6.0.1

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Storage array has appropriate rmware that supports T10-based Storage APIs - Array Integration (Thin
Provisioning). For information, contact your storage provider and check the HCL.
Space Usage Monitoring
The thin provision integration functionality helps you to monitor the space usage on thin-provisioned LUNs
and to avoid running out of space.
The following sample ow demonstrates how the ESXi host and the storage array interact to generate
breach of space and out-of-space warnings for a datastore with underlying thin-provisioned LUN. The same
mechanism applies when you use Storage vMotion to migrate virtual machines to the thin-provisioned
LUN.
1 Using storage-specic tools, your storage administrator provisions a thin LUN and sets a soft threshold
limit that, when reached, triggers an alert. This step is vendor-specic.
2 Using the vSphere Web Client, you create a VMFS datastore on the thin-provisioned LUN. The
datastore spans the entire logical size that the LUN reports.
3 As the space used by the datastore increases and reaches the specied soft threshold, the following
actions take place:
a The storage array reports the breach to your host.
b Your host triggers a warning alarm for the datastore.
You can contact the storage administrator to request more physical space or use Storage vMotion to
evacuate your virtual machines before the LUN runs out of capacity.
4 If no space is left to allocate to the thin-provisioned LUN, the following actions take place:
a The storage array reports out-of-space condition to your host.
C In certain cases, when a LUN becomes full, it might go oine or get unmapped from the
host.
b The host pauses virtual machines and generates an out-of-space alarm.
You can resolve the permanent out-of-space condition by requesting more physical space from the
storage administrator.
Identify Thin-Provisioned Storage Devices
Use the esxcli command to verify whether a particular storage device is thin-provisioned.
In the procedure, --server=server_name species the target server. The specied target server prompts you
for a user name and password. Other connection options, such as a conguration le or session le, are
supported. For a list of connection options, see Geing Started with vSphere Command-Line Interfaces.
Prerequisites
Install vCLI or deploy the vSphere Management Assistant (vMA) virtual machine. See Geing Started with
vSphere Command-Line Interfaces. For troubleshooting, run esxcli commands in the ESXi Shell.
Procedure
u
Run the esxcli --server=server_name storage core device list -d=device_ID command.
The following thin provisioning status indicates that the storage device is thin-provisioned.
# esxcli --server=server_name storage core device list -d naa.XXXXXXXXXXXX4c
naa.XXXXXXXXXXXX4c
Display Name: XXXX Fibre Channel Disk(naa.XXXXXXXXXXXX4c)
Size: 20480
Device Type: Direct-Access
vSphere Storage
274 VMware, Inc.