Product Introduction

Documentation …

Vital for troubleshooting, essential for planning … but who wants to maintain it!

Everyone wants the benefits of accurate, complete and current information.

Our mission was to create the most efficient product and methodology to ensure you always have it!

We would like to present

OBTAIN 24/7 To your data center.

Working Together

Automatic Diagram Generation!

Diagrams are a great tool during configuration planning and change implementation.

Drawing packages and CAD products can be used to make diagrams, however, the basic

design of such products demands a large amount of time and effort to produce the diagrams.

OBTAIN 24/7 uses a completely different approach. Diagrams are generated automatically

from the database. All spacial layout is performed by OBTAIN 24/7. You can tailor the

diagrams quickly and extensively. We realize that your job is to plan and implement

configurations changes. Diagrams are just a tool, the less time you spend maintaining them,

the better!

Configuration data is very

complex. Even small

objects often have many

relationships. If you

forget one of the links

during a change, it could

lead to a nasty failure.

Sure, you can store

configuration data in

spreadsheets and CAD

drawings, but they lack

automatic error and

consistency checking.

OBTAIN 24/7 is a robust

configuration database

designed wi th one

purpose in mind …

serving the data center! It

can record even the most

subt le re la t ionsh ips

between all of the objects you need

t o m a n a g e , a n d O B T A I N

accomplishes this in a multi-user,

concurrent access environment with

multiple versions of the configuration

data available!

No other configuration database can

provide this type of power and

flexibility! No other product has the

wide range of automatic diagram

generation combined with automatic

highlighting to show what has

changed between versions of

configuration data!

The huge increase in rack mounted devices creates documentation problems for

many sites. Like CAD based products, OBTAIN 24/7 provides a graphical way to

document each device and rack. But get ready to take your documentation to a

whole new level!

With OBTAIN you can quickly jump between four important views: rack, floor,

data and connectivity. And the linkage between views is automatic! Unlike CAD

drawings, you do not need to manually create and maintain ‘link buttons’ between

diagrams.

OBTAIN diagrams are not separate drawings that have to be maintained. The dia-

grams are fully integrated with the database so each change immediately alters all re-

lated diagrams.

Device Racks

Leverage the investment you have made in

your configuration data by adding power in-

formation.

Power Manager is an optional product, but it

is tightly integrated with the OBTAIN data-

base. It is a graphical planning tool for docu-

menting all aspects of power from substations

through the UPS to PDUs and end devices.

Facilities often maintains a separate set of

documentation that it ‘guards’ and rarely

shares. The demands of 24/7 planning an op-

eration require faster more complete informa-

tion sharing. OBTAIN 24/7 provides a com-

mon database for all data center assets and

connectivity.

Your OBTAIN administrator has complete

control over which users can update data.

Power Manager

For years, we’ve heard data center people say “Wouldn’t it be great to have all of our

hardware and connectivity documentation in a single database.” Well now you can! Say

goodbye to incomplete, out-of-date, inconsistent documents in different formats.

Location View is an optional product that provides a way to create CAD-like drawings to

document the placement of your Device, Rack, Patch Panel and Power Assets on the floor.

A single drawing can be created for each Location defined in OBTAIN.

Floor views are automatically integrated with connectivity and power data. This provides a

fast ‘jump’ between logical and physical data. Planners and problem solvers are able to

quickly view all aspects of an asset. Connectivity between assets can even be displayed on

the floor view!

Location View

The advantages of using OBTAIN Location View are:

Lower Maintenance Effort

All assets that are positioned in a location are automatically linked to related

device rack views, asset dialogs, connectivity diagrams, power panels, PDUs, etc.

Simplicity

The design of CAD based floor layout products are built around symbols. This

old technology was appropriate when devices were large and had unusual door

swings and clearances. Today, almost all devices are either rack mounted or

simple rectangular boxes. OBTAIN takes advantage of this graphic simplicity to

save you time and effort.

Multi-user Access

The Location features can be viewed by anyone with access to the OBTAIN

database without the expense and training cost of providing each user with their

own copy of a CAD product.

Tight Integration

The tight integration with the OBTAIN 24/7 database enables advanced features

such as displaying all connections from a device to other objects on the floor view

with just a couple of clicks.

Speed

The compact, object-oriented design of OBTAIN has been extended to the

graphic symbols used in the floor view. If you have ever waited while your CAD

software loads a project and then opens a full drawing that you much search and

zoom into before useful work can begin, then you may be ready for some new

technology.

Location View

Workorders is a revolutionary technology designed to solve several problems found in data centers that

have grown in size, complexity or have an increased number of people planning and making changes

concurrently.

Problem 1 – Communicating changes from planner to reviewer to implementor.

OBTAIN Workorders saves all changes in a ‘delta database’. This ensures that the production

database always reflects the current state of assets and connectivity even while the planned

change or workorder is being developed. A side benefit of this is that OBTAIN 24/7 knows

exactly which objects, such as cables or ports, will be changed by the plan.

The diagram on the next page is one example of how this information is used to highlight the

important items from those that do not need to be focused on. This can save valuable time

during the review process and more easily point out deficiencies in the plan. It also saves time

during the critical change window.

As well as highlighting changes. OBTAIN 24/7 can be used to exclude large amounts of detail

from reports and diagrams when it is unrelated to the change being worked on.

Problem 2 – Keeping planners from double allocating key resources such as switch ports or shared fiber infrastructure.

OBTAIN Workorders has a sophisticated lock mechanism that keeps asynchronous changes

from using the same physical resource. The locking happens at the smallest and most discrete

component such as a single port or jumper cable. This lets planners use the same patch panels

or switch devices but informs then when they try to double allocate a resource.

Problem 3 – Keeping a plan synchronized with a changing base set of documentation even if the plan is delayed.

OBTAIN Workorders are like delta databases that are spawned from the production database.

After a plan is reviewed and implemented, the workorder is applied to the production database.

All of its changes automatically flow through to other, “in-progress” workorders. This means

that other planners see the newly implemented changes integrated into their plan and can make

adjustments if required. Workorder plans can be evolved over extended periods of time while

ensuring that they are always in sync with the production database.

Workorders

Workorders

Problem 4 – Planning for Multiple Scenarios

Planning lead times and change windows are shrinking. Often the final decision on which set of

equipment will be purchased is not made until the very last moment. The best way to cope

with such a dynamic environment is to preplan for the two most likely scenarios. When the

final decision is made, one of the scenarios can be fleshed out in more detail and implemented

quickly.

OBTAIN Workorders can be made ‘mutually exclusive’. Meaning that from the start only one

of the workorders will be applied, while the other is discarded. OBTAIN allows mutually

exclusive workorders to double allocate resources such as CHPIDs, ports etc. This gives you a

jump on the planning process and often identifies other resources that need to be financed and

ordered to successfully implement the proposed change.

OBTAIN’s Workorder feature

turns it into a multi-state database

which is like having several

separate yet completely integrated

databases acting as one. This is a

good fit with how work in a real

data center is planned and

performed. In reality, thing

happen asynchronously. Several

changes are being planned, altered

and performed at the same time.

Some of them are implemented on

schedule. Others are delayed.

Some are abandoned or backed

out of. You need to constantly

adjust your plans based on changes

made or planned by other people.

OBTAIN 24/7 ensures you plan is

kept in sync.

Workorders

Many of the largest data centers in the US, Canada and Europe use OBTAIN.

With our business partners, we have helped our customers refine their hardware planning process. Along

the way we have learned a lot! The most important improvement in the accuracy and completeness of

documentation comes from making the documentation a by-product of the planning process.

Historically, documentation has been an afterthought. Something people get around to after the change is

finished and if there is time before the next change hits the fan. So, cable labels are created in an ad hoc

fashion and often the complete picture of a change can only be formed by piecing together documents

from several different sources.

In time of hardware failure, disaster recovery or loss of key personnel, a heavy price is paid. On a daily

basis, a hidden price is paid each time someone needs to:

Run out to the floor to check something;

Interrupt another worker for information they maintain but cannot share

because it is in their unique format … or in their head;

Pull a cable because on one knows where it goes;

Call a meeting to discuss a preventable outage.

It used to be that the mainframe equipment was completely separate from open systems. Even within

open systems the HP hardware might be controlled by a different group that the SUN Servers. Data

centers have changed and will continue to evolve. Accurate and complete configuration data maintained

by consistent methods is one of the hallmarks of a well run data center.

In an increasingly 24/7 mobile world, key data center people are expected to respond immediately to

outages. The continuing evolution of PDA technology will enable us to put the complete OBTAIN

database with security at your fingertips wherever you are. The efficient, object oriented data structure

and automatic diagram generating algorithms of the OBTAIN database make it uniquely adaptable to the

small screen size and limited memory of pocket PC based PDAs.

Our engineers are currently gathering design specs for this project. If you would like to share your ideas,

please e-mail your suggestions to kfc@obtain.com

Workorders

Future Developments

Import/Export

Features

HCD Utility

MVS UCB (VOLSER Import)

Device Import

Cable Import

Cable Label Export

MS Access Export

Spreadsheet Link

Contact

Information

System

Requirements

CLIENT

• IBM-compatible PC Pentium CPU

• 128 MB of RAM, 50 MB hard drive space

• Windows 9x/2000® or Windows NT® 4.x (or later)

SERVER

• IBM-compatible PC, Pentium 600 or above CPU

• 245 MB of RAM, 60 MB hard drive space

• Windows NT® Server 4.x (or later)

OBTAIN 24/7 is a registered trademark of Knowledge Flow Corp.

© Copyright 2003 Knowledge Flow Corp.