Tips & Tricks Volume 2: Policy based Auto-Add quotas

When system administrators think of managing disk space the first thing that usually comes to mind is home directories.  This is because home directories are where the majority of users store the bulk of their data.  By default there are no limitations to the amount of space any home folder can consume.  That being the case users, or any single user, can easily consume all the storage space on a file server, which can lead to costly server downtime.

The solution is to implement quotas (size limitations) on home directories.  To many system administrators this seems like a daunting task, mainly because many organizations have hundreds or thousands of home directories.  If the home directories on your file server have the same username as the user they belong to SpaceGuard SRM offers a simple and elegant deployment solution, Auto-Add.  A single Auto-Add may be used to automatically deploy quotas to every home directory on a file server.  Furthermore, the Auto-Add quota can automatically setup alert and revoke write access actions when limits are reached.  After and Auto-Add quota has been put in place it remains active, allowing it to automatically deploy quotas to any new home directories that are created.  This means that once an Auto-Add quota has been put in place system administrators may never have to setup a quota again.

To implement this powerful feature complete the following procedure:

This procedure assumes all home directories are within a shared folder called "users" and that the following limits and actions should be put into place:

200 MB quota limit
When 50% of the limit is reached send a popup to the user
When 100% of the limit is reached send a popup to the user
When 100% of the limit is reached send a popup to the administrator
When 100% of the limit is reached revoke the user's write access

***Before beginning make sure the SpaceGuard SRM client has been installed, and that he SpaceGuard Service has been installed on the machine where the home directories reside.

Let's begin

1.) Open the SpaceGuard SRM client, using the "Network view" navigate to the machine where the home directories reside.  Expand the machine so it's drives are displayed.  Expand the drive that contains the shared "users" folder so it can be seen.
2.) Right-click the shared "users" folder and choose Auto-Add/Add..., the following dialog appears:

Use this dialog to specify any home folders that should not receive a quota, click "Next" when finished, the following dialog appears:

Leave the default option "Specify quota limits" selected and click "Next," the following dialog appears:

3.) Leave the default option "Absolute value" selected and enter a value of "200 MB," click "Next," the following dialog appears:

4.) Click "Add," the following dialog appears:

Change the "Percentage of quota size:" to "50" and click "Add," the following dialog appears:

Choose "Popup" and click "OK," the following dialog appears:

Right-click your cursor in the "Destination" field and choose Keywords/%RELATIVE_QUOTA_DIRECTORY%, the %RELATIVE_QUOTA_DIRECTORY% keyword is the last part of the path the quota has been applied to.  Since the folder name is the same as the username the "Destination" field will automatically be populated with the username at runtime.  Now type in the message the end user should receive in the "Message" field.  Keywords may also be used in the message, this allows you to provide users with dynamic information about their quota, e.g.  how much space they have left.  Click "OK," click "OK," the following dialog appears:

5.) Follow step 4 again but this time enter "100" as the "Percentage of quota size:," the following dialog appears:

6.) Follow step 4 again but this select the "Popup at 100.00% " limit and choose "Edit." When constructing the popup alert enter "Administrator" as the destination for the popup, the following dialog appears:

7.) Select the "Popup, Popup at 100.00%" limit and choose "Edit," the following dialog appears:

Click "Add," the following dialog appears:

Choose "Revoke access," the following dialog appears:

In the "User or group" field enter \%RELATIVE_QUOTA_DIRECTORY%.  This will revoke write access for the user whose username is the same as the folder the quota is applied to.  Click "OK," click "OK," the following dialog appears:

Click "Next," the following dialog appears:

Enter a policy name.  Upon clicking "Finish" the Auto-Add policy is saved for re-use and is applied, every folder beneath the shared "users" folder will receive the configured quota.  New directories created in the shared "users" folder will automatically receive the Auto-Add quota.