Multi System Manager

The StorONE system includes a central management service called Multi System Manager, or MSM, which provides the following functionality:

• Manages multiple S1 systems from a single GUI or CLI client
• Synchronizes volume replication status between S1 systems
• Acts as a replication witness to enable automatic failover of replicated volumes between S1 systems

The MSM is a separate process that is installed and run on a Microsoft Windows server in your environment. It is a lightweight process, and does not require a dedicated server or virtual machine (VM). You can run this process on multipurpose servers.

The MSM service is required for replication. If you do not install and configure an MSM service, you cannot replicate volumes.

Installation requirements

Supported operating systems

Windows Server 2016
Windows Server 2019
Windows Server 2022

Required disk capacity

250MB free space

Required Memory

100 MB RAM

Network requirements

Inbound TCP port 18018

Configuration considerations

• All StorONE systems that are managed by the same MSM must be in the same customer license group.
• After installing the MSM, all member systems must register to the service using the GUI or CLI.
• Only one MSM can be installed per machine (physical or virtual).
• You can use multiple MSM services to group subsets of your S1 systems. You can group systems by registering them to the same MSM. You can also separate groups by requesting multiple customer license groups from StorONE.

Installation

1. Download the zip file from the landing-page.
2. Unzip the files to the destination server, where the Multi-Systems manager service will reside.
3. Run the installation batch file (MultiSystemManagementServiceSetup.bat). This installs a Windows service called MultiSystemManagement that listens on TCP port 18018. Make sure the Windows firewall allows inbound access to port 18018.
4. After installation you can register (and unregister) appliances to this service.

Registering an S1 system to an MSM

1. In the GUI, under Inventory 🡪 Systems 🡪 Multi System Manager, choose Register and enter the server address where the service was installed:
   

2. Click Submit. After the service is registered, repeat on all systems you want to connect to this MSM.

3. Click Status to confirm the registration, and review all the registered appliances:

   

Configuring the witness service

The witness service, which is part of the MSM, is required to enable automatic failover between replicated volumes on different S1 systems. This service constantly monitors the connection to both controller nodes, and collects statistics such as latency, in order to determine when to trigger an automatic failover.

The maximum recommended latency between the controller nodes and the witness service is up to 1 second round trip. With higher latency, the witness service will still work but might cause the automatic failover to take longer.

To access the witness configuration with the GUI:

1. Go to Replication 🡪 Witness 🡪 Settings.

2. Add the user and password. This user should be configured in all appliances that use replication.
   If you configure the MSM before adding the user, it will be automatically configured all appliances.

3. Check the Enable box and click Submit.

   

4. After the witness is configured, you can review the logs of the Witness service to confirm that it is connected successfully to all expected appliances. In the GUI, go to Replication 🡪 Witness 🡪 Logs: