What is emulation in terms of vmax/powermax?

Hello reachayush,

Which PowerMax system do you have?

The EMULATION type refers to the type of device. Open systems requires a Fixed Block Architecture (FBA) device, while Mainframe needs Count-Key-Data (CKD) for example. So it is the EMULATION type that describes this.

The CPUs in PMAX are hyper-threaded and capable of various roles.  So, Emulations are merely the assignment of the core to its role.  Which is what that CPU will be doing.  These are I/O tasks and Data Services that fall into one of three broad buckets, who’s categories are front-end, middle or back-end processes / data services.

HYPERMAX OS provides a range of emulations that operate between the array, host, management, and back-end functions. You asked about FA, EDS, IM Emulations:

Both IM & EDS are Management Emulations

IM enables the separation of infrastructure tasks and emulations. By separating these tasks, emulations can focus on I/O-specific work only, while IM manages and executes common infrastructure tasks, such as environmental monitoring, Field

Replacement Unit (FRU) monitoring, and vaulting.

EDS is the middle layer used to separate front-end and back-end communications. It acts as a translation layer between the front end, which is what the host knows about, and the back end, which is the layer that reads, writes, and communicates with

physical storage in the VMAX3 array.

FA is a Front-End Emulation for Fibre Channel that receives I/O’s from hosts and commits it to the PMAX.

DS, you didn’t ask about but it’s the Back-End Emulation, which handles the back-end connection in the array that communicates with the disk drives, DS is also known as an internal disk controller.

Good Knowledge sharing