Escalation Engineer CNA, MCSE, CSA, LCA, NetApp CA Network Appliance BV Hoofddorp, The Netherlands Office: +31 23 567 9685 Cellular: +31 6 5497 2568 ------------------------------------------------------------------ Get answers NOW! - NetApp On the Web - http://now.netapp.com ------------------------------------------------------------------ -----Original Message----- From: Frank Cusack [mailto:frank@google.com] Sent: Thursday, May 10, 2001 9:02 PM To: toasters(a)mathworks.com Subject: CLEARING an option setting How can I do this? I'd like to do something like unoption nis.servers so that there is a blank or no setting associated with an option. Is it safe to edit the registry file to to this? thx /fc

1 0

CLEARING an option setting
by Frank Cusack 11 May '01

11 May '01

How can I do this? I'd like to do something like unoption nis.servers so that there is a blank or no setting associated with an option. Is it safe to edit the registry file to to this? thx /fc

3 2

RE: Upgrading to Ontap 6.1R1 and Quotas
by Heller, Jeffrey 11 May '01

11 May '01

The quota problem was fixed with 6.1R1. The workaround is no longer needed for upgrades. > -----Original Message----- > From: Jeffrey Krueger [mailto:jkrueger@qualcomm.com] > Sent: Thursday, May 10, 2001 5:43 PM > To: Malek Hamdan > Cc: 'Toasters (E-mail) ' > Subject: Re: Upgrading to Ontap 6.1R1 and Quotas > > > Malek: > > NetApp support is the authoritative word on this, but it is my > understanding that the quota bug is only present in 6.1 and fixed in > 6.1R1. Anyone else care to confirm or deny? > > -- Jeff > > > > On Fri, May 11, 2001 at 10:07:09AM +1000, Malek Hamdan wrote: > > Hi all, > > > > I know that quota's should be turned off before upgrading > to 6.1 - though > > the NOW site says: > > > > <snip for NOW> > > Add the following entry to the /etc/quotas file for each > volume on the > > filer. > > Replace volname with the name of the volume. > > 0 user@/vol/volname - - > > </snip> > > > > Does this mean that I should keep existing entries in the > /etc/quotas file > > and just add the specified entry?? Also, does this need to > be done for all > > volumes or just volumes that had quotas turned on?? > > > > You help is appreciated. > > > > Kind Regards, > > > > Malek > > >

1 0

RE: filer head compatibility with older shelf hardware question
by Toal, Dave 11 May '01

11 May '01

The 330 was... um, _is_ running 5.2.1, and so is the 520. The 740, 5.3.6 . -----Original Message----- From: Toal, Dave To: 'toasters(a)mathworks.com' Sent: 5/11/01 12:27 AM Subject: filer head compatibility with older shelf hardware question Folks, The thing at the top of my list right now is an F330 which is having hardware problems. The scsi cards in it are the 50-pin narrow variety, with dec- style disk enclosures. A 740 and a 520 are available. Is there any possibility of bringing up the F330 disk as a vol on either of these heads? -- Dave Toal Systems Optimist T&T, NQ, MA

1 0

filer head compatibility with older shelf hardware question
by Toal, Dave 11 May '01

11 May '01

Folks, The thing at the top of my list right now is an F330 which is having hardware problems. The scsi cards in it are the 50-pin narrow variety, with dec- style disk enclosures. A 740 and a 520 are available. Is there any possibility of bringing up the F330 disk as a vol on either of these heads? -- Dave Toal Systems Optimist T&T, NQ, MA

1 0

AS/400s and filers
by Ambrose_Earle＠shamrockfoods.com 11 May '01

11 May '01

Does anyone have any experience with connecting AS/400s to filers via NFS?

1 0

Upgrading to Ontap 6.1R1 and Quotas
by Malek Hamdan 11 May '01

11 May '01

Hi all, I know that quota's should be turned off before upgrading to 6.1 - though the NOW site says: <snip for NOW> Add the following entry to the /etc/quotas file for each volume on the filer. Replace volname with the name of the volume. 0 user@/vol/volname - - </snip> Does this mean that I should keep existing entries in the /etc/quotas file and just add the specified entry?? Also, does this need to be done for all volumes or just volumes that had quotas turned on?? You help is appreciated. Kind Regards, Malek

3 2

RE: ndmpd errors
by Toal, Dave 10 May '01

10 May '01

-----Original Message----- From: Conner, Neil To: 'Toal, Dave' Sent: 5/10/01 7:12 PM Subject: RE: ndmpd errors Deleted all my snapshots (didn't have to reboot the filer) and same thing happened... Neil

1 0

Re: EMC IP4700 vs NetApp F740
by Chris_Van_Genderen＠NexFlash.com 10 May '01

10 May '01

Barry, I just re-read my message, and I meant to say that the performance figures for the EMC were pretty dreadful in your experiment. Sorry about the confusion. Regarding EMC's response with running multiple threads. That seems to imply that they are running a significant amount of overhead/operation, and that their system needs to run parallel processes internally to overcome that overhead. To apply this statement to our situation, it sounds like the bandwidth to any one machine may be limited to 40-50Mbits/s read and 20-25Mbits/s write. However, when multiple machines are using the network, the EMC box will probably scale quite nicely. Chris Van Genderen Software Engineer & Applications Manager NexFlash Technologies, Inc. chris_van_genderen(a)nexflash.com 408-969-4714 Barry Lustig <barry(a)lustig.com> To: Chris_Van_Genderen(a)NexFlash.com Sent by: cc: toasters(a)mathworks.com, (bcc: Chris Van Genderen/Santa barry(a)proxy.internal.i Clara/ISSIHQ) ssiusa.com Subject: Re: EMC IP4700 vs NetApp F740 05/10/01 12:02 PM Chris_Van_Genderen(a)NexFlash.com wrote: > > When did you perform your evaluation of the IP4700? Last week. > > On the F85 performance figures, the performance you are quoting seems > pretty bad. Is there an unusually small block size in your application, or > another reason you can account for such a difference? 95Mbits/sec throughput on a 100Mbits/sec connection is extremely good. It is running near the max rate of the connection. The 95Mbits was the data rate. That excludes the packet's header overhead. I'll have to check with the engineer who did the actual testing to find out what block sizes he was using. > > What was EMC's response regarding performance when you showed them your > data? They said that we should run multiple threads. The aggregate bandwidth abilities of the box could keep the links saturated, but the single threaded reads and writes ran into the limitations that I've mentioned. In our application, we need for the single thread to be able to read and write and high speed. We have a single data stream coming in off of a device that has to be written to the filer. barry > > Chris Van Genderen > Software Engineer & Applications Manager > NexFlash Technologies, Inc. > chris_van_genderen(a)nexflash.com > 408-969-4714

1 0

RE: ndmpd errors
by Toal, Dave 10 May '01

10 May '01

Neil, Any busy snapshots? -----Original Message----- From: Conner, Neil To: Toasters (E-mail) Sent: 5/10/01 6:26 PM Subject: ndmpd errors We just installed a second F740 and configured it for clustering. Both filers are running 6.0.1.R3. The original F740 has a tape library attached via SCSI and backups run fine on it using Veritas netbackup 3.4 patch 559 on Solaris 8. I'm trying to do a three-way backup of the new filer. On the master server, I set up authentication with "set_ndmp_auth" and I've verified that the master can connect to the new filer. When I run a backup of /vol/vol0, Veritas aborts with Error 99. The All Logs entry shows: 5/10/2001 3:05:33 PM squid tempest Warning WRN - Cannot backup filepath /vol/vol0, NDMP_HALT_INTERNAL_ERROR occurred (path may not exist), skipping The filer reports the following messages in syslog: Thu May 10 15:06:04 PDT [tempest: Java Thread:warning]: Ndmpd10: Top level IOException Thu May 10 15:06:04 PDT [tempest: Java Thread:warning]: Ndmpd10: IO exception: Socket closed. This is the output from ndmpd probe session: ndmpd ON. Session: 10 isActive: TRUE protocol version: 2 effHost: Local authorized: TRUE client addr: 134.89.10.149:41047 spt.device_id: none spt.ha: -1 spt.scsi_id: -1 spt.scsi_lun: -1 tape.device: not open tape.mode: Read only mover.state: Idle mover.mode: Read mover.pauseReason N/A mover.haltReason N/A mover.recordSize: 0 mover.recordNum: 0 mover.dataWritten: 0 mover.seekPosition: 0 mover.bytesLeftToRead: 0 mover.windowOffset: -1 mover.windowLength: -1 mover.position: 0 mover.connect.addr_type:LOCAL data.operation: None data.state: Idle data.haltReason: N/A data.connect.addr_type: LOCAL data.bytesProcessed: 0 Anybody see the problem? Neil

1 0

ndmpd errors
by Conner, Neil 10 May '01

10 May '01

We just installed a second F740 and configured it for clustering. Both filers are running 6.0.1.R3. The original F740 has a tape library attached via SCSI and backups run fine on it using Veritas netbackup 3.4 patch 559 on Solaris 8. I'm trying to do a three-way backup of the new filer. On the master server, I set up authentication with "set_ndmp_auth" and I've verified that the master can connect to the new filer. When I run a backup of /vol/vol0, Veritas aborts with Error 99. The All Logs entry shows: 5/10/2001 3:05:33 PM squid tempest Warning WRN - Cannot backup filepath /vol/vol0, NDMP_HALT_INTERNAL_ERROR occurred (path may not exist), skipping The filer reports the following messages in syslog: Thu May 10 15:06:04 PDT [tempest: Java Thread:warning]: Ndmpd10: Top level IOException Thu May 10 15:06:04 PDT [tempest: Java Thread:warning]: Ndmpd10: IO exception: Socket closed. This is the output from ndmpd probe session: ndmpd ON. Session: 10 isActive: TRUE protocol version: 2 effHost: Local authorized: TRUE client addr: 134.89.10.149:41047 spt.device_id: none spt.ha: -1 spt.scsi_id: -1 spt.scsi_lun: -1 tape.device: not open tape.mode: Read only mover.state: Idle mover.mode: Read mover.pauseReason N/A mover.haltReason N/A mover.recordSize: 0 mover.recordNum: 0 mover.dataWritten: 0 mover.seekPosition: 0 mover.bytesLeftToRead: 0 mover.windowOffset: -1 mover.windowLength: -1 mover.position: 0 mover.connect.addr_type:LOCAL data.operation: None data.state: Idle data.haltReason: N/A data.connect.addr_type: LOCAL data.bytesProcessed: 0 Anybody see the problem? Neil

1 0

Jump to page:

2026

2025

2024

2023

2022

2021

2020

2019

2018

2017

2016

2015

2014

2013

2012

2011

2010

2009

2008

2007

2006

2005

2004

2003

2002

2001

2000

1999

1998

1997

toasters