This chapter helps you define a new SP system or clustered enterprise server system that meets your hardware and software computing needs. You will be asked to answer many questions about the type of system you want and you will be instructed to complete a set of worksheets as you progress through the questions.
Decision making is an iterative and recursive process. Therefore, you might find yourself modifying answers to questions you previously answered. Reviewing and modifying your plans is a necessary part of a thorough planning process. The output of this exercise should be a completed layout of your system hardware and software that will help you to prepare for your installation.
| Contact your network administrator. |
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Connecting your SP system to a network has important benefits because networking information is critical to the success of the RS/6000 SP system installation. Network planning is a complex but necessary part of a thorough planning process. It is important to consider networking information early in the process so do not delay contacting your network administrator. |
As you plan your SP system you will make many decisions. The remainder of this chapter poses several questions for you to answer. Review these questions and become familiar with the type of information you need to gather throughout the planning process.
This chapter contains sample worksheets for a hypothetical corporation called the ABC Corporation. Review these sample worksheets and use them as a guide to see the decisions you need to make and how to complete them. Decisions made by the ABC Corporation are shown in constant width font to help distinguish them from the fixed text in the worksheet.
Your decisions will most likely be different from those of the ABC Corporation. This is natural since every company is different and the decisions you make must meet the needs of your organization.
As you go through these questions, fill in your copies of the worksheets in Appendix C, SP system planning worksheets with the information about your system. First, make several copies of all the worksheets. You might change your mind as you go through the worksheets. You will need the original blank copies plus your completed worksheets in the future when you want to add to or otherwise change your system.
Your completed worksheets serve primarily to prepare you with much of the information you need to have during installation and configuration of your system frames, nodes, and switches, as well as for installation or migration and configuration of the PSSP software. The book PSSP: Installation and Migration Guide instructs you through that process.
Your completed worksheets can also serve to document your system hardware, software, and network configuration. You might consider some of the information to be confidential. Take care to handle completed worksheets according to the security policy established in your organization.