On August 17, the Fix Level Recommendation Tool (FLRT) greatly expanded the supported products list to more than 1,200 IBM software products. FLRT now supports Software Group products running on AIX, IBM i, Linux on POWER, z/OS, Linux, Mac OS, UNIX and Windows. FLRT provides cross-product compatibility information and fix recommendations on IBM products. FLRT can be useful when you are planning to upgrade key components or you want to verify the current health of a system. www-304.ibm.com/webapp/set2/flrt/

While setting up Ganglia in our own lab, I created an AIX LPAR for the ganglia server. AIX Version 7.1 0.5 Power 7 CPUs virtualized as two CPUs 1GB RAM Modest resources, at best, and I was hopeful it would be sufficient for my needs.   After having it up and running with: Ganglia Client (reporting its own characteristics) Ganglia Server Ganglia Web Agent NFS Server A persisting 10MB/second file copy job across NFS CPU charts indicated to me that I had over-powered the LPAR by well over 100.0%. I used Dynamic LPAR tools to decrease CPU core to 0.2 Power 7 CPUs, while keeping the resource virtualized as two CPUs to the operating system. Looking five minutes later at charts I realized that this was a well-done trimback of resources, and the system w...

Ganglia, an open source monitoring solution, can be used to easily monitor many large AIX High Performance Computing (HPC) clusters and a group of logical partitions (LPARs) on a single machine. Summary of Ganglia capabilities: Monitor many large AIX clusters to monitor performance across large clusters of machines. Data is displayed graphically on a website, includes configuration and performance statistics. Monitor a group of logical partitions (LPARs) on a single machine - these just look like a cluster to Ganglia. Not just limited to AIX, which makes it useful to heterogeneous datacenters. Ganglia Graphs and How To Ganglia Home Website Ganglia for AIX and Linux on POWER Binaries Contact thinkASG for assistance with installing and configuring the Ganglia monitor...

With SMT, the number of CPUs can get cumbersome with AIX and performance monitoring tools. I found this interesting article from DeveloperWorks that discusses getting less data but more useful information from NMON:   https://www.ibm.com/developerworks/mydeveloperworks/blogs/aixpert/entry/nmon_i_can_t_see_all_the_cpus_on_screen_please_help1?lang=en   Are you still a little confused with SMT and how/if it can help you? If so this Infocenter article does a great job of discussing SMT basics. http://publib.boulder.ibm.com/infocenter/aix/v7r1/index.jsp?topic=/com.ibm.aix.genprogc/doc/genprogc/smt.htm

IBM Global Services offers PM for AIX, and has had this offering for decades (Performance Monitoring for AIX remote service).   The purpose of this offering is to collect local AIX stats, and send the information to IBM. It is analysed and performance graphs and reports are generated on an IBM web server for customers to review and take actions.   The down side is the per AIX charge which can add up to lots of money and some customers not liking data being sent off site.   The PM software package was never part of the default AIX install. Until now....... These packages are now included by default in AIX installations.   The service gets switched on, without asking, when you install AIX 6.1 TL06 SP3 or AIX 7.1 TL00 SP2.   You next get ...

IBM has identified a problem with HMC release 7.7.3 interacting in customer environments.   Due to some differences in code, customers are experiencing problems when:   Two HMCs are attached to a system One is upgraded to 7.7.3, one remains downlevel Firmware is next upgraded on one or more managed systems to the 730 family of code Finally a Live partition mobility move is done   Admittedly this is a rare event for all of these things to happen exactly as it's listed here, but it has happened.   At this moment, only the Power 795 has compelling issues driving an upgrade to the 730 family of microcode. If you don't have a 795, you are probably not worrying about the HMC upgrade immediately.   The root cause is the change of the l...

Hot Off The Press: Next Generation IBM XIV Storage System Improves Efficiency for Demanding Application Workloads.   XiV Gen3 uses a patented grid architecture to process high-transaction-type workloads, features several hardware improvements, plus a revamped user interface, multi-system monitoring, and improved replication.  Check out the article here.  

July 13, 2011 thinkASG shows off its completely revamped (BPIC) Business partner Innovation Center.   Yesterday was a fantastic event for thinkASG customers, prospects and local IBM teams to come and see our “Solutions” oriented thinkASG BPIC. With a complete refresh of technologies too numerous to mention, we devoted yesterday to highlight our latest IBM Storage focused solutions.   The day kicked off at 10AM with thinkASG customers and prospects eager to see live demonstrations of Storage Virtualization and Data Protection solutions. From 10 a.m. to 11:30 a.m. demonstrations of IBM’s Storwize V7000 kicked off the event. Demonstrating its ease of use, configuration and its rich standard feature set. We showed how easy it is to set up and virtualize other storag...

Storwize V7000, Real-Time Compression (RTC), ProtecTIER..the thinkASG Business Partner Innovation Center (BPIC) is going thru another technology update. Our team is diligently working to make sure that the latest and greatest IBM server and storage technologies are available for our valued client partners. We've recast our datacenter to the IBM 2011 IBM BPIC standards including POWER7, EX5 and Bladecenter enhancements as well as the aforementioned storage management additions. As always, the facility will be available for demonstration, testing, proof of concept and post project skills transfer...not to mention the opportunity for camaraderie with the thinkASG Professional Services Organization (PSO) experts and your personal account team. We thought you might enjoy seeing the p...

June 20, 2010, thinkASG was honored to have the opportunity to sponsor a hole at the SDSU Aztec Invitational Fundraiser at Bernardo Heights Country Club. Golf participants included Aztec legends, current coaches, student-athletes and other fellow sponsors. Among the list of attendees were SDSU greats Michael Cage, Kevin O'Connell, Jim Allison, Jeff Staggs and Gary Garrison. Aztec coaches Ryan Donovan, Steve Fisher and Tony Gwynn also attended along with Athletics Director Jim Sterk and student-athletes from the 19 teams at San Diego State. thinkASG enjoys the opportunity to play a role in the communities in which our own team members live and do business. All of the proceeds for this event benefited SDSU student-athlete scholarships. It is a fantastic opportunity for us to support...