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Control and monitor FlexVol volume I/O performance with Storage QoS

Contributors netapp-lenida netapp-aherbin netapp-aaron-holt netapp-dbagwell netapp-mwallis
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You can control input/output (I/O) performance to FlexVol volumes by assigning volumes to Storage QoS policy groups. You might control I/O performance to ensure that workloads achieve specific performance objectives or to throttle a workload that negatively impacts other workloads.

About this task

Policy groups enforce a maximum throughput limit (for example, 100 MB/s). You can create a policy group without specifying a maximum throughput, which enables you to monitor performance before you control the workload.

You can also assign SVMs, LUNs, and files to policy groups.

Note the following requirements about assigning a volume to a policy group:

  • The volume must be contained by the SVM to which the policy group belongs.

    You specify the SVM when you create the policy group.

  • Beginning with ONTAP 9.18.1, you can assign QoS policies to objects contained inside other objects that have QoS policies, such as a volume contained in an SVM. When you use nested QoS policies, the most restrictive policy is applied.

    In releases earlier than ONTAP 9.18.1, you can assign QoS policies to objects contained inside other objects with QoS policies, but those objects are tracked separately by QoS and do not interact. For example, if you have an SVM with a 50 IOPs ceiling and a FlexVol volume with a 100 IOPs ceiling, the FlexVol volume is limited by the 100 IOPs ceiling, but is not counted by QoS against the SVM workload.

For more information about how to use Storage QoS, see the System Administration Reference.

Steps

  1. Use the qos policy-group create command to create a policy group.

  2. Use the volume create command or the volume modify command with the -qos-policy-group parameter to assign a volume to a policy group.

  3. Use the qos statistics commands to view performance data.

  4. If necessary, use the qos policy-group modify command to adjust the policy group's maximum throughput limit.

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