Installing a Controller VM

This appendix describes how to install and configure a VM for the DANZ Monitoring Fabric Controller.

 

General Requirements

The minimum hardware required for installing the VM software image on a supported KVM or ESXi version is as follows:
  • 4 vCPUs with a minimum scheduling of 1 GHz.
  • 8 GB of virtual memory.
  • 400 GB hard disk.
  • 1 virtual network interface reachable from the physical switches.
Note: The DANZ Monitoring Fabric Hardware Appliance is recommended for production deployment because VM performance depends on many factors in the hypervisor setup.

Installing on VMware ESXi/vSphere

Prerequisites

  • A DMF Controller image in OVA format (.ova file).
  • An ESXi host can be part of vSphere cluster. Refer to the DMF Hardware Compatibility List for supported versions of ESXi and vCenter.
  • A virtual network has already been created.
  • A machine with an installed vSphereClient or webClient.
Note: Do not use ESXi 5.1 GA. A known issue exists where installing a large VM causes the ESXi host to crash. Check the VMware website for more information.

VM Installation

To install the VM, complete the following steps:
  1. Log in to vCenter or ESXi host with vSphere Client. The following uses vCenter 6.7.
  2. Right-click on the host where the Controller VM will be deployed and select Deploy OVF Template.
  3. Browse or enter the path to the OVA file and click Next.
  4. Enter the name of the VM and click Next.
  5. Select Compute Resource and click Next.
  6. Leave the provision format at the default, select the datastore, and click Next.
  7. Select Network Mapping. Map to the network created for the DMF Controller and switches. Click Next.
  8. Click Next and click Finish.
  9. Start the VM and complete the steps in Chapter 2, Installing and Configuring the DMF Controller, to set up the Controller.

vMotion support for Virtual Controller

VMware vMotion is supported for Controller pairs. This support is offered only for vCenter 7.0.2.

The following are some additional points to remember when performing vMotion of the virtual Controllers:
  • vMotion can be performed on each of the Controllers in the HA pair individually at separate times.
  • Performing vMotion of the standby Controller first is recommended.
  • Always back up the Controller configuration before performing vMotion.

Installing on Ubuntu KVM

Prerequisites

  • DMF Controller virtual disk in qcow2 format (.qcow2 file).
  • Ubuntu host with Virtual Manage Manager installed.
  • Ubuntu host is connected to the management network via a bridge br0.

VM Installation

To install the VM, complete the following steps:
  1. Copy DMF-Controller-VM.qcow2 to /var/lib/libvirt/images/.
  2. Start Virtual Machine Manager,and choose Create a new virtual machine.
  3. Provide a name for the new VM and click Import existing disk image options. Click Forward to continue.
  4. Set the existing storage path to point to the provided DMF Controller image. Press Forward to continue.
  5. Set the Memory (RAM) and CPU. Allocate at least 4G RAM and 2 CPU instances for the image. Click Forward to continue.
  6. Select the checkbox Customize configuration before install. Expand Advanced options, change to Specify shared device name.
  7. Enter the Bridge name: br0, to bind the Controller virtual machine to the br0 bridge interface created previously. Click Finish to continue.
  8. Under the Processor section, expand Configuration. Select the Copy host CPU configuration option. This may improve performance dramatically, depending on your VM host. Click Apply to save the changes.
  9. Under the Disk 1 section, expand Advanced options and Performance options. Set the options on this page as follows:
    • Disk bus: VirtIO
    • Storage format: qcow2
    • Cache mode: Writeback
    • IO mode: default
  10. Click Apply to save the changes.
  11. Under the NIC section, set the Device model to virtio. Click Apply to save the changes.
  12. Select Begin installation to create the virtual machine.
  13. Follow the steps in Installing and Configuring the DMF Controller to set up the Controller.