ISO/IEC 24775-2:2021

Overview

ISO/IEC 24775-2:2021 - "Information technology - Storage management - Part 2: Common Architecture" defines the core architecture and protocols used by the SMI-S (Storage Management Initiative Specification) API. Published jointly by ISO and IEC and prepared by SNIA, this standard specifies the transport model, object model conventions, messaging and service-discovery approaches, health and fault management, installation/upgrade guidance, and compliance requirements for interoperable multi‑vendor SAN and storage-management solutions.

Key Topics and Requirements

• Transport and Reference Model: Defines the transport stack, communication requirements and XML message syntax (CIM-XML) used to exchange management information between SMI-S constituents.
• Object Model and Naming: Describes the common object model (including CIM schema updates, e.g., CIM version 2.51 in recent revisions) and naming conventions that allow applications to correlate objects across SMI‑S and other standards.
• Health and Fault Management: Specifies monitoring mechanisms and operational status reporting used to detect failures and manage storage component health.
• Standard Messages and Indications: Provides standardized exception/alert messages and references the DMTF Indications Profile (e.g., DSP 1054) so clients receive consistent event/alert semantics.
• Service Discovery: Techniques for clients to discover SMI‑S services in a multi‑vendor environment.
• Installation, Upgrade and Compliance: Recommendations for implementation, versioning policy (major/minor/update), maturity levels (Experimental, Implemented, Stable, Finalized) and compliance rules to ensure interoperability.
• Security and Transport Links: References to related security guidance (e.g., SNIA TLS specification) and network transport considerations for secure management traffic.

Applications and Who Uses It

ISO/IEC 24775-2:2021 is intended for:

• Storage vendors building SMI‑S compliant arrays, controllers and software.
• Management software developers (enterprise storage managers, orchestration and monitoring tools) that integrate multi-vendor SANs.
• System integrators and architects designing interoperable storage ecosystems.
• Storage administrators who rely on standardized alerts, health monitoring and service discovery across heterogeneous storage environments.

Practical uses include vendor-neutral storage monitoring, automated provisioning, fault detection and cross‑vendor orchestration in SANs and data centers.

Related Standards

• ISO/IEC 24775 series (other parts of Storage Management)
• SNIA SMI‑S specification (Storage Management Technical Specification)
• DMTF Indications Profile (DSP 1054) - used for standardized event/indication handling
• CIM/CIM‑XML schema references (CIM schema updates referenced in the specification)
• SNIA TLS Spec for secure management transport

Keywords: ISO/IEC 24775-2:2021, SMI‑S, storage management, SAN interoperability, storage architecture, CIM-XML, DMTF Indications, SNIA, storage compliance.