What are the limitations of IBM Spectrum Scale support for Windows ?

• IBM Spectrum Scale for Windows does not support disks with 4K sector size.

• IBM Spectrum Scale for Windows does not support OpenLdap for Windows-Unix user-mapping. The only way to achieve Windows-Unix user-mapping in GPFS is via Identity Mapping for Unix (IMU) from Microsoft.

• Exporting IBM Spectrum Scale file systems as Server Message Block (SMB) shares (also known as CIFS shares) from IBM Spectrum Scale Windows nodes is not supported.

• GPFS V3.5.0.11 and later versions of 3.5, support Windows Server 2012 (Datacenter and Standard) in homogeneous clusters only. IBM Spectrum Scale V4.1 has no such limitation.

• NFS serving (any version of NFS) by GPFS Windows nodes is not supported.

• The mmapplypolicy command is not supported.

• If installing GPFS V3.5 on Windows 7, only the Enterprise and Ultimate x64 SP1 editions are supported as they include Subsystem for Unix-based Applications (SUA), a component of the operating system required for GPFS on Windows. In order to install SUA on Windows 7, go to Control Panel, click on Programs and then Turn Windows features on or off.

• Since Windows 7 Enterprise and Ultimate and Windows 8.1 Enterprise are desktop operating systems, these nodes can only operate as NSD clients and do not support direct attached disks. It is recommended that most GPFS administrative commands be executed on non-Windows 7 nodes.

• IBM Spectrum Scale for Windows is not supported in any environment where Citrix Provisioning Services are deployed.

• In IBM Spectrum Scale homogeneous Windows clusters, the Windows nodes can perform most of the management and administrative operations. The exceptions include:
• Certain GPFS commands to apply policies, administer quotas and administer ACLs.
• Support for the native Windows Backup utility.

• In IBM Spectrum Scale V4, the following user commands require Administrative privileges. They can only be run by a user who is a member of the Administrators group: mmchfileset, mmcrsnapshot, mmdelsnapshot, mmdf, mmlsdisk, mmlsfileset, mmlsfs, mmlspolicy, mmlspool, mmlssnapshot, and mmsnapdir.

• Encryption is not supported on Windows. The encryption function in the Advanced Edition should be disabled when Windows nodes are in the cluster.

• IPv4 subnets are not supported on a cluster that is defined with IPv6 primary addresses (hostname) that contains Windows nodes.

• With V4, V3.5 and V3.4.0.14 (and later), a DMAPI-enabled file system may be mounted on a Windows node, with certain restrictions.