Subscribe to this informationExamples: Logically partitioned systems
You can use the logical partitioning examples to consolidate servers, use computing resources more efficiently, and increase the flexibility of your enterprise.
Creating multiple client environments
You provide high-availability e-commerce services to a number of clients. You provide computing resources, applications, and technical support to each client, and each client can independently configure and use the applications running on the computing resources that you provide. In such an environment, it is essential to isolate the clients so that the clients have access only to their resources. However, dedicating a physical server to each client is cost prohibitive, and does not allow you to easily increase or decrease the amount of computing resources used by each client.
You therefore decide to create a logical partition for each client. You install an operating system and applications on each logical partition. You can then use dynamic partitioning to add resources to logical partitions or remove resources from logical partitions as needed. If a client stops using your service, you can delete the logical partition for that client and reassign the resources to other logical partitions.
Testing new applications
You are a furniture manufacturer that uses an application to track inventory at your plant. A new version of the application is now available. You want to test this new version before using it on your production server, but you do not have any money to buy separate test hardware.
You therefore decide to create a separate test environment on your managed system. You remove resources from the existing production environment, and you create a new logical partition that contains the resources that you removed from the production environment. You install an operating system and the new version of the inventory application on the logical partition. You can then use dynamic partitioning to move resources from the test logical partition to the production logical partition during peak production demand, and then return the resources to the test logical partition during testing. When you have finished testing, you can delete the test logical partition, add the resources back to the production logical partition, and install the new version of the inventory application on the production system.
Integrating new acquisitions
You have just acquired a new company. Your new acquisition does not use the same applications for payroll, inventory, and billing that you do. You plan to consolidate your two companies onto a single set of applications, but it will take time to implement this consolidation. In the meantime, you are under pressure to reduce data center costs quickly.
You therefore decide to create logical partitions for the applications used by your new acquisition. You install an operating system and the applications used by the new company on the logical partition. If the combined workloads require more resources, you can use Capacity Upgrade on Demand (CUoD) to add processors and memory to the managed system, and then use dynamic partitioning to add these resources to the logical partitions. This solution allows you to save hardware costs immediately while you determine the best way to consolidate onto a single set of applications.
