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White Paper

EMC Solutions Group (ESG)

Abstract

This white paper explains the benefits of migrating only SAP Application Server Instances from Unix servers to VMware ESXi™ servers as a low-risk step toward cloud computing. The paper describes an SAP application server migration solution, tested and validated in an EMC® Solutions laboratory, within the context of professional services offered by EMC Global Services.

April 2012

EMC TRANSFORMS IT FOR SAP

SAP APPLICATION SERVER MIGRATION TO ACCELERATE YOUR JOURNEY TO THE CLOUD VMware vSphere 5.0, EMC Symmetrix VMAX, and Enterprise Linux

• Reduce your TCO

• Respond faster to business demands

• Minimize business risk when updating your SAP infrastructure

EMC TRANSFORMS IT FOR SAP SAP Application Server Migration to Accelerate Your Journey to the Cloud

VMware vSphere 5.0, EMC Symmetrix VMAX, and Enterprise Linux

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Copyright © 2012 EMC Corporation. All Rights Reserved.

EMC believes the information in this publication is accurate as of its publication date. The information is subject to change without notice.

The information in this publication is provided “as is.” EMC Corporation makes no representations or warranties of any kind with respect to the information in this publication, and specifically disclaims implied warranties of merchantability or fitness for a particular purpose.

All performance data contained in this report was obtained in a rigorously controlled environment. Results obtained in other operating environments may vary significantly. EMC Corporation does not warrant or represent that a user can or will achieve similar performance.

Use, copying, and distribution of any EMC software described in this publication requires an applicable software license.

For the most up-to-date listing of EMC product names, see EMC Corporation Trademarks on EMC.com.

VMware, ESX, VMware vCenter, and VMware vSphere are registered trademarks or trademarks of VMware, Inc. in the United States and/or other jurisdictions.

All trademarks used herein are the property of their respective owners.

Part Number H8982.1

3 EMC TRANSFORMS IT FOR SAP SAP Application Server Migration to Accelerate Your Journey to the Cloud


Table of contents

Executive summary ................................................................................................................................ 5 Business case .................................................................................................................................. 5 Technology solution ......................................................................................................................... 5 TCO benefits .................................................................................................................................... 5 Key results ....................................................................................................................................... 7 EMC Global Services for SAP virtualization ....................................................................................... 7

Introduction ......................................................................................................................................... 8 Organization of this paper ................................................................................................................ 8 Purpose ........................................................................................................................................... 9 Scope .............................................................................................................................................. 9 Audience ......................................................................................................................................... 9 Terminology ................................................................................................................................... 10

Technology components ..................................................................................................................... 11 Environment comparison ............................................................................................................... 11 Alternative components are possible ............................................................................................. 11 EMC Symmetrix VMAX storage ........................................................................................................ 12 Unix operating system and servers ................................................................................................. 13 Linux operating system and x86-based commodity servers ............................................................ 13 SAP ERP and NetWeaver ................................................................................................................. 13 Oracle Enterprise database ............................................................................................................ 14 VMware vSphere 5 virtualization software ...................................................................................... 14 VMware vSphere ESXi .................................................................................................................... 14 VMware vCenter Server .................................................................................................................. 15 vSphere clients .............................................................................................................................. 15

Solution architecture and design......................................................................................................... 16 Architecture: “Before” environment ............................................................................................... 16 Hardware and software: “Before” environment .............................................................................. 17 Architecture: “After” environment .................................................................................................. 18 Hardware and software: “After” environment ................................................................................. 19

Unix-only environment configuration ................................................................................................. 20 Hardware and software compatibility ............................................................................................. 20 Sizing ............................................................................................................................................. 20 Storage .......................................................................................................................................... 20 Network ......................................................................................................................................... 22 Servers .......................................................................................................................................... 22 OS and applications ....................................................................................................................... 22



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Virtualized environment configuration ................................................................................................24 About SUSE Linux Enterprise Server for SAP Applications ............................................................... 24 Hardware and software compatibility ............................................................................................. 24 Sizing ............................................................................................................................................. 25 About infrastructure service virtualization ...................................................................................... 25 About storage service virtualization ............................................................................................... 26 Storage services............................................................................................................................. 28 Network services ............................................................................................................................ 29 Compute services .......................................................................................................................... 31 Management services .................................................................................................................... 34 Application services ....................................................................................................................... 35 VMware virtual machines ............................................................................................................... 36

Non-disruptive migration of SAP users to virtual SAP application servers .......................................... 39 Migration process overview ............................................................................................................ 40 Migration process details ............................................................................................................... 40

Using a VM template to accelerate the deployment of additional virtual SAP application servers ....... 44 Deployment procedure ................................................................................................................... 44

SAP application server deployment duration comparison ................................................................... 45

Workload validation ........................................................................................................................... 46 Validation tools and approach ....................................................................................................... 46 SD Benchmark configuration .......................................................................................................... 46 The benchmark run ........................................................................................................................ 46 About benchmark and performance results .................................................................................... 47 Workload testing environments ..................................................................................................... 47 Workload testing results ................................................................................................................ 48 Key results ..................................................................................................................................... 48 CPU utilization ............................................................................................................................... 48 Number of dialog steps comparison ............................................................................................... 48 Average dialog response time comparison ..................................................................................... 49 Total response time comparison .................................................................................................... 49

Migration of a live VM under workload ................................................................................................ 50

Conclusion .......................................................................................................................................... 51 Key results ..................................................................................................................................... 51 EMC Global Services for SAP virtualization ..................................................................................... 51

References .......................................................................................................................................... 52



Executive summary

Large, Unix-based IT landscapes are well-suited for the demanding needs of mission-critical applications such as SAP. These Unix environments are stable, scalable, and highly available. Unfortunately, they are also very expensive from both an operational and capital expenditure perspective.

Today’s enterprises face massive pressures on IT costs, growing user expectations for agility, user-friendliness, and innovation. Cloud computing is radically changing the world of IT by meeting these needs. Cloud computing represents a significant shift, altering forever the way in which IT is designed, consumed and managed across data centers, applications and end-user access points. EMC delivers cloud solutions in this fashion—simplifying and automating IT services to help customers not only reduce costs, but also transform IT into a strategic asset that yields business and competitive value.

Virtualization is the first step toward transforming your IT infrastructure for SAP to cloud computing. Over the course of the past decade, there have been huge advances in commodity x86 64-bit processors and VMware® hypervisor functionality, especially now with the new release of VMware vSphere™ 5.0.

EMC can provide the benefits of large Unix platforms on a cost-effective, VMware virtual Linux platform. Hundreds of SAP accounts have already migrated from Unix servers to x86 servers on a VMware vSphere virtualized platform. These accounts have realized reduced CAPEX (server consolidation) and reduced OPEX (fewer resources needed to manage the landscape). This reduction in capital and operating expenses occurs while improving IT service delivery and using non-proprietary operating systems and hardware, breaking free from the preconfigured, limited options currently available in the market.

Even though updating the SAP infrastructure that supports your business functions may appear risky, EMC Global Services can seamlessly migrate your tier-1 ERP SAP application servers to VMware without touching your central server infrastructure. No fundamental changes are needed. EMC leverages SAP functionality that dynamically moves your business users from rigid and costly servers to flexible and cost-effective virtual servers with no downtime. Business users will log in to the new, virtual servers and notice little difference except for improved performance. Your existing SAP servers will remain available until all users and IT personnel are satisfied that the new virtual infrastructure meets or exceeds their expectations. This adds up to a low-risk step toward a reduced total cost of ownership (TCO) and improved system performance.

Because every customer starts at a different point with different cost structures and with different consolidation and virtualization opportunities, the potential savings of virtualizing your SAP infrastructure can seem difficult to quantify. This solution provides significant TCO benefits, your technical staff becomes familiar with VMware virtualization and Linux technologies, and you get closer to realizing the benefits of cloud computing.

Business case

Technology solution

TCO benefits



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Example VMware TCO benefit study

A VMware study shows the reduction in TCO following a migration to VMware for three SAP accounts in different industries. A summary is shown in Table 1 and more detail is provided in the document TCO and ROI Analysis of SAP Landscapes using VMware Technology available at http://www.vmware.com/files/pdf/partners/sap/SAP_TCOROI_Customers_Final.pdf

A condensed version is available at http://docs.media.bitpipe.com/io_2x/io_23424/item_352608/SAP_SAP%20Insider%20Article_TCO-ROI%20Analysis%20of%20SAP%20Landscapes%20using%20VMware%20Technology.pdf

Table 1. TCO savings with VMware virtualization

VMware offers a TCO / ROI Calculator, available at http://roitco.vmware.com/vmw/, which can be used to easily profile your unique savings and provide a detailed PowerPoint presentation using your actual expense numbers. The tool provides a simple guide and the ability to configure as much or as little detail as you desire, breaking down the CAPEX, OPEX, and miscellaneous expenses, to show estimated potential savings with a virtualized infrastructure. Use the tool on your own or with the help of EMC to make the case to move some or all of your SAP infrastructure to a platform that performs and scales better at a cost that will reduce your TCO.

A sample page from the VMware ROI TCO Calculator guide is presented in Figure 1:

Figure 1. TCO savings and ROI after migrating an SAP landscape to VMware virtualization

http://www.vmware.com/files/pdf/partners/sap/SAP_TCOROI_Customers_Final.pdf�

http://docs.media.bitpipe.com/io_2x/io_23424/item_352608/SAP_SAP%20Insider%20Article_TCO-ROI%20Analysis%20of%20SAP%20Landscapes%20using%20VMware%20Technology.pdf�


http://roitco.vmware.com/vmw/�



90% reduction in time required to deploy new SAP application servers

Solution validation showed that new Linux-based virtual SAP application servers can be provisioned and deployed in hours instead of days when compared to typical Unix-based physical server deployments. This represents up to a 90% reduction in the time required to deploy these servers.

VMware vStorage APIs for Array Integration (VAAI) with VMAX storage provided hardware acceleration that reduced the time required to create a VM from a template, making the operation 5 times faster than without hardware acceleration.

Non-disruptive business user migration between platforms in minutes

SAP users were migrated to virtual SAP application servers with no downtime.

Relocation of live virtual SAP application servers under workload in seconds

Using VMware vMotion, a non-disruptive relocation of live virtual SAP application servers was performed in seconds between physical x86 servers.

Over 16% improved business process performance

The performance of existing systems was improved. SAP average dialog response time improved over 16% when using VMware vSphere virtual Linux-based SAP application servers running on x86 Intel-based servers.

EMC can implement a cost-effective virtualized platform for your SAP environment that delivers the same benefits as a large, Unix-based platform. The EMC service for virtualizing SAP starts with an assessment of your current SAP landscape and its performance. Next, we develop a virtualization strategy and a new landscape design. These are the first steps toward a reduced TCO and improved business processing performance. Finally, we implement a solution that reduces hardware in the datacenter, which leads to reductions in real estate, power, and cooling requirements and results in significantly lower IT costs. Refer to Top Ten Reasons Why EMC for VMware at http://www.emc.com/collateral/hardware/solution-overview/h7414-emc-vmware-t10.pdf

Why EMC Global Services?

EMC Global Services drives execution for its clients, including more than half of the Global Fortune 500 companies, to transform information into actionable strategies and tangible business results. EMC can assist you with all aspects of SAP deployment and management and help you achieve greater efficiency by virtualizing your SAP landscape. EMC has proven SAP experience and expertise that speeds project timelines and minimizes risks. 15,000 people strong, with worldwide expertise across organizations’ businesses, applications, and infrastructures, as well as deep industry understanding, EMC Global Services guides and delivers revolutionary thinking to help clients realize their ambitions in an information economy. To learn more, contact your EMC representative.

Key results

EMC Global Services for SAP virtualization

http://www.emc.com/collateral/hardware/solution-overview/h7414-emc-vmware-t10.pdf�



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Introduction This solution demonstrates the migration of SAP application servers from Unix servers to VMware Linux servers. The validation of the solution began with a “before” (Unix-only) environment and ended with an “after” (hybrid Unix/Linux, partially virtualized) environment. This paper describes both environments. Every effort is made to keep the distinctions between the two environments clear, and the organization of this document reflects this effort.

Technology components Briefly describes the major components of the validated solution. Descriptions include the roles of the components in the solution.

Solution architecture and design Describes the validated solution by providing details about both the “before” environment and the “after” environment. Includes topology diagrams and hardware and software lists.

Unix-only environment configuration Describes the configuration of the SAP environment with Unix SAP application servers—the “before” environment, which served as the starting point for the validation of this solution. Topics include hardware and software compatibility, sizing, and infrastructure components—storage, network, and servers.

Hybrid environment configuration Describes the configuration of the new SAP environment where virtualized SAP application servers replaced the Unix SAP application servers—the “after” environment. Topics include hardware and software compatibility, sizing, and infrastructure services—storage, network, compute, management, and application services.

Non-disruptive migration of SAP users to virtualized SAP application servers Describes how simulated SAP end users were non-disruptively migrated from Unix-based SAP application servers to VMware Linux-based SAP application servers.

Using a VM template to accelerate the deployment of additional virtual SAP application servers Describes how VMware VM templates can be leveraged to deploy additional virtual SAP application servers, quickly and easily, in a VMware virtualized environment.

SAP application server deployment duration comparison Presents a comparison of the estimated time to deploy three additional Unix-based SAP application servers in a typical SAP environment versus the estimated time to deploy three additional VMware Linux-based SAP application servers in a virtualized SAP environment where VMware SAP application servers already exist.

Workload validation Describes how a simulated SAP workload was run on both the Unix-only SAP environment and the hybrid Unix/virtual Linux SAP environment to compare performance. Includes a comparison of the workload test results.

Organization of this paper



Migration of a live VM under workload Describes how VMware vMotion technology was used in the hybrid environment to demonstrate the migration, under load, of a running virtual machine from one physical VMware ESXi server to another.

Conclusion Provides a concise summary of the paper’s content, including all key findings.

References Lists other white papers, product documents, specific SAP notes, and other sources of additional information or corroboration of practices used during the design, installation, configuration, and validation phases of the solution.

The purpose of this paper is to demonstrate that SAP customers can significantly reduce operational costs, while maintaining optimal performance and availability, by migrating current Unix-based SAP application servers to virtual x86 Linux-based application servers quickly and without downtime.

This paper also demonstrates that SAP customers can now deploy new SAP application servers, quickly and as needed, to meet ever-changing business demands.

The paper describes an SAP application server migration solution, tested and validated in an EMC Solutions laboratory, within the context of professional services offered by EMC Global Services.

To qualify and quantify this service, a typical SAP environment with, among other components, Unix-based SAP application servers was built in an EMC solutions laboratory. The Unix-based SAP application servers were then methodically replaced with Linux-based, virtual SAP application servers in a way that would be non-disruptive to SAP end-user processes. The new, Unix/VMware hybrid environment was then tested and all processes were documented. This paper represents the culmination of that effort.

The scope of this paper corresponds to the scope of the solution validation (build, test, and document) activities performed by EMC engineers in an EMC solutions laboratory. What was built and tested is described and, where possible, recommendations and guidelines are provided for professionals to design a similar solution. The concepts, instructions, procedures, recommendations, and guidelines presented in this document are thorough but not all-inclusive.

The target audience for this white paper is business executives, IT directors, and infrastructure architects and administrators who are responsible for their company’s SAP landscape. The target audience also includes professional services groups, system integration partners, and other EMC teams and partners tasked with deploying SAP systems in a customer environment. An understanding of SAP landscapes is beneficial. Familiarity with VMware virtualization concepts is also beneficial.

Purpose

Scope

Audience



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This paper includes the following terminology.

Table 2. Terminology

Term Definition

Datastore Represents a storage location for virtual machine files. A storage location can be a Virtual Machine File System (VMFS) volume, a directory on Network Attached Storage, or a local file system path. A datastore is platform-independent and host-independent. Datastores do not change when the virtual machines they contain are moved between hosts. The scope of a datastore is a datacenter; the datastore is uniquely named within the datacenter.

HA High availability

LUN In computer storage, a “logical unit number” is a number used to identify a logical unit, which is a device addressed by the SCSI protocol such as Fibre Channel or iSCSI. A LUN may be used with any device which supports read/write operations. It is most often used to refer to a logical disk as created on a SAN.

OLTP On-line transaction processing

SAP ABAP SAP Advanced Business Application Programming

SAP ERP SAP Enterprise Resource Planning

SAP IDES International Demonstration and Education System (IDES) represents a model international company with subsidiaries in several countries. IDES contains application data for various business scenarios that can be run in the system. The business processes in the IDES system are designed to reflect real-life business requirements and characteristics.

SAP SID SAP System Identifier

SAPS SAP Application Performance Standard (SAPS) is a hardware-independent unit of measurement that describes the performance of a system configuration in the SAP environment. It is derived from the Sales and Distribution (SD) benchmark, where 100 SAPS is defined as 2,000 fully business processed order line items per hour.

VAAI VMware vStorage APIs for Array Integration. Hardware acceleration functionality that enables the ESXi host to integrate with EMC VMAX and other EMC storage arrays to offload specific virtual machine and storage management operations to the storage hardware.

VM Virtual machine. A software implementation of a machine that executes programs as a physical machine does. In this paper, “virtual machine” and “VM” always refers to a VMware virtual machine.

VMDK Virtual machine disk. A file that encapsulates a hard disk image.

VMware VM template

A VMware VM template is a master image of a virtual machine that can be used to create new virtual machines. This image typically includes an operating system, applications, and configuration settings for the virtual machine. Templates are used to create new virtual machines faster based on know, tested configurations.

Terminology



Technology components This section briefly describes the major components that make up both the “before” (Unix-only) environment and the “after” (Unix/VMware hybrid) environment. Descriptions include the roles of the components in the solution.

Table 3 presents a high-level overview of the components in each environment (“before” and “after”), so that you can see, at a glance, which components remained the same and which components changed between the environments. Shaded rows highlight components that changed between the two environments.

Table 3. Comparison of components in “before” and “after” environments

Component Unix-only (“before”) Hybrid Unix/VMware (“after”)

EMC Symmetrix VMAX™ storage

Unix operating system and servers (server consolidation)

Linux operating system and x86-based servers (lower investment)

VMware vSphere 5 virtualization software (VMware vSphere ESXi, VMware vCenter Server, VMware Client)

(virtualization platform)

Oracle Enterprise

SAP ERP 6.0 and NetWeaver 7.01 The solution was validated with:

• IBM pSeries Unix servers running IBM AIX 5.3 TL 12 POWER System (64-bit)

• Cisco UCS C210 M2 Intel x-86 servers running VMware vSphere 5.0 with VMs running SUSE Linux Enterprise Server for SAP Applications 11 SP1 64-bit

• Oracle Database 11g Enterprise Edition Release 2 (64-bit) Different SAP-supported combinations of server hardware, operating systems, and databases are possible; however, you must make careful choices based on the interoperability of all components in your SAP landscape and verify the support of all components with SAP.

Environment comparison

Alternative components are possible



12

The EMC Symmetrix VMAX series is the latest generation of the Symmetrix® product line. Built on the strategy of simple, intelligent, modular storage, it incorporates a scalable fabric interconnect design that allows the storage array to seamlessly grow from an entry-level configuration into a large-scale enterprise storage system. Symmetrix VMAX arrays provide improved performance and scalability for demanding enterprise environments such as those found in large virtualization environments, while maintaining support for EMC's broad portfolio of platform software offerings.

Symmetrix VMAX systems deliver software capabilities that improve capacity use, ease of use, business continuity, and security. These features provide significant advantages for customer deployments in virtualized environments where ease of management and protection of virtual machine assets and data assets are required.

Built on the strategy of simple, intelligent, modular storage, the Symmetrix VMAX incorporates a highly-scalable Virtual Matrix Architecture that enables it to grow seamlessly and cost-effectively from an entry level configuration into the world’s largest storage system. The VMAX™ supports Enterprise Flash Drives (EFDs), Fibre Channel drives, and SATA drives within a single array, as well as an extensive range of RAID types.

The EMC Enginuity™ operating environment provides the intelligence that controls all components in a VMAX array. EMC Enginuity 5875 introduced Fully Automated Storage Tiering for Virtual Pools (FAST VP), which enables customers to improve efficiency and security, increase cost savings, and ensure predictable performance from their Symmetrix VMAX arrays.

The Symmetrix Management Console (SMC) is a powerful, browser-based interface that simplifies management of EMC Symmetrix storage, from device creation to advanced Symmetrix features such as FAST, FAST VP, Virtual Provisioning, Auto-Provisioning Groups, replication configuration, and monitoring.

Enhanced support for virtualization

VMware vStorage APIs for Array Integration (VAAI) enables storage administrators to maintain control of the infrastructure while managing virtual server storage and other applications sharing the same storage array. The hardware acceleration functionality enables the ESXi host to integrate with EMC VMAX and other EMC storage arrays to offload specific virtual machine and storage management operations to the storage hardware. With the storage hardware assistance, the host performs these operations faster and consumes less CPU, memory, and storage fabric bandwidth.

The servers can receive assistance with the following activities:

• Deploying virtual machines from templates

• Cloning virtual machines or templates

• VMFS clustered locking and metadata operations for virtual machine files

• Migrating virtual machines with Storage vMotion

• Writing to thin provisioned and thick virtual disks

EMC Symmetrix VMAX storage



In the 1980’s and 90’s, Unix was adopted as the platform for large-scale business computing, particularly on Solaris, HP-UX, and AIX. Large corporations were also standardizing on SAP as the business software of choice. The Unix platform has matured and grown in computing power and cost. The reality is that many SAP test and production systems are running on servers that are oversized for their needs, leaving large amounts of excess CPU and memory capacity, which often cannot be shared or redistributed easily to meet specific needs or demands. Upgrading or maintaining Unix systems tends to lock the customer in to individual vendors, and these systems might not be compatible with other applications in the enterprise. Customers in this situation can find that migrating some of these applications to Linux provides much lower TCO.

Linux comes with all the reliability and scalability provided by Unix servers at a reduced cost. Linux servers can run on a variety of hardware, including x86 hardware.

These are some of the advantages of converting Unix servers to Linux servers.1

• Linux is open source, allowing a clear and open technology road map. It runs on many hardware and processor combinations. Some of the common ones are x86, and RISC.

• Linux has all the capabilities of Unix servers. It is reliable, scalable, secure and capable of running mission-critical workloads, including database servers.

• Similarities with Unix simplify application migration and IT staff training.

• Large numbers of independent hardware vendors support Linux, including IBM, Cisco, Dell, HP, and Fujitsu. Linux is supported by a large number of software vendors such as SAP, Oracle, and IBM.

• Maintenance costs for the hardware are lower because of the support for multiple hardware vendors. This is combined with lower software maintenance costs. Hardware and software maintenance cost savings can be as great as 75% and more than 60%, respectively.

SAP Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) 6.0 Enhancement Package (EhP) 4 is a fully integrated solution that fulfills the core business needs of midsize and large organizations across all industries and market sectors. Powered by the SAP NetWeaver technology platform, SAP ERP 6.0 EhP4 helps enterprises to perform financial analysis, human capital management, procurement and logistics, product development and manufacturing, and sales and service. These functions support analysis, corporate services, and end-user service delivery. Together with SAP NetWeaver and a repository of enterprise services, SAP ERP 6.0 EhP4 is a solid business process platform that supports continued growth, innovation, and operational excellence.

1 Source: White Paper Make the Move from UNIX to Linux: Now is the Time http://www.novell.com/docrep/2007/06/4622060_f_en.pdf

Unix operating system and servers

Linux operating system and x86-based commodity servers

SAP ERP and NetWeaver

http://www.novell.com/docrep/2007/06/4622060_f_en.pdf�



14

Oracle is leading the market for databases supporting enterprise business applications such as the SAP Business Suite. This customer base gains a cost benefit from the two companies’ technologies in the long term and receives first-class database support from both Oracle and SAP. Both companies have a relationship at the technical level. In the latest version, Oracle Database 11g Release 2, innovative features maintain Oracle's reputation for performance, scalability, and optimal use of hardware resources for enterprise applications.

VMware vSphere is the industry-leading virtualization platform for building cloud infrastructures, which enables users to run business-critical applications with confidence and respond faster to their business.

vSphere accelerates the shift to cloud computing for existing datacenters and also delivers uncompromised control over all IT resources with the highest efficiency and choice in the industry. With VMware vSphere, you can manage IT resources like a shared utility and dynamically provision resources to different business units and projects.

VMware vSphere offers a set of distributed services including high availability, distributed resource scheduling, fault tolerance, recovery, and others. With a unique scale-out architecture, VMware vSphere provides workload balance, automatic resource sharing, and failover of servers in the same VMware cluster. VMware vSphere has a centralized management interface to manage all virtualized servers in the landscape.

VMware vSphere enables customers to quickly move live, virtualized SAP application servers between physical servers using VMware vMotion technology to protect information and support business continuity. The two core components of vSphere are VMware ESXi and VMware vCenter Server.

For more information, refer to the VMware white paper Top 10 Reasons Why VMware vSphere 5 is Years Ahead of the Competition at http://www.vmware.com/files/pdf/vmware-vsphere-top-10-reasons-ds-en.pdf

Also refer to the VMware brochure VMware vSphere: The Best Platform for Cloud Infrastructures at http://www.vmware.com/files/pdf/vsphere_enterprise_datasheet.pdf

For comprehensive information about VMware vSphere, refer to VMware vSphere documentation at http://www.vmware.com/support/pubs/vsphere-esxi-vcenter-server-pubs.html

VMware vSphere ESXi is the virtualization platform on which you create and run virtual machines. VMware vSphere ESXi is a "bare-metal" hypervisor installed directly on top of the physical server, which partitions the server into multiple virtual machines that can run simultaneously, sharing the physical resources of the underlying server.

VMware vSphere ESXi provides a robust, production-proven, high-performance virtualization layer that abstracts server hardware resources, allowing them to be shared by multiple virtual machines. Unique memory management, including memory compression and advanced scheduling capabilities of the vSphere host, provides the highest consolidation ratios and the best application performance.

Oracle Enterprise database

VMware vSphere 5 virtualization software

VMware vSphere ESXi

http://www.vmware.com/files/pdf/vmware-vsphere-top-10-reasons-ds-en.pdf�

http://www.vmware.com/files/pdf/vmware-vsphere-top-10-reasons-ds-en.pdf�

http://www.vmware.com/files/pdf/vsphere_enterprise_datasheet.pdf�

http://www.vmware.com/support/pubs/vsphere-esxi-vcenter-server-pubs.html�



VMware ESXi 5.0 has an ultra-thin architecture with less than 100 MB of code base disk footprint, and it delivers the industry-leading performance and scalability of ESX with several additional benefits:

• Improved reliability and security—With fewer lines of code and independence from the general-purpose OS, ESXi drastically reduces the risk of bugs or security vulnerabilities and makes it easier to secure your hypervisor layer.

• Streamlined deployment and configuration—With fewer configuration items, ESXi deployment and configuration is greatly simplified.

• Higher management efficiency—You can automate routine tasks by leveraging remote command line scripting environments such as vCLI or PowerCLI.

• Simplified hypervisor patching and updating—Due to its smaller size and fewer components, ESXi requires far fewer patches, shortening service windows and reducing security vulnerabilities.

Enhanced features that benefit SAP environments In the vSphere 5.0 release, VMware added a new virtual hardware enhancement to ESXi. Virtual machine hardware version 8 includes the following new features for memory- and CPU-intensive workloads:

• 32 virtual CPUs—Enables you to run larger CPU-intensive workloads.

• 1 TB virtual machine RAM—Supports larger, memory-intensive workloads.

VMware vSphere ESXi 5.0 provides:

• 160 logical CPUs and 2,048 virtual CPUs per host—Enables you to create more VMs, often required in SAP environments, on a smaller number of physical servers.

• Up to 2 TB of RAM per host—Enables you to create a greater number of large SAP virtual machines on the same server.

For more information, refer to VMware vSphere 5.0 Configuration Maximums at http://www.vmware.com/pdf/vsphere5/r50/vsphere-50-configuration-maximums.pdf

VMware vCenter Server is the central point for configuring, provisioning, and managing virtualized IT environments. vCenter Server provides unified management for the entire virtual infrastructure and unlocks many key vSphere capabilities. vCenter Server is a service that acts as a central administrator for ESXi hosts that are connected on a network. vCenter Server allows you to pool and manage the resources of multiple hosts. vCenter Server provides many features that allow you to monitor and manage your physical and virtual infrastructure. Migration with vMotion enables a virtual machine that is powered on to be transferred from one ESXi host to another without shutting down the virtual machine.

Users can access the VMware vSphere datacenter through GUI clients such as the vSphere Client or the vSphere Web Client.

VMware vCenter Server

vSphere clients

http://www.vmware.com/pdf/vsphere5/r50/vsphere-50-configuration-maximums.pdf�



16

Solution architecture and design This section describes the validated solution by providing details about both the “before” (Unix-only) environment and the “after” (hybrid Unix/VMware) environment. Topology diagrams and hardware and software lists are presented.

Figure 2 illustrates the architecture of the “before” SAP environment built in the EMC Solutions laboratory. This environment represents a traditional SAP landscape, where all SAP servers reside on the same Unix platform.

Figure 2. Topology of SAP “before” environment with Unix-based SAP application servers

Architecture: “Before” environment



Table 4 lists the specific hardware and software resources used to build the “before” environment illustrated in Figure 2. The role of each resource is provided.

Table 4. Hardware and software resources of SAP “before” environment

Hardware Units Specifications Role

IBM pSeries servers 5 Unix p570

4-way, dual-core CPU

16 GB RAM

1 SAP Database Instance

1 SAP Central Instance

3 SAP Application Server Instances

EMC Symmetrix VMAX 1 64x 600 GB/15k FC drives

Enginuity 5875

Central storage

SAN switches 2 Cisco MDS 9513

8 Gb FC

SAN fabric

Network switches 4 Cisco Nexus 2000 and 5000 series Ethernet network

Software Units Version Installed on

IBM AIX 5 5.3 TL 12 (64-bit) SAP Database Instance

SAP Central Instance

SAP Application Server Instances

SAP ERP 1 6.0 EhP4 Core IDES Unicode All SAP instances

SAP NetWeaver 5 7.0 EhP 1 Unicode (64-bit) ABAP Stack

All SAP instances

Oracle Enterprise 5 11g R2 (64-bit) SAP Database Instance

SAP Central Instance

SAP Application Server (Dialog) Instances

Hardware and software: “Before” environment



18

Figure 3 illustrates the architecture of the hybrid Unix/VMware-based SAP environment built in the EMC Solutions laboratory. This environment represents a partially virtualized SAP landscape, where SAP application servers run in VMware virtual machines on x86 Intel-based servers.

Figure 3. Topology of SAP “after” environment with virtualized SAP application servers

Architecture: “After” environment



Table 5 lists the specific hardware and software resources used to build the hybrid Unix/VMware-based SAP landscape illustrated in Figure 3. The role of each resource is provided.

Table 5. Hardware and software resources of SAP “after” environment

Equipment Units Configuration Role

IBM pSeries servers 2 Unix p570

4-way, dual-core CPU

16 GB RAM

1 SAP Database Instance

1 SAP Central Instance

x86 Intel-based servers

2 Cisco UCS C210 M2

2-way, 6-core Westmere X5675

128 GB RAM

2 VMware ESXi 5.0 servers for SAP Application Server Instances

EMC Symmetrix VMAX 1 64x 600 GB/15k FC drives

Enginuity 5875

Central storage

SAN switches 2 Cisco MDS 9513 8 Gb FC SAN fabric

Network switches 4 Cisco Nexus 2000 and 5000 series

Ethernet network

Software Units Version Installed on

IBM AIX 2 5.3 TL 12 (64-bit) SAP Database Instance server

SAP Central Instance server

SAP ERP 1 6.0 EhP4 Core IDES Unicode All SAP instance servers (2 physical and 3 virtual)

SAP NetWeaver 5 7.0 EhP 1 Unicode (64-bit) ABAP Stack

All SAP instance servers (2 physical and 3 virtual)

Oracle Enterprise 5 11g R2 (64-bit) SAP Database Instance server

SAP Central Instance server

SAP Application Server Instance VMs (3)

VMware vSphere ESXi 3 5.0.0 build 474610 x86 Intel-based Cisco C210 M2 servers


1 5.0.0 build 455964 VMware vCenter VM

Microsoft Windows 1 2008 R2 Server Enterprise Edition (64-bit)

VMware vCenter VM

SUSE Linux Enterprise Server for SAP Applications

5 11 SP1 x86_64 (64-bit) All SAP Application Server Instance VMs

SAP Application Server Instance VMware template

Hardware and software: “After” environment



20

Unix-only environment configuration This section describes the configuration of the SAP environment with Unix SAP application servers—the “before” environment which served as the starting point for the validation of this solution. Topics include hardware and software compatibility, sizing, and infrastructure components—storage, network, and servers.

To create a realistic, typical SAN-based SAP infrastructure in which all SAP application servers ran on the same Unix platform, the interoperability of all required components was verified. The SAP Product Availability matrix, available from the SAP Support Portal at http://service.sap.com/pam, was used to verify SAP software compatibility. Five IBM pSeries 570 servers were used in the physical, non-partitioned environment.

SAP has established a sizing process with its hardware partners to determine the hardware requirements to implement an SAP system. The sizing process uses the Web-based QuickSizer tool, which calculates SAP requirements based on throughput numbers and the number of users working with the different SAP Business Suite components, in a hardware- and database-independent format.

After the results from the SAP QuickSizer are obtained, the SAP Competency Center for the selected hardware vendor offers assistance with customized sizing and architecture services. For more information, visit http://service.sap.com/sizing.

IBM pSeries 570 servers were used to represent typical Unix servers used in traditional Unix-based SAP environments.

Configuration principles

The storage environment was configured on EMC Symmetrix VMAX storage according to EMC best practices for configuring a Fibre Channel-based SAN.

LUNs were provisioned on centralized, shared storage to take advantage of the enhanced protection and performance provided by VMAX. The LUNs were attached to physical hosts by a Fibre Channel-based Storage Area Network (SAN).

Each server’s operating system was installed on the server’s pair of internal hard drives. SAP and Oracle file systems were created both locally and on shared VMAX LUNs.

Thick LUNs at the storage level were used. (Thin LUNs can be used instead, without compromising the required functionality.)

Hardware and software compatibility

Sizing

Storage

http://service.sap.com/pam�

http://service.sap.com/sizing�



SAP and Oracle storage layout

Table 6 shows the combined SAP and Oracle storage layout configured for the Unix-only environment.

Table 6. SAP and Oracle storage layout configured for the Unix-only environment

Mount point VG Prot. Type Size (GB)

/oracle/SEP/oraarch saparchvg RAID 5 64

/oracle/SEP/saptrace

/oracle/client oraclevg

RAID 5

32

/oracle/stage

/oracle/SEP/102_64

/sapmnt/SEP sapvg RAID 5

32

/usr/sap/SEP

/usr/sap/trans

/oracle/SEP/mirrlogA, B sapmirrlogvg RAID 1+0 32

/oracle/SEP/origlogA, B saporalogvg RAID 1+0 32

/oracle/SEP/sapdata1-6 sapdatavg RAID 5 6x 128

SAP kernel directory (sapmnt) location The SAP kernel directory (sapmnt) was shared from the SAP Central Instance to the SAP application servers. The sapmnt directory was mounted from the Unix server Central Instance to all SAP application servers, as shown in Table 7.

Table 7. SAP kernel directory (sapmnt) configuration

Mount point Exported from

Exported from the Unix SAP Central Instance server

Mounted to the Unix SAP Application Servers

Usage

/sapmnt/SEP/ CI /sapmnt/SEP/ /sapmnt/SEP/ Used to read the common SAP files



22

The Unix-only environment used both an Ethernet network and a SAN.

Ethernet network configuration

• Four VLANs were created at the physical switch level to isolate application traffic from management traffic. The Ethernet network configuration adhered to network security best practices.

• Each Unix server had a pair of Ethernet 1 Gbps Network Interface Cards (NICs) connected to the fabric extender switch for load balancing and redundancy. The NICs were physically segregated on multiple VLANs.

SAN configuration

• The SAN used a pair of highly available, scalable, and fully redundant fabric switches.

• The SAN configuration adhered to Cisco and EMC SAN best practices.

The Unix-only environment used five IBM p570 Unix servers. Each Unix server had a pair of Fibre Channel 8 Gbps Host Bus Adapters (HBAs) and a pair of Ethernet 1 Gbps NICs, of the same brand and model, connected to a virtual SAN provided by the fabric switches for load balance and redundancy.

The date/time for all Unix servers was set to match the date/time of the database server. This ensured proper synchronization between the SAP Central Instance and the SAP Application Server Instances.

The Unix-only environment used SAP ERP 6.0 Core Enhancement Pack (EhP) 4 IDES with SAP NetWeaver 7.0 EhP 1. A distributed SAP system “SEP” was installed and configured according to the SAP Installation Guide for SAP ERP 6.0 EHP 4 NetWeaver 7.01 ABAP Unicode. SEP consisted of one SAP Database Instance, one SAP Central Instance, and three SAP Application Server (also known as Dialog) Instances.

• The operating systems, Oracle software, SAP patches, parameters, Basis settings (housekeeping batch jobs, SAP buffers, extended memory, operation mode, load balancing, and so on) were installed and configured according to SAP procedures and guidelines provided in SAP installation documentation.

• SAP Update processes were configured only on the SAP Central Instance. Dialog, Batch, and Spool work processes were configured on the SAP Application Server Instances.

• Storage was provisioned on EMC Symmetrix VMAX according to SAP, Oracle, and EMC recommendations.

Network

Servers

OS and applications



Figure 4 shows the distributed SAP system deployed on five physical servers in the Unix-only environment.

Figure 4. Distributed SAP system deployed on five physical servers in the Unix-only environment



24

Virtualized environment configuration This section describes the configuration of the SAP environment with virtualized SAP application servers—the “after virtualization” environment. Topics include hardware and software compatibility, sizing, and infrastructure services—storage, network, compute, management, and application services.

SAP recommends and supports running SAP applications on SUSE Linux Enterprise Server for SAP Applications 11 SP 1. This Linux version provides the following SAP-specific benefits:

• Saves time through faster deployments with an automated, end-to-end installation workflow, including SAP application installation, which accelerates time to value

• Consistently delivers outstanding uptime and performance—even under full CPU loads and high memory stress. Includes high-availability components that enable SAP clustering solutions for physical and virtual Linux deployments

• Offers integrated priority support and maintenance from both SUSE Linux Enterprise Server for SAP Applications and SAP through your SAP Solution Manager

• Protects critical business operations with built-in business continuity

Cisco UCS C210 M2 (Intel x86) servers were chosen to virtualize the SAP Application Server Instances. These servers are compatible with the following operating system, SAP, database, and virtualization software:

• SUSE Linux Enterprise Server for SAP Applications 11 SP1—The version of the Linux operating system supported by SAP for use with SAP ERP 6.0 EHP4 and SAP NetWeaver 7.01 64-bit ABAP Stack Unicode and Oracle Enterprise 11g R2 64-bit

• VMware vSphere 5 virtualization software—VMware’s latest virtualization software platform

The Cisco UCS C210 M2 server is a general purpose, two-socket, two-rack unit (RU) rack-mount server that balances performance, density, and efficiency for intensive workloads. The server is an ideal application server, where multiple processor cores contribute directly to performance.

Other servers and Linux operating systems supported by SAP

SAP supports various combinations of server hardware and Linux operating systems. Using the following resources, EMC can work with you to choose x86 server hardware and Linux (guest OS) software compatible with your database and SAP software. The x86 servers that you select must be capable of running VMware vSphere ESXi 5.0. To check software compatibility with SAP, use the SAP Product Availability matrix. For hardware compatible with SAP, visit the SAP on Linux webpage on the SAP Development Network. For an overview of the VMware compatibility between software, hardware, guest OS, storage, and so on, refer to the VMware vSphere documentation at http://www.vmware.com/support/pubs/vsphere-esxi-vcenter-server-pubs.html.

About SUSE Linux Enterprise Server for SAP Applications

Hardware and software compatibility




SAP-specific sizing guidance

No changes to the QuickSizer process are needed for a virtualized system configuration—follow the same process when sizing for either a virtualized or a physical environment.

After obtaining the results of a QuickSizer project, work with the SAP Competency Center of your specific hardware vendor for sizing and architecture services.

For more information, visit http://service.sap.com/sizing.

VMware-specific sizing guidance

VMware and SAP work closely with the same hardware partners. Even though VMware can provide assistance with vSphere sizing, it is the hardware partner that delivers the official virtual sizing recommendations.

For more sizing considerations for virtualized environments, refer to the Sizing section in the SAP Solutions on VMware Best Practices Guide.

VMware vSphere 5 was used to virtualize the infrastructure services (storage, network, and compute) and application servers in the virtualized environment.

VMware vSphere aggregates the storage, network, and compute resources and presents a uniform set of elements to the infrastructure administrator. The administrator can manage IT resources as a shared utility and dynamically provision resources to different business units and projects.

VMware software stack

The VMware vSphere software stack is composed of virtualization, management, and interface layers, as shown in Figure 5.

Figure 5. VMware vSphere software stack

Sizing

About infrastructure service virtualization

http://service.sap.com/sizing�



26

Virtualization Layer

The virtualization layer of VMware vSphere includes infrastructure services and application services.

Infrastructure services Infrastructure services (storage, network, and compute services) abstract, aggregate, and allocate hardware resources.

• Compute services abstract underlying disparate server resources, aggregate these resources across multiple, discrete servers, and assign the resources to applications.

• Storage services enable the most efficient use and management of storage in virtual environments.

• Network services simplify and enhance networking in virtual environments.

Application services Application services are the set of services provided to ensure availability, security, and scalability for applications. Examples include vSphere High Availability and Fault Tolerance. In the virtualized environment, VMware High Availability was configured to protect the SAP application server virtual machines against physical hardware failures.

Management Layer

VMware vCenter Server is the central point for configuring, provisioning, and managing virtualized IT environments.

Interface Layer

Users can access the VMware vSphere datacenter through GUI clients such as the vSphere Client or the vSphere Web Client. Additionally, users can access the datacenter through client machines that use command-line interfaces and SDKs for automated management.

For further information about VMware virtualization concepts, refer to the VMware vSphere Basics Guide.

EMC Symmetrix VMAX storage provided storage services for the virtualized environment.

Hardware acceleration provided by vStorage APIs for Array Integration

Hardware acceleration transparently offloaded specific storage operations from the ESXi hosts to the VMAX array so that the hosts performed these operations faster and consumed less CPU, memory, and storage fabric bandwidth. For this solution, the benefits of this hardware acceleration included:

• Faster deployment of virtual machines from templates

• Faster cloning of virtual machines and templates

• Faster migration of virtual machines between datastores with Storage vMotion

About storage service virtualization



VMware vSphere storage service architecture

The VMware vSphere storage service architecture consists of layers of abstraction that hide the differences between, and manage the complexity of, physical storage subsystems.

To the applications and guest operating systems inside each virtual machine, the storage subsystem appears as a virtual SCSI controller connected to one or more virtual SCSI disks. The virtual SCSI disks are provisioned from datastore elements in the datacenter. A datastore acts as a storage appliance that delivers storage space for virtual machines across multiple physical hosts.

Datastore abstraction is a model that assigns storage space to virtual machines while insulating the guest from the complexity of the underlying physical storage technology. Each datastore is a physical VMFS volume on a storage device.

Figure 6 presents a conceptual illustration of the VMware vSphere storage service architecture.

For more information about vSphere storage services, refer to the VMware vSphere Storage Guide.

Figure 6. VMware vSphere storage service architecture



28

Configuration principles

The storage environment was configured according to the Best Practices for Fibre Channel presented in the VMware vSphere 5.0 Storage Guide.

• The LUNs were provisioned on centralized shared storage to take advantage of the enhanced protection and performance provided by EMC Symmetrix VMAX. The LUNs were attached to physical VMware ESXi 5.0 servers by a Fibre Channel-based Storage Area Network (SAN). The provisioned LUNs were presented (masked) to all ESXi servers

• The operating system of each virtual machine was installed on separate datastores created on separate LUNs provisioned, in advance, by a storage administrator from an EMC Symmetrix VMAX storage array.

• The virtual machine files were stored in the datastores created on the external, shared storage array to take advantage of VMware distributed services, vMotion, High Availability, and Distributed Resource Scheduling.

• Each Cisco server had a pair of dual-port, 8 Gbps HBAs, of the same brand and model, connected to the SAN fabric for load balancing and redundancy.

• For performance reasons, a predictive scheme was used to provision storage for the ESXi servers. LUNs were created with one datastore on each of them. Every VM and VMware template had its own datastore.

• Thick LUNs were used at the storage level. Eager zeroed2

Notes

disks were used at the VMware Virtual Disk level. (Thin LUNs at the storage level could have been used without compromising functionality.)

Even though it might be easier to present storage for the ESXi servers as one large datastore on one large LUN or meta-LUN, doing so might be detrimental to the scalability and performance characteristics of the environment, depending on the storage design and implementation.

The predictive scheme might add some overhead to the management of the virtual infrastructure, but the scheme improves the performance of VMware vSphere by providing multiple storage queues, which minimize response times. Up to 256 datastores/LUNs can be created for each ESXi server.

Whether to use thick or thin LUNs depends on the customer’s environment and specific requirements. Thin LUNs can be used at the storage level and thick LUNs can be used at the VMware Virtual Disk level.

For additional guidelines about storage services configuration, refer to the Hardware Storage Considerations section in the Performance Best Practices for VMware vSphere and the VMware vSphere 5.0 Storage Guide.

2 The concept of eager zeroed disks is described in the Performance Best Practices for VMware vSphere and the VMware vSphere 5.0 Storage Guide.

Storage services



Configuration details

Eight datastores, listed in Table 8, were created and configured.

Table 8. Datastore configuration

Datastore LUN RAID type Size (GB)

Created to support Software installed

slessap01

slessap02

slessap03

slessap04

slessap05

296

297

298

299

29A

RAID 5 (3+1) 100 New SAP Application Server instance VMs

Linux OS, VMware tools, Oracle client, SAP software for virtualized SAP Application Server instances

slessap00

slessap10

29C

29D

RAID 5 (3+1) 100 VMware template for deploying additional SAP Application Server instance VMs

Linux OS, VMware tools, Oracle client

vCenter_DS 2A6 RAID 5 (3+1) 200 VMware vCenter Server VM Windows OS, VMware tools, VMware vCenter Server software bundle

SAP_BenchDS 2A5 RAID 5(3+1) 200 SAP Standard SD Benchmark VM

SAP Standard SD Benchmark software

Shared_DS 29B RAID 5(3+1) 32 All VMs Common files including ESXi patches and ISO files

Notes SUSE Linux Enterprise Server for SAP Applications was installed on all VMs, except for the VMware vCenter Server VM on which Windows was installed. Each VM booted from its corresponding datastore. Each datastore resided on a separate, physical LUN at the storage level.

The virtualized environment used both an Ethernet network and a SAN similar to the Unix-only environment.

Ethernet network

VMware vSphere provides virtual networking elements similar to those found in a physical environment, including virtual network interface cards (virtual NICs), vSphere Standard Switches (VSS), standard port groups, vSphere Distributed Switches (VDS), and distributed port groups.

The configuration of the physical and virtual layers of the Ethernet network adhered to EMC, Cisco, and VMware configuration best practices. Also followed were best practices presented in the VMware vSphere Networking Guide, the Networking section of the SAP Solutions on VMware Best Practices Guide, SAP Note 1122388 Linux: VMware vSphere Configuration Guidelines and SAP documentation.

Network services



30

Physical network layer • The pairs of fabric extenders and switches were the same as those used in the

Unix-only environment.

• Each Cisco server had four physical Ethernet 1 Gbps NICs, of the same brand and model, connected to a pair of fabric extender switches.

• Two physical NICs connected to one VLAN and another pair of physical NICs connected to the other VLAN. Both VLANs were set up at the physical network layer.

• NIC teaming combined physical NICs, providing load balancing and redundancy to prevent downtime in case of a hardware failure or network outage.

Virtual network layer • A vSphere Standard Switch (VSS) was created on each ESXi server. A VSS is a

type of virtual switch that handles network traffic at the host level and routes traffic internally, between virtual machines, and connects to external networks.

• Three standard port groups were set up on the VSS to isolate ESXi management traffic, VMkernel traffic, and virtual machine application traffic from each other.

• VMXNET paravirtualized network interface adapters passed network traffic between the VMs and the physical NICs with minimal overhead. One VMXNET adapter was configured for each VM and connected to the VM network dedicated to application traffic.

To illustrate some of these concepts, Figure 7 shows an example of the relationships between the layers of a physical/virtual Ethernet network.

Figure 7. Relationships between the layers of a physical/virtual Ethernet network



Figure 8 shows the relationships between the VMs, vSphere Standard Switches, and physical NICs associated with each VM network in the virtualized environment of the validated solution.

Figure 8. Relationships between VMs, vSphere Standard Switches, and physical NICs associated with each VM network

For detailed information about VMware ESXi network installation and configuration, refer to the VMware vSphere Networking Guide or visit the VMware vSphere 5 Documentation Center at http://pubs.vmware.com/vsphere-50/index.jsp.

SAN network

The SAN used a pair of highly available, scalable, and fully redundant fabric switches.

The SAN configuration adhered to the best practices recommended by Cisco, VMware, and EMC. The configuration followed guidelines presented in the VMware vSphere ESXi 5.0 Storage Guide.

Intel x86 servers

The virtualized environment introduced two Cisco UCS C210 M2 Intel x86 servers to host new, virtualized SAP Application Server Instances. Each Cisco server had four Ethernet 1 Gbps NICs and a pair of Fibre Channel 8 Gbps dual-port Host Bus Adapters, of the same brand and model, configured and connected to the Ethernet network and SAN switches for load balancing and redundancy.

Unix servers

The two IBM p570 Unix servers hosting the SAP Database Instance and the SAP Central Instance remained unchanged from the Unix-only environment to the virtualized environment.

Compute services

http://pubs.vmware.com/vsphere-50/index.jsp�



32

About hosts, clusters, and resource pools in a virtual environment

Hosts, clusters, and resource pools provide flexible and dynamic ways to organize the aggregated computing and memory resources in a virtual environment and link them back to the underlying physical resources.

A cluster acts and can be managed as a single entity. It represents the aggregate computing and memory resources of a group of physical x86 servers sharing the same network and storage arrays.

Resource pools are partitions of computing and memory resources from a single host or a cluster. Resource pools can be hierarchical and nested. Any resource pool can be partitioned into smaller resource pools to divide and assign resources to different groups or for different purposes.

Additional guidelines for configuring VMware vSphere on Linux are provided in SAP Note 1122388. Also refer to the vSphere Resource Management Guide for more information on how to use and configure resource pools.

Configuration of Cisco UCS C210 M2 Intel x86 Linux servers and VMs

In the virtualized environment, a resource pool named SAP_Pool was created to aggregate the resources of the two Cisco UCS C210 M2 Intel x86 servers.

Table 9 presents the detailed configuration of each Cisco physical server.

Table 9. Configuration of each Cisco UCS C210 M2 Intel x86 physical server

Physical Server Server name Operating system CPUs Cores Memory (GB)

NICs HBAs OS boot disk (GB)

Cisco UCS C210 M2 sapesx241, 2, 3 VMware ESXi 5.0 2 6 128 4 2 300

Table 10 presents the detailed configuration of each VMware virtual machine.

Table 10. Configuration of each VMware virtual machine

Server role VM name Operating system vCPUs Cores Memory (GB)

NICs OS boot disk (GB)

SAP Application Servers 1, 2, 3

sepap01, 02, 03 SUSE Linux Enterprise Server for SAP Applications 11 SP1

2 2 16 1 100


SAPVCenter MS Windows 2008 R2 2 2 16 1 150

SAP SD Benchmark Driver

SAPBench SUSE Linux Enterprise Server for SAP Applications 11 SP1

2 2 16 1 100



VMware ESXi installation and configuration

VMware vSphere ESXi is a comprehensive product with multiple components to install and configure. For detailed information about installation and configuration of VMware vSphere ESXi 5.0, visit the VMware vSphere 5 Documentation Center.

VMware ESXi installation Because only two servers needed to be installed, the Interactive Installation option was used to install ESXi. During installation, an auto-configuration routine formatted all disks that were visible, blank, and internal with the VMware vSphere Virtual Machine File System (VMFS 5.0) so that virtual machines could be placed on these local disks. Intel Hyper-Threading technology was enabled on the ESXi server.

VMware ESXi configuration The Direct Console ESXi Interface was used to configure network settings and troubleshooting options.

The date/time for all ESXi servers was set to match the date/time of the SAP Central Instance Unix server. This ensured proper synchronization when the new, virtual SAP Application Server Instances were started.

For more information about time configuration for SAP virtual machines, refer to the section Time Keeping in Virtual Machines in the SAP Solutions on VMware Best Practice Guide and SAP Note 989963: Linux: VMware timing problem.

VMware Monitoring Interface (VMI) configuration In order to monitor an SAP system on VMware virtualized hardware, enhanced SAP System Monitoring must be activated. SAP provides documentation on how to activate the enhanced monitoring functionality.

VMware vSphere Client installation An Internet browser on a local desktop was used to access the webpage of the ESXi server to download and install the VMware vSphere Client (VI Client) to manage the ESXi servers remotely.



34

VMware vCenter Server installation and configuration

A VMware virtual machine with two virtual CPUs and 8 GB of RAM was created. A standard VMware vCenter Server configuration was installed. The standard configuration included Microsoft SQL Server 2008 R2 Express, the database bundled with vCenter Server.

The VMware vSphere 5 Documentation Center provides detailed information about VMware vCenter Server installation and configuration.

vSphere clusters By using a VMware vSphere cluster, multiple virtual machines can run on different servers that belong to the same cluster while permitting non-disruptive migration of SAP virtual machines from one physical server to another.

A VMware vSphere cluster, named SAP_APP_Cluster, was created from the two Cisco UCS C210 M2 Intel x86 servers to support high availability features and VMware vMotion live migration capabilities.

vSphere resource pools SAP recommends the use of resource pools. Resource pools hierarchically partition the available CPU and memory resources of a standalone host or a cluster. Resource pools can be used to aggregate resources and set allocation policies for multiple virtual machines simultaneously, eliminating the need to set up resources on each virtual machine individually. A resource pool, named SAP_POOL, was created and the SAP VMs were added to it.

VMware vCenter Server was used to manage the virtual machines in the cluster and resource pool, shown in Figure 9 as viewed with vSphere Client.

Figure 9. Virtual machine cluster management with VMware vCenter Server

Management services



The virtualized environment used SAP ERP 6.0 Core Enhancement Pack (EhP) 4 IDES with SAP NetWeaver 7.0 EhP 1 ABAP Stack. A distributed SAP system “SEP” was installed and configured according to the SAP Installation Guide for SAP ERP 6.0 EHP 4 NetWeaver 7.01 ABAP Unicode. SEP consisted of one SAP Database Instance, one SAP Central Instance, and three SAP Application Server Instances.

• The SAP Database Instance and the SAP Central Instance remained, from the Unix-only environment, on two separate IBM p570 servers running IBM AIX 5.3 TL12 and Oracle Enterprise Server (on the SAP Database Instance) and Oracle InstantClient (on the SAP Central Instance).

• On a single Cisco UCS C210 M2 Intel x86 server running VMware ESXi 5.0, three SAP Application Server Instances were installed in three separate virtual machines. These virtual machines ran SUSE Linux Enterprise Server for SAP Applications 11 SP1 and Oracle InstantClient 11g R2.

• The operating systems, Oracle software, SAP patches, parameters, and Basis settings (SAP buffers, extended memory, operation mode, load balancing and so on), were installed and configured on the SAP Application Server Instances according to SAP procedures and guidelines.

• SAP Update processes were configured only on the SAP Central Instance. The SAP Dialog, Batch, and Spool work processes were configured on the SAP Application Server Instances.

• Storage was provisioned on EMC Symmetrix VMAX according to SAP, Oracle, and EMC recommendations.

Figure 10 shows the distributed SAP system deployed on both Unix servers and Linux-based virtual machines in the virtualized environment.

Figure 10. Distributed SAP system deployed on both Unix servers and Linux-based virtual machines in the virtualized environment

Application services



36

To complete the installation and configuration of the virtualized environment, three Linux-based VMware virtual machines were created with three new virtualized SAP Application Server Instances. These instances replaced the three physical, non-partitioned Unix-based SAP Application Server Instances after SAP end users were moved off the Unix-based instances onto the Linux-based instances.

The following steps were performed to create the three Linux-based virtual machines and configure each one with a new virtualized SAP Application Server Instance:

1. Created first VM and started its configuration 2. Created initial VM template from first VM 3. Completed configuration of first VM 4. Created second VM from initial template, started its configuration 5. Created final template from second VM 6. Completed configuration of second VM 7. Created third VM from final template and configured third VM

Step 1: Created first VM and started its configuration

A virtual machine with the characteristics listed in Table 11 was created on one of the two physical VMware ESXi servers. The SAP Solutions on VMware Practices Guide provides configuration guidelines.

Table 11. Virtual machine characteristics

Server role VM name

Datastore vCPUs

Cores Memory (GB)

NICs OS virtual boot disk (GB)

SAP Application Server Instance 1

sepap01 sleasdssap01 2 2 16 1 100

a. Installed SUSE Linux Enterprise Server for SAP Applications 11 SP 1 with the Basic installation option. The operating system for each Linux VM was placed in a single datastore/LUN.

b. Configured the network settings, set the server date/time, and set the hardware clock to UTC.

c. Installed VMware tools and ran the configuration script to install the improved drivers from VMware.

d. Mounted the NFS share /sapmnt/<SID>/profile and /sapmnt/<SID>/global subdirectories from the SAP Central Instance on the Unix server. These subdirectories must be shared among all SAP Application Server Instances in an SAP system, as shown in Table 12.

Table 12. Subdirectories shared from SAP Central Instance


Mounted from Unix SAP Central Instance server

Mounted to Linux SAP Application Server Instance

Function

/sapmnt/SEP/ SAP Central Instance

/sapmnt/SEP/ /sapmnt/SEP/profile Used to read the common SAP profile

VMware virtual machines




Mounted from Unix SAP Central Instance server

Mounted to Linux SAP Application Server Instance

Function

/sapmnt/SEP/ SAP Central Instance

/sapmnt/SEP/ /sapmnt/SEP/global All SAP Application Server Instances share global files

e. Mounted an NFS share that contained the SAP installation media (DVDs) downloaded from SAPNet to install the SAP Application Server Instance.

f. Edited the Linux network configuration file to eliminate the need for persistent names. VMware technical note Installing and Configuring Linux Guest Operating Systems provides more information.

g. Started the SAP Installer, entered all required parameters until the Summary screen was reached, and exited the SAP Installer.

h. Downloaded and extracted the Oracle InstantClient 11g R2 installation file.

Step 2: Created initial VM template from first VM

a. Allocated a single, 100 GB VMware datastore named sepap00 on a dedicated LUN to store the virtual hard disk of the template.

b. Used vCenter Server to create a VM template named sap_template from the newly created VM.

Step 3: Completed configuration of first VM

a. Restarted the SAP Installer, completed the SAP installation of the application server instance on the VM sepap01, and performed the required post-installation steps.

b. Shut down the SAP Application Server Instance.

c. Upgraded the Oracle InstantClient from version 10.2.0.5 to version 11g R2.

d. Created an NFS export of the /sapmnt/<SID> directory. This contains the SAP kernel files, which can be shared by any additional virtual SAP Application Server Instances that are created. This ensures that the same SAP kernel and subdirectories are propagated across all the new virtual SAP Application Server Instances, which facilitates the periodic kernel upgrades recommended by SAP. The /sapmnt/<SID> mount is shared across the new virtual Linux-based application servers, and the global and profile subdirectories are shared across the entire SAP system from the Unix-based SAP Central Instance. Details are shown in Table 13.

Table 13. NFS export of the /sapmnt/<SID> directory

Mount point From To Function

/sapmnt/SEP First virtual SAP Application Server Instance (sepap01)

All other virtual SAP Application Server Instances (sepap02, sepap03, …)

Contains the SAP kernel for Linux, used by all virtual SAP Application Server Instance



38

Step 4: Created second VM from initial VM template and started its configuration

a. From the VI Client on VMware vCenter Server, selected the VM template named sap_template, selected Deploy Virtual Machine from Template, and selected the datastore slessap02 in the VMware Customization Wizard.

b. Started the new VM. The VMware Customization Wizard disables the Ethernet virtual network interface of the new VM.

c. Inside the guest OS, modified the SUSE Linux Enterprise Server for SAP Applications network configuration to remove a second virtual NIC created by the VMware Customization Wizard. In VM settings, enabled the Ethernet virtual network interface.

d. Edited the file system table (fstab) file to add the NFS share /sapmnt/<SID> created in the first VM (see Step 3d), and mounted on the /sapmnt/<SID> of the local application server.

Step 5: Created final VM template from second VM

a. vCenter Server was used to create a VM template named new_sap_template from the second VM. This template can be used to create all subsequent VMs.

b. Created a single, 100 GB VMware datastore named slesdssap10 on a dedicated LUN to store the virtual hard disk of the template.

Step 6: Completed configuration of second VM

a. Restarted the SAP Installer, completed the SAP installation of the Application Server Instance on the VM, and performed the post-installation steps.

b. Shut down the SAP Application Server Instance.

c. Upgraded the Oracle InstantClient from version 10.2.0.5 to version 11g R2.

Step 7: Created third VM from second VM template

The second VM template, named new_sap_template, contained a fully configured installation of SUSE Linux Enterprise Server for SAP Applications, VMware Tools, and Oracle InstantClient 11g R2 files. The template also incorporated in its fstab file all NFS shares required to create and deploy any number of additional virtual SAP Application Server Instances.

a. From VMware vCenter Server, selected the VM template named new_sap_template and selected Deploy Virtual Machine from Template.

b. Selected the datastore slessap03.

c. Started the new VM.

d. Restarted the SAP Installer, completed the SAP installation of the SAP Application Server Instance on the VM, and performed the post-installation steps.

e. Shut down the SAP Application Server Instance.

f. Upgraded the Oracle Instant Client from version 10.2.0.5 to version 11g R2.



Non-disruptive migration of SAP users to virtual SAP application servers This section describes how simulated SAP end users were non-disruptively migrated from the physical (non-partitioned) Unix-based to the virtual Linux-based SAP application servers.

After all the new, virtualized SAP Application Server Instances were installed and configured, the SAP Installer (SAPInst) automatically started the instances on their respective virtual machines and automatically added the instances to the SAP system.

The started and initialized SAP Application Server Instances were not automatically assigned to SAP logon groups. These new virtual SAP application servers were manually added to the appropriate existing logon group.

Figure 11 shows the SAP system landscape during SAP end user migration from the Unix-based SAP Application Server Instances to the Linux-based virtual SAP Application Server Instances.

Figure 11. SAP system landscape during SAP end user migration



40

The following process was used to migrate simulated SAP end users from the Unix-based SAP Application Server Instances to the new virtual Linux-based SAP Application Server Instances.

1. Verified the availability of the new virtual SAP Application Server Instances.

2. Added the virtual SAP Application Server Instances to the logon group Public.

3. Removed the Unix-based SAP Application Server Instances from the logon group.

4. Had a simulated user log off and then log on again. The user was automatically directed to a new, virtual SAP Application Server Instance.

Step 1: Verified the availability of the new, virtual SAP Application Server Instances

The first step was to ensure that the new, virtual SAP Application Server Instances were recognized by the Unix-based SAP Central Instance. We viewed the list of SAP servers as shown in Figure 12.

Figure 12. List of SAP servers recognized by the SAP Central Instance

Migration process overview

Migration process details



Step 2: Added the virtual SAP Application Server Instances to the logon group Public

We issued the transaction Maintain Assignment of Logon Group to Instance to add the virtual SAP Application Server Instances (sepap01, 02, 03) to the same SAP logon group (Public) containing the Unix-based SAP Application Server Instances (sapaix04, 05, 2).

Figure 13 and Figure 14 show all SAP Application Server Instances before and after the virtual instances were added to logon group Public.

Figure 13. SAP Application Server Instances before virtual instances added to logon group

Figure 14. SAP Application Server Instances after virtual instances added to logon group All SAP Application Server Instances, both Unix-based and virtual Linux-based, were now included in the same Public logon group, which enabled users to log on to either type of instance.

In a customer deployment, this configuration can be maintained temporarily so that the SAP environment can be thoroughly tested prior to decommissioning the Unix-based servers.



42

Step 3: Removed the Unix-based SAP Application Server Instances from their logon group

The next step was to remove the Unix-based SAP Application Server Instances from the Public logon group, leaving only the virtual SAP Application Server Instances. The Maintain Logon Groups > Delete Assignment transaction was used to remove the Unix-based SAP Application Server Instances from the Public logon group. Figure 15 shows the Maintain Logon Groups window after deleting the logon group assignments of the Unix-based instances.

Figure 15. Maintain Logon Groups window after deleting Unix-based SAP Application Server Instance assignments

The Unix-based SAP Application Server Instances were no longer part of the Public logon group. Users could no longer log onto these instances by using the Public entry in the SAP GUI.



Step 4: Had a user log off and then log on again

The next step was to have a user attempt to log on to the new, virtual SAP Application Server Instances to determine whether the login worked and did not generate error messages.

1. From a user’s local computer, the SAP Graphical User Interface (SAPGUI) was called.

Figure 16. SAP user logon

2. Selected the entry that corresponded to the user’s SAP system and logon group and clicked Log On. An authentication window appeared.

Result

The name of one of the new virtual Linux-based instances appeared in the bottom right of the SAPGUI Logon window. This was the new preferred SAP Application Server Instance. The login process completed successfully.

Customer deployment considerations

Even though the Unix-based SAP Application Server Instances have been removed from the logon group, any users currently logged on to these instances can continue to work regularly, uninterrupted, until they log off or the Unix-based instances are shut down.

The advantage of commissioning the new, virtual Linux-based application servers prior to decommissioning their Unix-based counterparts is that interoperability between the Unix-based database and central instance servers and the new virtual Linux-based application servers can be verified without the risk of disrupting business operations.

Important: In each customer environment, any processes that are set to run on specific Unix servers must be reviewed and appropriately adjusted before any Unix server is shut down and decommissioned. This can take up to several days, depending on the complexity of the processes and the performance of the hardware in the customer environment.



44

Using a VM template to accelerate the deployment of additional virtual SAP application servers

This section describes how VMware VM templates can be leveraged to deploy additional virtual SAP application servers, quickly and easily, in a VMware virtualized environment.

Once you have a VMware VM template that contains a fully configured installation of SUSE Linux Enterprise Server for SAP Applications, VMware Tools, Oracle InstantClient 11g R2, and incorporates in its fstab file all required NFS shares, it is very simple to create and deploy any number of additional virtual SAP Application Server Instances.

VMAX hardware acceleration enables the ESXi host to offload specific virtual machine and storage management operations to the storage hardware. The host performs these operations faster and consumes less CPU, memory, and storage fabric bandwidth. VMAX storage hardware acceleration reduces the time required to create a VM from a template from ~15 minutes to ~3 minutes (~5x improvement).

1. From the VI Client on VMware vCenter Server, select the final VM template and select Deploy Virtual Machine from Template.

2. Follow the VMware Customization Wizard prompts to configure the new VM.

3. Start the new VM.

4. Restart the SAP Installer, complete the SAP installation of the application server instance on the VM, and perform the required post-installation steps.

5. If necessary, upgrade the Oracle Instant Client from version 10.2.0.5 to version 11g R2.

6. Add the new SAP Application Server Instance to the appropriate SAP logon group.

Deployment procedure



SAP application server deployment duration comparison This section presents a comparison of the estimated time to:

• Deploy three additional physical (non-partitioned) Unix-based SAP application servers in a typical Unix-only SAP environment

Versus

• Deploy three additional VMware virtual Linux-based SAP application servers in a virtualized SAP environment where VMware virtual SAP application servers already exist

Assumptions for the virtualized environment

• A final VMware VM template has already been created

• The current number of ESXi servers can support the three additional SAP application server VMs

• Storage for the three additional virtual SAP application servers has already been provisioned and presented to the ESXi servers in advance

Note: Actual durations will vary depending on the customer’s environment.

Table 14. SAP application server deployment duration comparison

Activity Unix-only environment

Hybrid VMware/Linux environment

Comments

Prepare physical environment: Rack, cable, label servers, provide power and cooling

~8 hours n/a New VMs can be created on an ESXi server without additional physical resources.

Install operating system ~8 hours n/a New VMs can be made directly from a VM template with the OS and OS patches already installed and configured.

Provision network (IP, VLAN configuration)

1 hour minimum n/a New VMs use the network connectivity already available on the ESXi servers.

Provision storage (zoning, LUN creation, masking to servers)

4 hours minimum n/a LUNs and datastores can be provisioned, in advance, based on predicted growth. In a virtual environment, a virtual disk is created in a datastore that appears as a LUN to the OS. Multiple VMs can be created in the same datastore depending on the storage design.

Install/configure three new SAP Application Server Instances

9 hours minimum ~3 hours Duration based on deploying three new virtual SAP Application Server Instances from a final VM template.

Total 30 hours minimum ~3 hours ~90% total reduction!



46

Workload validation This section describes how a simulated SAP workload was run on both the Unix-only (non-partitioned) SAP environment and the new hybrid (Unix/VMware virtual Linux) SAP environment to compare performance. A comparison of the results is presented.

An SAP Standard Application Benchmark, the SAP ERP Sales and Distribution (SD) Benchmark, was used to generate a sample SAP workload on both the Unix-only environment and the hybrid environment to demonstrate that the hybrid environment could handle at least the same workload (or greater) as the Unix-only environment without compromising the SAP system’s performance.

The SAP SD Benchmark toolkit performs predefined standard SD transactions against an SAP environment. The toolkit covers a sell-from-stock business scenario, which includes the creation of a customer order with five line items and its corresponding delivery with subsequent goods movement and invoicing. The scenario consists of the following transactions:

• Create an order with five line items (VA01) • Create a delivery for the order (VL01N) • Display the customer order (VA03) • Change the delivery (VL02N) and post a goods issue • List 40 orders for one sold-to party (VA05) • Create an invoice (VF01)

SAP SD Benchmark Driver was installed on a dedicated VM and ran the workload from a central location to facilitate monitoring. The workload was run three times on each environment. To avoid data-locking situations, each benchmark user had its own master data. Table 15 presents the SD Benchmark configuration. It was assumed that this configuration represented typical user activity in most situations.

Table 15. SD Benchmark configuration

Runs Users per app server

Users per CI

Logon delay

Ramp-up time

Think time Loops per user

Concurrent users

High-load phase run time

3 100 1 5 seconds 2 minutes 10 seconds 5 300 20 minutes

A benchmark run consists of a ramp-up phase where all users log on one after another, a high-load phase where all users run their actions concurrently, and a ramp-down phase where all users log off one after another.

Figure 17. Benchmark run

Validation tools and approach

SD Benchmark configuration

The benchmark run



Benchmark results are determined by workload characteristics, specific application requirements, and system design and implementation. Relative system performance will vary as a result of these and other factors. Therefore, this workload should not be used as a substitute for a specific customer application benchmark when critical capacity planning and/or product evaluation decisions are contemplated.

For the Unix-only environment, the workload was run using three physical (non-partitioned) Unix-based servers with three SAP Application Server Instances, one instance per physical server (number 1 in Figure 18).

For the hybrid environment, the workload was run using only one ESXi server with three virtual machines running Linux SAP Application Server Instances, one instance per virtual machine (number 2 in Figure 18).

In both environments, the SAP Central and Database Instances ran on dedicated physical (non-partitioned) Unix-based servers, one instance per physical server.

Figure 18. Workload testing environments

About benchmark and performance results

Workload testing environments



48

The results of the workload validation are presented in Table 16.

Table 16. Workload validation test results

The average dialog response time of the virtual Linux-based SAP Application Server Instances was 16% better than the average response time of the physical Unix-based SAP Application Server Instances.

In the hybrid environment, over 10% more dialog steps were processed in the same period of time (the high-load phase) and still the total response time was 4% better than in the Unix-only environment.

The CPU utilization of the single x86 Intel-based server hosting all three virtual Linux-based SAP Application Server Instances was 62% lower than the combined CPU utilization of the three physical Unix-based servers hosting the three Unix-based SAP Application Server Instances (one instance per physical server). This demonstrates the scalability and server efficiency of the consolidated hybrid environment.

The CPU utilization of the Unix server hosting the physical Unix-based SAP Central Instance was greater when running the workload with the virtual Linux-based SAP Application Server Instances than when running the workload with the physical Unix-based SAP Application Server Instances. The processing bottleneck shifted from the servers hosting the SAP Application Server Instances to the server hosting the SAP Central Instance because the Unix servers were not as powerful as the ESXi server.

Figure 19. Number of dialog steps processed in high-load phase (higher is better)

29,000

30,000

31,000

32,000

33,000

34,000

35,000

SAP AS Unix-only SAP AS VMware/Linux

Workload testing results

Key results

CPU utilization

Number of dialog steps comparison



Figure 20. Average dialog response time in milliseconds (lower is better)

Figure 21. Total response time in milliseconds (lower is better)

0 25 50 75

100 125 150 175 200 225

Run 1 Run 2 Run 3

SAP AS Unix-only SAP AS VMware/Linux

150

160

170

180

190

200

Run 1 Run 2 Run 3

SAP System Unix-only SAP System Hybrid

Average dialog response time comparison

Total response time comparison



50

Migration of a live VM under workload VMware vMotion technology was used in the hybrid environment to demonstrate the migration, under load, of a running virtual machine from one physical VMware ESXi server to another. This was done to demonstrate the efficiency, availability, and performance that can be achieved in a virtualized environment.

The same SD Benchmark scenario as the one used to perform workload validation was run a single time. The SD Benchmark configuration was the same as the one used for workload validation.

The VM was moved between physical ESXi servers in less than 30 seconds without any impact to the SAP transactions currently being processed.

Note: Results might vary in a customer environment, depending on many factors.

Figure 22. Migration of a live virtual machine under load



Conclusion Large, Unix-based IT landscapes are well-suited for the demanding needs of mission-critical applications such as SAP. These Unix environments are stable, scalable, and highly available. Unfortunately, they are also very expensive from both an operational and capital expenditure perspective.

Today’s enterprises face massive pressures on IT costs, growing user expectations for agility, user-friendliness, and innovation. Cloud computing is radically changing the world of IT by meeting these needs. Cloud computing represents a significant shift, altering forever the way in which IT is designed, consumed and managed across data centers, applications and end-user access points. EMC delivers cloud solutions in this fashion—simplifying and automating IT services to help customers not only reduce costs, but also transform IT into a strategic asset that yields business and competitive value.

Virtualization is the first step toward transforming your IT infrastructure for SAP to cloud computing. Over the course of the past decade, there have been huge advances in commodity x86 64-bit processors and VMware hypervisor functionality, especially now with the new release of VMware vSphere 5.0.

90% reduction in time required to deploy new SAP application servers

Solution validation showed that new Linux-based virtual SAP application servers can be provisioned and deployed in hours instead of days when compared to typical Unix-based physical server deployments. This represents up to a 90% reduction in the time required to deploy these servers.

VMware vStorage APIs for Array Integration (VAAI) with VMAX storage provided hardware acceleration that reduced the time required to create a VM from a template, making the operation 5 times faster than without hardware acceleration.

Non-disruptive business user migration between platforms in minutes

SAP users were migrated to virtual SAP application servers with no downtime.

Relocation of live virtual SAP application servers under workload in seconds

Using VMware vMotion, a non-disruptive relocation of live virtual SAP application servers was performed in seconds between physical x86 servers.

Over 16% improved business process performance

The performance of existing systems was improved. SAP average dialog response time improved over 16% when using VMware vSphere virtual Linux-based SAP application servers running on x86 Intel-based servers.

EMC can implement a cost-effective virtualized platform for your SAP environment that delivers the same benefits as a large, Unix-based platform. The EMC service for virtualizing SAP starts with an assessment of your current SAP landscape and its performance. Next, we develop a virtualization strategy and a new landscape design. These are the first steps toward a reduced TCO and improved business processing performance. Finally, we implement a solution that reduces hardware in the datacenter, which leads to reductions in real estate, power, and cooling requirements and results in significantly lower IT costs.

To learn more, contact your EMC representative.

Key results

EMC Global Services for SAP virtualization



52

References For more information on topics presented in this white paper, refer to the following documents and web pages:

EMC Community Network—Everything SAP http://community.emc.com/community/connect/everything_sap

Physical to Virtual SAP Conversion Enabled by VMware vCenter Converter and EMC Auto Provisioning Technology—EMC White Paper https://community.emc.com/docs/DOC-11443

SAP Development Network—SAP on Linux http://www.sdn.sap.com/irj/sdn/linux

SAP Development Network—SAP on Oracle http://www.sdn.sap.com/irj/sdn/ora

Collection of SAP Notes about SAP with VMware virtualization SAP Community Network Forums > Database & OS Platforms > SAP on VMware http://forums.sdn.sap.com/thread.jspa?threadID=1524523&tstart=0

SAP Installation Documentation http://service.sap.com/erp-inst

Important SAP Notes for an SAP heterogeneous environment 1067221: Composite note for heterogeneous installation 0531069: Heterogeneous Unix Systems 0552464: What is Big Endian Little Endian? What Endian do I have? 1310720: Collection Note for Unicode Systems with different endianess

Important SAP Notes for SAP in a Linux and virtual environment 1492000: SAP—General Support Statement for Virtual Environments 1380654: SAP support in cloud environments 1173954: Support of Oracle for VMware 1122387: Linux: SAP Support in virtualized environments 1122388: Linux: VMware vSphere configuration guidelines 0989963: Linux: VMware timing problem 1102124: SAPOSCOL on Linux: Enhanced function 0171356: SAP software on Linux: Essential information 1310037: SUSE Linux Enterprise Server for SAP Applications: Installation Notes 0816097: Availability of SAP on Linux for x86_64 platform 0819829: Oracle InstantClient Installation and Configuration on Unix

TCO and ROI Analysis of SAP Landscapes using VMware Technology http://www.vmware.com/files/pdf/partners/sap/SAP_TCOROI_Customers_Final.pdf A condensed version is available at http://docs.media.bitpipe.com/io_2x/io_23424/item_352608/SAP_SAP%20Insider%20Article_TCO-ROI%20Analysis%20of%20SAP%20Landscapes%20using%20VMware%20Technology.pdf

VMware vSphere for Enterprise webpage http://www.vmware.com/products/vsphere/mid-size-and-enterprise-business/overview.html

VMware compatibility Compatibility can be checked using several different criteria: http://www.vmware.com/support/pubs/vsphere-esxi-vcenter-server-pubs.html http://www.vmware.com/go/hcl http://www.vmware.com/resources/compatibility/search.php

EMC

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SAP Solutions on VMware Best Practice Guide http://www.vmware.com/files/pdf/techpaper/SAP-Solutions-on-VMware-Best-Practice-Guide-2011.pdf

General installation, configuration and support documentation VMware vSphere 5 Documentation Center http://pubs.vmware.com/vsphere-50/index.jsp

vSphere Installation and Setup Guide, vSphere Networking Guide, vSphere Storage Guide, vSphere Resource Management Guide VMware vSphere Basics Guide http://pubs.vmware.com/vsphere-50/topic/com.vmware.ICbase/PDF/vsphere-esxi-vcenter-server-50-basics-guide.pdf

VMware patches http://www.vmware.com/patchmgr/findPatch.portal

Patch for VMAX support VAAI http://kb.vmware.com/selfservice/microsites/search.do?language=en_US&cmd=displayKC&externalId=1027808

VMware ESXi Server and vCenter Server product documentation http://www.vmware.com/support/pubs/vsphere-esxi-vcenter-server-pubs.html

General installation instructions for all VMware products http://partnerweb.vmware.com/GOSIG/general%20_instructions.html

General guidelines for supported guests http://partnerweb.vmware.com/GOSIG/supported_OS_guidelines.html#configure3

Guest operating system installation guides http://partnerweb.vmware.com/GOSIG/home.html

Installing and Configuring Linux Guest Operating Systems http://www.vmware.com/files/pdf/linux_install_config.pdf http://partnerweb.vmware.com/GOSIG/SLES_11.html

VMware Tools documentation http://kb.vmware.com/kb/340 http://kb.vmware.com/kb/1014294

Installing and Configuring VMware Tools http://www.vmware.com/pdf/vmware-tools-installation-configuration.pdf

Timekeeping in VMware Environments, Timekeeping in VMware Virtual Machines http://www.vmware.com/resources/techresources/238 http://kb.vmware.com/kb/1006427

Make the Move from UNIX to Linux http://www.suse.com/solutions/enterprise-linux-servers/unixtolinux.html http://www.novell.com/docrep/2007/06/4622060_f_en.pdf

SUSE Linux Enterprise Server for SAP Applications webpage http://www.suse.com/products/sles-for-sap/

Related documents http://www.suse.com/products/sles-for-sap/resource-library/ http://www.suse.com/documentation/slepos11/ http://www.suse.com/documentation/sle_ha/

Product Flyer http://www.novell.com/docrep/2011/02/suse_linux_enterprise_server_for_sap_applications_flyer.pdf

Protection of Business-critical Applications in SUSE Linux Enterprise Environments Virtualized with VMware vSphere 4 and SAP NetWeaver as an Example http://www.novell.com/docrep/2011/05/protection_of_bussiness_critical_apps.pdf

Best Practices for Running SAP NetWeaver on SUSE Linux Enterprise Server with High Availability http://www.novell.com/docrep/2011/04/sap_on_sles11_simple_stack.pdf

SUSE

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