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Relocate ownership of an ONTAP local tier within an HA pair

Contributors netapp-thomi netapp-lenida netapp-ahibbard netapp-aherbin
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You can change the ownership of local tiers among the nodes in an HA pair without interrupting service from the local tiers.

Note Prior to ONTAP 9.7, System Manager uses the term aggregate to describe a local tier. Regardless of your ONTAP version, the ONTAP CLI uses the term aggregate. To learn more about local tiers, see Disks and local tiers.

Both nodes in an HA pair are physically connected to each other's disks or array LUNs. Each disk or array LUN is owned by one of the nodes.

Ownership of all disks or array LUNs within a local tier changes temporarily from one node to the other when a takeover occurs. However, local tiers relocation operations can also permanently change the ownership (for example, if done for load balancing). The ownership changes without any data-copy processes or physical movement of the disks or array LUNs.

About this task

  • Because volume count limits are validated programmatically during local tier relocation operations, it is not necessary to check for this manually.

    If the volume count exceeds the supported limit, the local tier relocation operation fails with a relevant error message.

  • You should not initiate local tier relocation when system-level operations are in progress on either the source or the destination node; likewise, you should not start these operations during the local tier relocation.

    These operations can include the following:

    • Takeover

    • Giveback

    • Shutdown

    • Another local tier relocation operation

    • Disk ownership changes

    • Local tier or volume configuration operations

    • Storage controller replacement

    • ONTAP upgrade

    • ONTAP revert

  • If you have a MetroCluster configuration, you should not initiate local tier relocation while disaster recovery operations (switchover, healing, or switchback) are in progress.

  • If you have a MetroCluster configuration and initiate local tier relocation on a switched-over local tier, the operation might fail because it exceeds the DR partner's volume limit count.

  • You should not initiate local tier relocation on local tiers that are corrupt or undergoing maintenance.

  • Before initiating the local tier relocation, you should save any core dumps on the source and destination nodes.

Steps

  1. View the local tiers on the node to confirm which local tiers to move and ensure they are online and in good condition:

    storage aggregate show -node source-node

    The following command shows six local tiers on the four nodes in the cluster. All local tiers are online. Node1 and Node3 form an HA pair and Node2 and Node4 form an HA pair.

    cluster::> storage aggregate show
Aggregate     Size Available Used% State   #Vols  Nodes  RAID Status
--------- -------- --------- ----- ------- ------ ------ -----------
aggr_0     239.0GB   11.13GB   95% online       1 node1  raid_dp,
                                                         normal
aggr_1     239.0GB   11.13GB   95% online       1 node1  raid_dp,
                                                         normal
aggr_2     239.0GB   11.13GB   95% online       1 node2  raid_dp,
                                                         normal
aggr_3     239.0GB   11.13GB   95% online       1 node2  raid_dp,
                                                         normal
aggr_4     239.0GB   238.9GB    0% online       5 node3  raid_dp,
                                                         normal
aggr_5     239.0GB   239.0GB    0% online       4 node4  raid_dp,
                                                         normal
6 entries were displayed.

  2. Issue the command to start the local tier relocation:

    storage aggregate relocation start -aggregate-list aggregate-1, aggregate-2…​ -node source-node -destination destination-node

    The following command moves the local tier aggr_1 and aggr_2 from Node1 to Node3. Node3 is Node1's HA partner. The local tiers can be moved only within the HA pair.

    cluster::> storage aggregate relocation start -aggregate-list aggr_1, aggr_2 -node node1 -destination node3
Run the storage aggregate relocation show command to check relocation status.
node1::storage aggregate>

  3. Monitor the progress of the local tier relocation with the storage aggregate relocation show command:

    storage aggregate relocation show -node source-node

    The following command shows the progress of the local tiers that are being moved to Node3:

    cluster::> storage aggregate relocation show -node node1
Source Aggregate   Destination    Relocation Status
------ ----------- -------------  ------------------------
node1
       aggr_1      node3          In progress, module: wafl
       aggr_2      node3          Not attempted yet
2 entries were displayed.
node1::storage aggregate>

    When the relocation is complete, the output of this command shows each local tier with a relocation status of “Done”.