This chapter includes the following sections:
To install and configure STA for the first time, perform the following activities in the order listed. You can perform the process yourself or purchase Oracle installation services.
Note:
To upgrade STA from a previous version, see Chapter 8, "Upgrading to STA 2.2.x".Review and verify STA requirements at your site. See the STA Requirements Guide.
Review installation and configuration best practices. See "Best Practices for STA Deployment".
Prepare service requests for the drives and libraries, as necessary. See "Prepare Service Requests for the Libraries and Drives".
Install Linux on the STA server. See "Installing Linux".
Install STA on the STA server. See "Installing STA".
Configure the libraries to send data to STA. See "Configuring SNMP on the Libraries".
Configure STA to receive data from the libraries and begin monitoring. See "Configuring Library Connections in STA".
Configure additional STA usernames and email addresses. See the STA User's Guide.
Configure STA monitoring and database backup services. See "Configuring STA Services".
Configure one or more approved security certificates (optional). See "Configuring Security Certificates".
Configure one or more external providers for STA access control (optional). See "Configuring External Authentication Providers for STA".
This section provides tips for optimizing the performance and value of the STA server, database, and application.
To ensure optimal performance and functionality of the STA application, STA must be installed on a dedicated server (called the STA server). Additionally, there should be no other applications running on the server. Oracle Service can provide support only if these conditions are met.
As soon as possible in the planning process, contact your Oracle sales representative for assistance with sizing your STA server. Your sales representative can use the STA Server Sizing Tool to provide you with best sizing recommendations to meet your site's current needs and expected growth.
See the STA Requirements Guide.
If you have significant exchanges-per-hour rates (that is, greater than 300 EPH), with multiple libraries attached to a single STA server and a long history with STA, you should carefully consider the size and configuration of the following key areas.
Operating system and main application area—Oracle recommends this to be on its own appropriately sized HDD. The Oracle storage home location (for example, /Oracle) needs to be at least 100GB, but you should allocate 200GB if /tmp is in the root partition. Allocate another 200GB if /var/log/tbi is also in the root partition.
STA database data (for example, /dbdata)—Oracle recommends this to be on its own appropriately sized HDD. Guidance is from 250GB up to 500GB.
STA database backups (for example, /dbbackup)—Oracle recommends this to be on its own appropriately sized HDD. Guidance is from 500GB up to 2TB.
You may also want to consider using SSDs.
For optimal performance and functionality of the STA application, plan your STA filesystem layout and space allocations carefully. The file system is configured during Linux installation.
For optimal system performance, you may want to disable the firewall on the STA server.
Use yum to install Linux RPM packages. yum greatly simplifies the package installation process by automatically searching RPM package repositories for the latest package versions and their dependencies.
For best system performance and the most robust analytics and reporting, always upgrade to the latest version of STA.
See "Installing STA".
Beginning with STA 2.1.0, the STA installer uses the Oracle central inventory location, which is a convention common to many Oracle products. After STA installation is complete, you should register the Oracle central inventory location on the STA server by running the provided registration script. Registering the location will facilitate the installation of STA upgrades in the future.
For optimal STA server performance, you should not run a browser on the STA server to access the STA user interface or for any other purpose. Run browsers on platforms separate from the STA server.
To ensure richer library and drive data, use the most current library and drive firmware levels. See the following sections:
STA Requirements Guide, for library firmware requirements
STA Requirements Guide, for drive firmware requirements
To ensure complete compatibility with STA, some library parameters must be set to specific values. Be sure to make the following changes before you configure the library connection to STA so the libraries send data to STA in the correct format.
For SL8500 libraries, make sure the complex ID is unique for each monitored SL8500 complex.
For SL150 and SL500 libraries, ensure the volume label format is set correctly.
It is recommended that you quiesce all activity to a library before changing its parameters. In addition, tape applications and hosts may require configuration changes after library parameters have been changed.
Because all history for a particular piece of media is tied to its volume serial number (volser), you should avoid duplicate volsers in your tape library environment.
For communication between STA and the monitored libraries, Oracle recommends the more secure SNMP v3 protocol rather than SNMP v2c. The authentication, encryption, and message integrity features in SNMP v3 provide a secure mechanism for sending library data. SNMP v3 is also required for the STA media validation feature.
Oracle recommends creating a new, unique SNMP v3 user on the libraries for STA communications.
Certain activities performed in STA or on a monitored library may cause the SNMP connection with the affected library to be dropped. To minimize the dropped connection time and prevent the loss of large amounts of SNMP data, you should perform a connection test at the following times:
After the initial SNMP connection between STA and a library has been configured
After any STA SNMP client settings have been modified
After any SNMP settings for a monitored library have been modified
After a monitored library has been rebooted
After a monitored library has experienced a Redundant Electronics switch
Any time the library engine ID field is blank on the SNMP Connections – Monitored Libraries screen
After STA has been upgraded
See the STA User's Guide.
After configuring STA, you should perform a manual library data collection on each library configured to the STA server. It is recommended that you perform these initial data collections while library activity is low or quiesced.
See the STA User's Guide.
STA relies on automatic daily library data collections to gather key information for processing exchanges and evaluating the state of the library. Ideally, the daily data collections should be scheduled for times when the library is less busy. It is recommended that you choose the best time for your organization.
See the STA User's Guide.
For STA to receive SNMP data from a library, you must perform a manual data collection at the following times:
After a new library connection has been configured
After SNMP settings in STA and on the library have been modified
After a Redundant Electronics switch has occurred
After there have been any hardware configuration changes to the library, including moving drives
See the STA User's Guide.
You should configure a remote backup server for STA database backups.
It is the customer's responsibility to manage space on the STA remote backup server. You should periodically check the amount of space consumed by the STA database backups and take appropriate action when space is running low.
To assist with management of the STA server, you can define high water marks for disk and memory usage, and the Resource Monitor will alert you if these are exceeded.
If you have significant exchanges per hour rates (that is, greater than 300 EPH) with multiple libraries attached to a single STA server and a long history with STA, you might need to make adjustments to two InnoDB buffer pool parameters in the MySQL configuration file, /etc/my.cnf. To change these parameters, first stop STA, then modify the my.cnf file, and then restart STA to activate the new values.
The key parameters that may need adjusting based on your server configuration are as follows.
| Parameter | Minimum Recommended Value | Comments |
|---|---|---|
| innodb_buffer_pool_size | 24 GB or greater | The value should be 70–80 percent of the STA server's physical memory. |
| innodb_buffer_pool_instances | 8 | More buffer pools improve concurrent processing. |
Use this procedure and the referenced sections to provide Oracle Support with the information needed to prepare your libraries and drives for monitoring by STA.
Note:
If STA will be monitoring a library complex, prepare a service request for each library in the complex. Additionally, open a Service Request to install the latest drive firmware supported by STA.Verify the library firmware version. See "Verify the Library Firmware Version."
Verify a high-memory HBT card is installed (SL3000 and SL8500 only). See "Verify the Drive Controller Card Version (SL3000 and SL8500 only)".
Enable ADI on library and LTO drives: For libraries with LTO drives only. See "Enable ADI on the Library (all libraries except SL150)"
Set the library complex ID (SL8500 only). See "Ensure the Correct Library Complex ID (SL8500 only)".
Set the library date and time: To ensure that library data date/time stamps correlate to STA server date/time stamps, the library clock should be set appropriately by Oracle Support.
Submit the necessary service requests.