the changing landscape of capacity management for the mainframe
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Who said this?
: Elon Musk ?
: Thomas J. Watson Jr ?
: David Bowie ?
: Steven Hawking ?
Wisdom from 25 centuries ago!
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Capacity Management is…
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Capacity management is a process used to manage information technology (IT). Its primary goal is to ensure that IT resources are right-sized to meet current and future business requirements in a cost-effective* manner. Wikipedia
* I’d add here: “and timely”
Large
Bad
Good
Resource（Cost）
Service（Response time）
Workload
Few
ManySmall
See Do
Plan It is important to cycle Plan-Do-See continuously for maintaining SLA and for spending wisely.
Performance metrics of Workload, Resource and Service must be measured and balanced
appropriately
“You cannot control it if it couldn’t be measured!!”
Continuous Optimization
Benefits of Capacity Management
Today’s Reality
Management is focused on cost
– The cost of disruption in services can be severe
– Focus is on immediate payback and ongoing reduction in IT budgets
Large and diverse data sources, including business and transactional data
Off- and on-premise
Virtualization and self-service = Cloud
Time is limited, staff numbers lean, budgets tight
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Capacity Management was… (is…?)
Manual process
Dependent on SMF/RMF
Slow / ponderous
Not business-centric
Reliant on wizards
What changes in scope and processes require a philosophy change
IT Business
Business IT
Capacity Management must become a
ITIL adoption - Capacity Management across the Enterprise -> increase maturity
Reporting must elevate to be business- or customer-centric
Capacity Risk Assessments – regulatory/audit requirements
New technologies to embrace, new data sources, better reporting techniques
Need to embrace Multi-Tiered Applications; no more “them ‘n’ us”
Why organizations are reviewing CM and their current tools
Inspired by ITIL
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COMPONENT SERVICE BUSINESS
UNIXReporting/
Monitoring
z/OS
IntegrationCAB
Incident/Problem
Focus Reactive Project based implementation
Some GUI Simulation
Planning Some trending
ITIL - Capacity Management within the Enterprise – Low Maturity
ITIL - Capacity Management within the Enterprise – High Maturity
COMPONENT SERVICE BUSINESS
Unified Reporting – Capacity Portal
Enterprise
Integration
CAB
Incident/Problem
Focus Reactive -and- Proactive
Tracked response times
Agreed SLA targets
Business Volumes
Transaction Volumes
Facilities
SLM Service OwnersConfig. Management
Reporting/
Monitoring
PlanningTrending/Modelling/The Capacity Plan
Capacity Risk Assessment
Capacity RISK Index October
Capacity Manager
Capacity CATEGORY RISK CONTROL MEASURES
Networks
DME Licensing TelephonyCore Router/SWITCH
Performance
CELLPHONE Network availability
CORE SERVERS
Server Processing CAPACITY
Tuxedo CAPACITY Vmware capacity
Mainframe MIPS Capacity
Storage/SAN
DISK STORAGE CAPACITY
DIP CAPACITYStorage array network
capacity
Inter SWITCH Link Capacity
Non Production Environments
NPE CORE Database Server capacity
NPE storage capacityNon production
VMWARE CAPACITY
NPE overnight Batch IMPACT
Capacity CATEGORY RISK CONTROL MEASURES
EcommerceTransactional Web
site Capacity
WEB SITE PERFORMANCE -
Synthetic Monitoring
Overnight processingProduction Batch Completion times
DatabaseLIVE database FileSystem capacity
Core Database performance
Capacity Management
Component metric collection
Service CapacityReports
Service Demand
CAPACITY INCIDENTS caused by change
Capacity related PROBLEM records
Capacity Category review
OtherSharePoint server
performanceSharePoint file system
capacity
Overall Trend Outlook Commentary
Overall risk currently amber. Grey fields are work in progress. Amber fields are explained below.
Additional disk space being added w/e Dec 3
New data sources, new ways to get data
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RESTful API = http(s) + JSON format
{“key1”:value, “key2”:value, … }
REST=REpresentational State Transfer
Useful for “agentless” capture of data,
or, for sending data off mainframe to
e.g. Splunk
Dynamics of the multi-tiered applications: the transaction is King
Network Firewall
Proxy
VirtualWeb
ServersDirectory
Server
Load Balancer
App Servers
Mainframe
DB
Partner App
ExternalCloud
Web Services
Msg. Broker
Firewall
VirtualWeb
Servers
App Servers
Partner App
Wire Xfer>$100K
Wire Xfer<$100K
New reporting techniques – pick what works for your audience
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Line Printer Old Look Graphical New(er) Look
Easy self-service reporting, web based, dynamic, flexible
We, the workers, demand…(but very nicely)
…Mainframe to be an integral part of the family; no bimodal (2-speed) IT thank you very much, Gartner…
…Understanding of interactions with Multi-Tiered applications; tool up to see end to end and top to bottom
…Open dialogs with service managers, business leaders; let’s communicate until it hurts
Remove the reliance solely on component-level reporting
– Mechanical reporting -> mechanical predictions
Discuss/promote the value of Capacity Management with business stakeholders
Match business KPIs with technical data
Reach out to other IT areas; stop being a technical silo
Correlate customer, business, service, technical data
Validate predictions against actuals and continually refine the prediction process
Incorporate Customer, Business and Service views
Service View Dashboard
Correlation of Business Transactions vs CICS Transactions
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A central repository for all data
– This could be several databases / technologies, but needs to be made to look and feel like a single entity
– Pipe data in through the likes of RESTful or web APIs
– Talk to other teams to see what data they have and can provide
Data Analytics and Data Mining techniques
– Many new and exciting options – Big Data / open source / unstructured databases
Correlate data to uncover natural “units of capacity” for quick planning of changes
Plans for addressing new technologies
Why Do It?
Capacity Management should add value to the business
– Analysis and reporting suitable for the intended target
– Identification of under/over used resources
– Strategic planning and budgeting - the right money at the right time
– KPIs/Service Levels met and sustained, service disruptions reduced/eliminated
Get Capacity Management recognized as a strategic activity, not a tactical one
– Resourced appropriately
– Tooled up appropriately
– Represented at senior levels
Get buy in and trust from the business by talking to everyone in their language
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Summary
Mainframe Capacity Management continues to evolve
Aim for Capacity Management to be at Business-level or higher!
Modernize data acquisition and reporting to support business objectives
Mentor, tutor other areas of IT, as wide as you can go; you’re good at this stuff!
Ensure your voice is heard
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QUESTIONS?
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THANK YOU