Test 330: Power Systems Technical Support for AIX and Linux

Value Proposition

1. Identify business requirements that can be met by Power Systems capabilities and technologies (e.g. flexibility responsiveness etc.).
2. Describe Power Systems' value proposition as relates to investment protection
3. Describe Power Systems scalability (horizontal and vertical scalability and clustering)
4. Evaluate the customer's existing system environment and describe performance

Product Positioning - Price, Performance, and Capabilities

1. Identify resources needed to provide predictable performance for the customers' requirements (CPU, memory, I/O, etc.)
2. Recognize sizing elements (applications, databases, CPU, memory, transaction rates, processing spikes, growth, performance) and use benchmarks.
3. Describe and compare various Power System family members and packaging including capabilities, storage options, and capacities, including Capacity on Demand (propose the correct model to meet customer requirements).
4. Position the energy saving features of the Power Systems family of servers (Active Energy Manager, Energy Scale, intelligent PDU, etc.) relative to customer requirements.

Competition

1. Demonstrate Power Systems competitive advantages (e.g. architecture, performance, balanced system, TCO, and virtualization) compare with other architectures (e.g. Sun, HP, and Dell)
2. Describe AIX competitive advantages over other operating system environments.
3. Understand competitors' use of terminology and how it compares with IBM terminology.
4. Describe Linux on Power and compare with other Linux implementations, including PowerVM Lx86.
5. Describe competitive advantages of virtualization (PowerVM).

Hardware Architecture and Technologies

1. Describe storage options for Power Systems including SCSI, iSCSI, NAS, SAN and SAS.
2. Describe POWER6 architecture and hardware (processor, I/O and memory, CoD processors and memory).
3. Identify basic networking concepts and options (TCP/IP, LAN, WAN, switches, VLAN, and IVE).
4. Compare and contrast console / system management options and tasks (e.g. HMC, Integrated Virtualization Manager (IVM), KVM ).
5. Describe RAS components and capabilities, and apply business value to the customer.

Operating Systems and Licensed Program Products

1. Identify software offerings for high availability (e.g. CSM, PowerHA, GPFS).
2. Articulate the features, characteristics, and flexibility of available operating systems (AIX, i5/OS, Linux)
3. Identify networking products (GPFS, Grid Toolbox) --REMOVED DURING DEV
4. Identify system management tools available for Power Systems (e.g. Performance Toolbox, Tivoli, AIX Management Edition, Systems Director, CSM)
5. Describe provisions and features of SWMA as it applies to POWER6 and the previous generation

Virtualization

1. Distinguish between PowerVM Express, Standard, and Enterprise Editions.
2. Describe partition mobility
3. Understand and describe Workload Partitions
4. Describe virtual I/O (e.g. IVE, VLAN, IVM and VIOS).
5. Explain shared processors micro-partitioning (incl. capped and uncapped, multiple shared processing pools, etc.), and provisioning, and describe their business value.

Support and Services

1. Utilize appropriate support resources (e.g. Techline/PartnerLine/CompeteLine, whitepapers, Redbooks, COMP website, Migration Factory,etc.)
2. Solution Assurance/TDA
3. Installation Planning (including power requirements, site planning, etc.)
4. Ongoing customer support and services (SupportLine, ITS/IGS installation services, STG Lab services, Availability Services, etc)