This post is a continuation of the series that I started with aggregates. FlexVols are created inside of an aggregate and are the logical assignment of the aggregate’s capacity to sub-containers. Think of a FlexVol as a folder on a file system with a quota applied to it…while that isn’t technically true, it get’s the gist across.
- Aggregates
- Volumes (this post)
FlexVols are the data containers from which CIFS/NFS data (including virtual machines) is served, and/or LUNs are hosted from. They are the functional level for which many features are applied, such as deduplication, and provide logical separation for data sets. From a security point of view, no data in one volume is available from another, and even though the disks are shared, there are no shared blocks between volumes (even with deduplication).
Clustered Data ONTAP introduced the ability to move volumes between nodes in the cluster. I won’t preach about the benefits of cDOT, but there are many and they far outweigh the added complexity. This series is meant to stay focused on the data container settings, which are the same between 7-Mode and clustered Data ONTAP.
Before we begin, I want to note that TR-3749 and TR-4068 should always be the primary reference and guide when deploying VMware using NetApp storage.