Uncategorized

EMC Isilon OneFS 7.2.1 is available!

By   |  

EMC Isilon OneFS 7.2.1 release has some great new and updated features that provide benefits on both the hardware and software side, including:

  • Security Technical Implementation Guide (STIG) configuration support
  • FIPS OpenSSL support
  • CAC/PIV authentication
  • Enhanced IPv6 support
  • Enhanced Swift support
  • Global namespace acceleration and L3 cache interaction
  • New node and SSD class compatibility support

In addition, the upgrade requirements for OneFS 7.2.1 differ from previous releases. This post highlights some of the new capabilities and upgrade requirements.

For more technical information about all of the new OneFS 7.2.1 features and enhancements, refer to the following documents:

New features

The following new features are included in OneFS 7.2.1.

Hardened profiles: Security Technical Implementation Guide (STIG)

If your site requires compliance with the Defense Information Systems Agency (DISA) STIG configuration standards, you’re in luck! OneFS 7.2.1 introduces a license-based security hardening feature through which you can apply and revert a hardening policy on the EMC Isilon cluster to meet DISA STIG configuration standards.

Networking:  enhanced IPv6 support

You can configure your cluster to accept client connections through both IPv4 and IPv6. OneFS adds dual-stack support to enable your cluster to support IPv4 and IPv6 client connections concurrently. And, OneFS 7.2.1 also supports IPv6-only environments.

Note that HDFS, InsightIQ 3.1 and earlier, MMC, NIS, and Swift are not supported over IPv6.

OneFS API: enhanced Swift support

Isilon Swift is now supported with the HTTP and secure HTTP (HTTPS) protocols over IPv4.

Isilon Swift supports the HTTP protocol with IPv6, but does not support HTTPS with IPv6. Isilon Swift also supports the HTTP protocol with IPv4 if STIG hardening is disabled.

File system: Global namespace acceleration (GNA) and L3 cache interaction

OneFS 7.2.1 includes some changes to how storage space calculations work when GNA and L3 cache are both enabled in the same cluster.

In OneFS, you can use solid-state drives (SSDs) for strategies such as GNA mirroring or for L3 cache. GNA mirroring enables data on node pools that do not have SSDs to have additional metadata mirrors on SSDs elsewhere in the cluster. The additional SSD metadata mirroring can improve file system performance by accelerating metadata read operations.

In OneFS 7.2.1, GNA requires that at least 20 percent of the nodes in the cluster contain at least one SSD, and that at least 1.5 percent of the total cluster storage is SSD-based. Any SSDs that are used for L3 cache are not counted against the GNA requirements: with GNA enabled and with L3 cache configured for a pool, the nodes in the pool with L3 cache configured become invisible to the GNA calculations. This change helps to ensure equitable and fair calculations when L3 cache and GNA are enabled in the same cluster.  For more information, see the OneFS 7.2.1 Release Notes and the OneFS 7.2.1 CLI Administration Guide.

Hardware: Node class compatibility

You can deploy a newer-generation node to a cluster that contains nodes from an earlier generation of the same class. For example, if your cluster already has a node pool that consists of Isilon X200 nodes, you can define a compatibility that enables you to add an X210 node to the same node pool. OneFS 7.2.1 supports compatibilities for S200/S210, X200/X210, X400/X410, and NL400/NL410 nodes. Compatible node generations must have identical HDD and SSD layouts and must have a compatible memory configuration. See the OneFS 7.2.1 Release Notes for details.

SSD compatibility

SSD compatibility enables you to add nodes with different capacity SSDs to the same node pool. For example, if your cluster has a node pool that consists of Isilon S200 nodes with 100 GB SSDs and you purchase new S200 nodes with 200 GB SSDs, you can create an SSD compatibility so that the new S200 nodes can be provisioned into the existing S200 node pool. For nodes of different generations—for example, S200 and S210 nodes – you might have to create a node class compatibility and an SSD compatibility to enable the S210 nodes to be provisioned into an S200 node pool.

Support for new platforms

OneFS 7.2.1 provides support for two new platforms: the X210 and the NL410. These nodes support node class compatibility. X210 nodes can be added to existing X200 node pools, and NL410 nodes can be added to existing NL400 node pools.

How to upgrade to OneFS 7.2.1

You can upgrade directly to OneFS 7.2.1 only from OneFS 7.1.1.4 or later, or from OneFS 7.2.0.2 or later. For more information, see Upgrade Paths to OneFS 7.2.1.0.

If you want to upgrade to this new release, explore your upgrade options by reviewing the Isilon Supportability and Compatibility Guide. Then, prepare for the upgrade process by reviewing the following documents:

When you’re ready to upgrade, download the OneFS 7.2.1.0 installation file from the Download section of the EMC Online Support site.

About the Author: Risa Galant