3PAR InForm® OS 2.2.4 Concepts Guide (320-200085 Rev B, March 2009)

2.11

3PAR Products, Features, and Licenses

InForm OS Version 2.2.4 3PAR InForm OS Concepts Guide

2.2.1 InForm Software Suite

3PAR InServ Storage Servers come with the InForm software suite. 3PAR InForm Suite is the

core set of storage management software.

3PAR InForm Suite includes:

■ 3PAR InForm Operating System. Independent instances of the operating system run

on each controller node.

■ Access Guard, to provide volume security at logical and physical levels by enabling you to

secure hosts and ports to specific virtual volumes.

2.2.2 Optional System Features

The following system features, products, and solutions are optional. It is possible that some of

these products are not currently enabled on your system since they may require additional

licenses.

■ 3PAR Thin Provisioning licenses allows you to allocate virtual volumes to application

servers yet provision only a fraction of the physical storage behind these volumes. By

enabling a true capacity-on-demand model, a storage administrator can use 3PAR Thin

Provisioning to create thinly provisioned virtual volumes (TPVVs) that maximize asset

utilization.

To learn more about CPGs and TPVVs, see Chapter 10, Common Provisioning Groups and

Chapter 8, Virtual Volumes.

■ 3PAR Virtual Copy is an optional system feature that allows you to take instant virtual

copy snapshots of existing volumes. It uses copy-on-write technology so that virtual copies

consume minimal capacity. Virtual copies are presentable to any host with read and write

capabilities. In addition, virtual copies can be made from other virtual copies, providing

endless flexibility for test, backup, and business-intelligence applications.

NOTE: When features are not available on your system because they have not

been licensed for use, screens and functionality relating to those features may

appear grayed out or be otherwise inaccessible in the InForm Management

Console and InForm CLI. Wherever possible, this guide identifies features that

may fall into this category.