Comments on: NetApp autosupport rocks

by: rajeev

Wed, 22 Feb 2006 03:15:21 +0000

many a time, a disk would fail on a sat evening, while the admin is busy catching up on his favorite sci-fi show (or whatever it is the admins do on Sat night). Come Mon 8 am, the admin walks into the door to find out a replacement disk sitting outside his office door. It is goodness all over.

-nuff said.

by: mark

Thu, 26 Jan 2006 17:38:04 +0000

That’s a good point, Ben. And sysadmins are probably more conditioned than most when it comes to fearing software that “phones home”, which might explain why someone could react negatively to autosupport.

There will certainly be customers that don’t want their filers contacting NetApp, for any number of reasons. You can get the filer to email you when a problem happens but not contact NetApp HQ, of course. So “autosupport” doesn’t have to be all or nothing. Which is good. But I’m pretty sure that by default it will send autosupport messages back to NetApp tech support.

One thing to keep in mind is that these are fairly expensive storage systems with support contracts to keep them running. So the customers are paying for this service, and I can’t imagine the whole autosupport thing wouldn’t have been made crystal clear during the sales process. It’s usually front and centre in the sales pitch. It’s also very typical that first time customers have the local SE sent over to help them with the install, and that always includes going over autosupport, initiating a test autosupport and seeing what it transmits, etc. At least, that’s been my experience in both Toronto and Vancouver.

But I’m sure it’s still possible that autosupport takes someone by surprise. I honestly have no idea if the potential privacy implications are layed out in the quick start guide, or at all. When we get our next filer I’ll take a look and see what’s explained and what’s not.

by: Ben Eng

Wed, 25 Jan 2006 01:35:34 +0000

Customers are so afraid of their software phoning home to enforce digital rights management, software license agreements, or reporting usage statistics. Of course, there are privacy concerns. auto-support seems to provide such a huge benefit that it overshadows any privacy concerns. Just noting a difference in perception.

by: jbctech’s web log

Tue, 24 Jan 2006 20:56:25 +0000

[…] The support team takes autosupports very seriously, and Mark’s article is a perfect example. I encourage you to read his article here, but basically the idea is this: Mark added a new disk shelf to an existing filer. When he added the new disks, the filer noticed that the disks were previously in another aggregate and immediately marked the aggregate as offline to preserve data. It then generated an error to inform the admin that the disks are offline. Well, it sent out a few emails, and also submitted a trouble ticket with NetApp Global Support (NGS). He received a call within EIGHT minutes from NGS and they were ready to walk him through the process to “online” his newly added disks. NGS also received information that a firmware update failed, and they were ready to ship him a new part. It’s just another example of NetApp striving to be “Fast, Simple, and Reliable.” […]

by: Doug Frith

Tue, 24 Jan 2006 13:59:08 +0000

Yeah, autosupport is unique and can be implemented in a secure fashion (or turned off it that turns your crank). Being in a highly hostile ISP/telco environment for 10 years (starting with the F3XX line) I can speak from experience that it has saved my butt several times. Even basic “sent me an email when stuff happens” functionality built right in without having to dedicate a managment box (running pricey software, you know who you are) rocks.

Cheers

by: mark

Tue, 24 Jan 2006 07:23:41 +0000

Note to the guy who emailed me anonymously saying, amongst other name calling, “netapp is for retards. a box will never be smarter than me. and making you hook the filer up to the net is inherantly [sic] insecure.”:

Either you’re a moron, or you didn’t read my post. The point is that a HUMAN looked over the error report and called me, another HUMAN, to make sure everything was a-ok. The post was titled “autosupport rocks”, not “netapp self-healing rocks”. Got it? Secondly, the filer doesn’t refuse to bloody boot if it can’t generate an autosupport call. In fact, aside from just firewalling it off (you do use network access lists, don’t you Mr. Secure?) you can actually TURN AUTOSUPPORT OFF. Imagine!