v5.0.0 of Device42’s data center infrastructure management software will contain some significant changes to the way racks and other objects behave in the room view. These changes are being made to accommodate a number of customer requests including:
(1) Ability to model L-shaped rooms requiring racks pointing up or down in addition to left and right.
(2) Ability to model very small rooms such as closets.
(3) Ability to place racks on the walls in addition to in the middle of a room.
Smaller racks that can rotate up, down, left or right
The first thing you will notice about the new room view is that racks take up one square instead of two. We made this change because we thought that the expected behavior of a rack that was rotated 90 deg or 270 deg was not well-defined.
Rotate 90 deg instead of rotate 180 deg
The second thing you will notice is that when you hover over a rack, you will see an option to Rotate 90 deg (previously the option was rotate 180 deg). With the new 90 deg rotate capability, you can now create L-shaped rooms, have some racks facing left/right, and have other racks facing up/down. Some examples are shown below.
Rack orientation from the room edit page
Additionally, you can change the rack orientation from the room edit page.
Relaxed rack placement
A number of customers also requested that we relax the restrictions on where a rack can be placed. Previously, one could not place a rack on a wall or in the aisle in front of a wall. Those restrictions have been relaxed and you can place a rack anywhere you please.
Zoom in / Zoom out change
Another customer-requested change was to enable finer zoom-in / zoom-out control. Previously, each zoom click would add or remove 2 rows or columns. In this version, each zoom click will add or remove just 1 row or column. Additionally, you can now reduce the size of the grid as small as 3 x 3. This way you can use smaller grid to model a closet. Previously, the minimum grid size was 11 rows x 6 columns.
Improved data center visualization with v5.0.0
v5.0.0 will have few more exciting changes that will make life easier to document your data center with better visualizations. Follow us on twitter or subscribe to our rss feed to stay up-to-date with the latest news.
