HP-UX Workload Manager overview

7
• Adjust resource allocations by automatically enabling or disabling SLOs based on time of day,
system events, or application metrics
• Enable SLOs associated with an HP Serviceguard package failover
• Adjust the number of cores in a partition or pSet to meet SLOs
• Grant a workload dedicated CPU and memory resources in the form of a pSet
• Create Secure Resource Partitions (in conjunction with the HP-UX 11i v2 and v3 Security
Containment feature) based on pSets or FSS groups, providing file and process isolation and
automatic resource allocation
• Grant a workload CPU resources in direct proportion to a metric, such as number of processes in
the workload
• Set minimum and maximum amounts of CPU resources and memory resources available to a
workload
• Set and manage user expectations for performance
• Monitor resource consumption by applications or users through HP Glanceplus, WLM tools, or PRM
tools
Service level objectives
A key reason for using WLM is its ability to manage SLOs. WLM automatically allocates CPU
resources to workloads based on whether the application in the workload is underperforming,
meeting, or outperforming its SLOs.
SLOs can be shares-based or goal-based:
• Shares-based SLO—You specify a fixed number of CPU shares or a shares-per-metric allocation for
a workload. WLM tries to grant the workload the specified amount of CPU shares. (A CPU share is
1/100 of a single core or 1/100 of each core on a system, depending on the WLM mode of
operation.) The actual amount of CPU shares granted to the workload is subject to the availability of
CPU resources after the needs of higher priority SLOs have been met. You can specify maximum
and minimum CPU bounds and an explicit shares request.
A shares-based SLO consists of:
– A workload
– A shares allocation
– A priority
– Optional conditions (time of day, an event, and so on)
– Optional CPU lower and/or upper bounds
• Goal-based SLO—You specify one of two goal types:
– Usage goals—Goals based on a workload’s utilization of its allocated CPU resources. If the
processes in a workload are not using a certain amount of the workload’s allocation, the
allocation is decreased. If the processes are using a high percentage of the workload’s
allocation, the allocation is increased.
– Metric goals—Goals based on a metric, such as processing at least x transactions per minute or
having a response time under y seconds. Metric goals are based on performance data and
require understanding of that data. HP recommends using usage goals instead—usage goals
can be implemented immediately without prior knowledge of workload performance.
WLM grants CPU resources based on the usage goals or metric goals you specify. WLM
dynamically changes CPU allocations for an associated workload of an SLO based on:
– SLO priority
– Limits placed on the SLO, such as minimum and maximum CPU bounds
– Performance or utilization of the workload
– Amount of CPU resources needed to meet the goal, as determined by the controller