Beginning with ONTAP 9.10.1, File System Analytics includes an Activity Tracking feature that allows you to identify hot objects and download the data as a CSV file. Beginning with ONTAP 9.11.1, Activity Tracking is expanded to the SVM scope. Also beginning in ONTAP 9.11.1, ONTAP System Manager features a timeline for Activity Tracking, allowing you to look through up to five minutes of Activity Tracking data.

Activity Tracking enables monitoring in four categories:

Directories
Files
Clients
Users

For each category monitored, Activity Tracking will display read IOPs, write IOPs, read throughputs, and write throughputs. Queries on Activity Tracking refresh every 10 to 15 seconds pertaining to hot spots seen in the system over the previous five-second interval.

Activity tracking information is approximate, and the accuracy of the data depends on the distribution of the incoming I/O traffic.

When viewing Activity Tracking in ONTAP System Manager at the volume level, only the menu of the expanded volume will actively refresh. If the view of any volumes are collapsed, they will not refresh until the volume display is expanded. You can stop the refreshes with the Pause Refresh button. Activity data can be downloaded in a CSV format that will display all the point-in-time data captured for the selected volume.

With the timeline feature available beginning in ONTAP 9.11.1, you can keep a record of hotspot activity on a volume or SVM, continuously updating approximately every five seconds and retaining the previous five minutes of data. Timeline data is only retained for fields that are visible area of the page. If you collapse a tracking category or scroll so the timeline is out of view, the timeline will stop collecting data. By default, timelines are disabled and will automatically be disabled when you navigate away from the Activity tab.

Enable Activity Tracking for a single volume

You can enable Activity Tracking with ONTAP System Manager or the CLI.

About this task

If you use RBAC with the ONTAP REST API or ONTAP System Manager, you will need to create custom roles to manage access to Activity Tracking. See Role-based access control for this process.

ONTAP System Manager

Steps

Select Storage > Volumes. Select the desired volume. From the individual volume menu, select File System and then select the Activity tab.
Ensure Activity Tracking is turned on to view individual reports on top directories, files, clients, and users.
To analyze data in greater depth without refreshes, select Pause Refresh. You can download the data to have a CSV record of the report as well.

CLI

Steps

Enable Activity Tracking:

volume activity-tracking on -vserver svm_name -volume volume_name
Check if the Activity Tracking state for a volume is on or off with the command:

volume activity-tracking show -vserver svm_name -volume volume_name -state
Once enabled, use ONTAP System Manager or the ONTAP REST API to display Activity Tracking data.

Enable Activity Tracking for multiple volumes

You can enable Activity Tracking for multiple volumes with ONTAP System Manager or the CLI.

About this task

If you use RBAC with the ONTAP REST API or ONTAP System Manager, you will need to create custom roles to manage access to Activity Tracking. See Role-based access control for this process.

ONTAP System Manager

Enable for specific volumes

Select Storage > Volumes. Select the desired volume. From the individual volume menu, select File System and then select the Activity tab.
Select the volumes that you want to enable Activity Tracking on. At the top of the volume list, select the More Options button. Select Enable Activity Tracking.
To view Activity Tracking at the SVM level, select the specific SVM you would like to view from Storage > Volumes. Navigate to the File System tab then Activity and you will see data for the volumes that have Activity Tracking enabled.

Enable for all volumes

Select Storage > Volumes. Select an SVM from the menu.
Navigate to the File System tab, choose the More tab to enable Activity Tracking on all volumes in the SVM.

CLI

Beginning in ONTAP 9.13.1, you can enable Activity Tracking for multiple volumes using the ONTAP CLI.

Steps

Enable Activity Tracking:

volume activity-tracking on -vserver svm_name -volume [*|!volume_names]

Use * to enable Activity Tracking for all volumes on the specified storage VM.

Use ! followed by volume names to enable Activity Tracking for all volumes on the SVM except the named volumes.
Confirm the operation succeeded:

volume show -fields activity-tracking-state
Once enabled, use ONTAP System Manager or the ONTAP REST API to display Activity Tracking data.