In my previous post I covered DPTPB Dynamic shape usage in manual mode. At the end of the previous post I described briefly how to add new disk sizes to existing front view shapes and promised to deliver more detailed and safer instructions for adding new disk sizes.
The method I described earlier is based on manually editing shapesheet variables in master shapesheet. While not awfully difficult, manually editing might sound scary to users unfamiliar with Visio shapesheets and variables. Additionally manual operations always carry more risks.
Maybe there is a better way?
New “Select Disk Sizes Used” pull-down menu
So I thought about adding new disk sizes little bit more and decided to add new functionality to front view shapes. With new “Shape Data” pull-down menu “Select Disk Sizes Used”, users can now have more control over disk sizes that are used with the front view shapes.
Supported (Disk Sizes)
The default value for “Select Disk Sizes Used” is “Supported”. Just like before once you select a disk layout, additional pull-down menus are shown where you can select disk size per disk type. And disk labels are populated with disk sizes based on your selections.
By leaving “Select Disk Sizes Used” in its default value, the disk lists will contain the same disk sizes as previously, the disk sizes that were supported according to spec sheets at the time when the shape was created.
Generic (Disks sizes)
Disk sizes tend to change during the lifetime of NX hardware models, even without hardware generation changing. From time to time, new disk sizes are introduced by disk manufacturers. Usually it takes a while for new disk sizes to find their way onto supported disk lists as Nutanix has to qualify new disk sizes, decide which are good candidates to be used and then release a new version of AOS which supports using these new disk sizes.
So what to do when DPTPB Dynamic shapes are lagging behind and have not been updated to have recently released disk sizes?
By selecting “Generic” entry in “Select Disk Sizes Used” pull-down menu, previously mentioned disk size lists are now populated with more disk sizes, both smaller and larger disk sizes than the currently supported disk sizes. Users can select whatever disk size they want to and the labels will be populated accordingly.
Obviously “generic” list contains disk sizes that are not supported by Nutanix or might not even exist yet, so some care is required when using “Generic” setting.
Manual Entry
Predicting future is not always so accurate, and “generic” disk lists might not contain disk sizes you are looking for. As the last option for labeling the disks, there is now third entry in the “Select Disk Sizes Used” menu, a “Manual Entry”.
Be selecting “Manual Entry” few things happen
- The prompt now states “Type in XXX Size”, instead of “Select XXX Size”
- The field that previously was a pull-down menu, now becomes a text entry field
- And users can type in missing disk size into that field
- Any text typed into the text entry field will be shown in the disk label shapes
- There are NO validity checks, you can type in whatever you desire
- The space with label shapes is limited to just few characters, try to keep your entry short or it might not fit within the label shape
Examples
Example 1: Older “NX-8155-G7 Dyn (F)” shape with supported disk sizes only
Example 1.1: “Shape data” without “Select Disk Size Used” menu
Example 1.2: “4xSSD” selected as “Disk layout”
Example 1.3: “Select SSD Size” menu expanded
- The largest SSD available is 3.84TB (selected)
Example 1.4: Older Dynamic “NX-8155-G7 Dyn (F)” based on the selections above
Example 2: New “NX-8155-G7 Dyn (F)” shape with “Generic” disk sizes
Example 2.1: New “Shape data” with “Select Disk Size Used” menu
- A new entry in the “Shape Data”
- “Select Disk Sizes Used”
Example 2.2: “Select Disk Sizes Used” expanded
- Three possible selections
- Supported
- The default value
- Same supported disk size lists as before
- Generic
- Generic Disk Size lists
- with more different sizes
- Selected
- indicated by the blue color
- Generic Disk Size lists
- Manual Entry
- Users can type in disk size text
- Supported
Example 2.3: “4xSSD” selected as “Disk layout”
Example 2.4: “Select SSD Size” menu expanded
- More SSD sizes to choose from
- 7.68TB selected
Example 2.5: New Dynamic “NX-8155-G7 Dyn (F)” based on the selections above
Example 3: New “NX-8155-G7 Dyn (F)” shape with “Manual Entry” disk sizes
Example 3.1: New “Shape data” with “Select Disk Size Used” menu
Example 3.2: “Select Disk Sizes Used” expanded
- “Manual Entry” selected instead of default value “Supported”
Example 3.3: “4xSSD” selected as “Disk layout”
- Since we had previously chosen “Manual Entry” in “Select Disk Sizes Used” menu
- The label for disk size selection has now changed to
- “Type in SSD Size”
- With “Supported” and “Generic” selections in “Select Disk Sizes Used” menu the label is
- “Select SSD Size”
Example 3.4: “SSD 9.6TB ” typed in “Type in SSD Size”
Example 3.5: New Dynamic “NX-8155-G7 Dyn (F)” shape based on the selections above
Example 4: You can type whatever you like in the “Type in XXX Size” field
- No validity checks…
Other bug fixes
While I was at it, I also decided to address one limitation found with the DPTPB Dynamic shapes.
Previously there was a chance that a shape might get broken, if font size was changed while a DPTPB Dynamic shape was selected. I’ve now modified DPTPB shapes to address this issue and changing font size should not break the shapes anymore.
In Visio there is a handy function called “GUARD()”. Any changes made in the GUI will not affect shapesheet values protected by “GUARD()” functions. All DPTPB Dynamic shapes with values in “font size” fields are now protected by “GUARD()” function.
Bugs found?
Comments regarding any possible bugs can be left in the comments section of this post, your help is much appreciated
Downloads
- Please visit the Nutanix stencil download page for the latest stencil package.
- Since these are unofficial Visio shapes, they are not available on visiocafe.com, where the official stencil package resides.
Further documentation
- Intro
- Front & Rear View Shape usage
- Cables & Labels
- NX-1175S-G7 & NX-1175S-G6
- NX-1065-G7 /-G6 & NX-3060-G7 /-G6
- NX-8150-G7 & NX-8155-G7/ -G6 & NX-5155-G6
- NX-8035-G7 & NX-8035-G6
- NX-8170-G7 & NX-3170-G6
- NX-3155-G7 & NX-3155-G6
- Non-Dynamic mode
- Custom Disk Sizes (this post)
- Disk Size Validity Checks
- Why unofficial shapes?
- Limitations
- Update Notes
- NX-3170-G7 & Minor updates
- NX-8170-G7 with partially populated NVMe bays
- NX-1120S-G7 & Minor updates
DontPokeThePolarBear 