HiveManager NG Virtual Appliance

Transcription

1 HiveManager NG Virtual Appliance vsphere Configuration This document provides information on setting up the vsphere virtualization environment to deploy and run HiveManager NG Virtual Appliance. The configuration instructions in this guide are based on vsphere ESXi 6.0 and vcenter 6.0 Document Revision History Revision Date Notes 01 6/02/2017 Initial version To learn more about Aerohive products, visit Aerohive Networks, Inc.

2 HiveManager NG Virtual Appliance: vsphere Configuration 2 Contents Preparing the Network Environment... 3 vsphere... 4 High Availability... 5 Changing Virtual Machine Resource Settings... 8 Optimizing vsphere Resources (Optional) Managing the Virtual Machine with vsphere... 14

3 HiveManager NG Virtual Appliance: vsphere Configuration 3 Preparing the Network Environment The network in which you put your HiveManager NG Virtual Appliance must meet the following requirements: Internet access (http/https) for the purposes of license verification. With the version of the HiveManager NG Virtual Appliance, this can also be achieved using a proxy server. The appliance no longer needs direct access to the Internet but can instead use a proxy server if available. An A record on the local DNS server for the FQDN of the HiveManager NG Virtual Appliance (for example, the host name hivemanager.local.domain resolves to the internal IP address ). A PTR record on the local DNS server for the reverse lookup which will resolve the IP address back to the HiveManager NG Virtual Appliance FQDN (for example, in-addr.arpa resolves to hivemanager.local.domain). Note: Failing to configure DNS correctly may cause issues with accessing HiveManager NG and disrupt database operations! Example DNS A and PTR record configuration on Windows Server 2012 serving as local DNS server:

4 HiveManager NG Virtual Appliance: vsphere Configuration 4 vsphere In general, you will need the following components before you proceed with installing the HiveManager NG Virtual Appliance: VMware ESXi Server 5.5 or higher. VMware vsphere vcenter server, same version as ESXi or higher. If the vcenter version is lower than the ESXi, vcenter will not be able to properly manage the ESXi server. When using ESXi versions above 5.5, do not forget to upgrade the VMtools from the vsphere client. To check whether the VMtools version is current, select the VM from the vsphere client and go to the Summary page. The VMware tools version should show Current. If the VMtools version is Out-of-date, select the VM and click Guest > Install/Upgrade VMware Tools. The upgrade will be done automatically in the background.

5 HiveManager NG Virtual Appliance: vsphere Configuration 5 High Availability To support high availability (HA), at least two physical ESXi hosts are required. Both hosts must have access to shared storage to be able to retrieve the VM image. The ESXi hosts must form a cluster because HA functionality is configured at the cluster level. When you create a cluster, check the Turn On vsphere HA option. You will also need to have at least two physical hosts available, both running on at least the minimum hardware specification for your selected deployment size. 1. To configure a cluster through the vsphere client, click File > New > Cluster. 2. Give the cluster a name, select Turn On vsphere HA, and then click Next.

6 HiveManager NG Virtual Appliance: vsphere Configuration 6 3. On the vsphere HA page, select Enable Host Monitoring, and then click Next. 4. On the VM Monitoring page, choose VM and Application Monitoring from the VM Monitoring drop-down list and then click Next.

7 HiveManager NG Virtual Appliance: vsphere Configuration 7 5. Add both ESXi hosts to the cluster. Do this for each host. 6. Assign a VMware license to each host.

8 HiveManager NG Virtual Appliance: vsphere Configuration 8 7. Verify that the hosts are in the cluster. Changing Virtual Machine Resource Settings Depending on the number of access points and switches in your deployment, you might need to change the amount of resources on the HiveManager NG Virtual Appliance (virtual machine). CPU Type Small-Medium (up to 500 devices) Xeon E v5, 3.0GHz, 8MB cache or better CPU Cores/Threads 4C/4T 8C/16T Memory 16GB 32GB Storage Type HDD SSD Storage Size 1TB 1TB Large (up to 2000 devices) Xeon E v4, 2.1GHz, 20MB cache or better Once you have determined the correct amount of resources for your deployment, you can modify the resource settings by editing virtual machine settings from within the vsphere client. Select the virtual machine, right-click it and then click Edit Settings. Note: The virtual machine must be powered off to be able to change its resources.

9 HiveManager NG Virtual Appliance: vsphere Configuration 9 8. For small-medium deployments, set the number of vcpus to 4. To do this, click CPUs and change the number of cores per socket from 4 (default) to 2. Keep the number of virtual sockets at 2 (default). The final settings are as follows: Number of virtual sockets: 2 Number of cores per socket: 2 For large deployments set the number of vcpus to 8. To do this, click CPUs. Make sure your settings for CPUs are set as follows: Number of virtual sockets: 2 Number of cores per socket: 4 Note: for large deployments, it is recommended that the ESXi hosts supports hyperthreading which will enable the VA to run up to two threads per a physical core. For optimal performance, make sure the hyperthreading is enabled on the host (Hyperthreading: Active). You can check this on the Summary page on the host under the General section.

10 HiveManager NG Virtual Appliance: vsphere Configuration For small-medium deployments, set the Memory Size to 16 GB. To do this, select Memory and then change the values in the Memory Size fields to 16 GB. For large deployments, set the Memory Size to 32 GB. 10. When you are done, click OK.

11 HiveManager NG Virtual Appliance: vsphere Configuration 11 Optimizing vsphere Resources (Optional) If HiveManager NG Virtual Appliance is sharing resources with other virtual machines, there is likely to be a situation where the physical resources of the host are oversubscribed. This can lead to performance drops and long response times. If the HiveManager NG Virtual Appliance is not sharing host resources with any other virtual machines, you can skip these steps. To protect a virtual machine from performance issues, it is recommended to reserve resources (CPU, memory, and storage access). To do this, open the vsphere client and perform the following steps. 1. Inside the vsphere vcenter, select the HiveManager NG Virtual Appliance, right-click it, click Edit Settings, and then navigate to the Resources tab. To protect the virtual machine from oversubscribing the CPU resources of the physical host, you must reserve CPU cycles and give this virtual machine a higher priority when it comes to CPU cycle assignment. 2. Click CPU and set the following parameters: Shares: High Reservation: 2000 MHz

12 HiveManager NG Virtual Appliance: vsphere Configuration 12 To protect the virtual machine from oversubscribing the memory resources of the physical host, you must reserve memory. Reserving the same amount of memory that the virtual machine has assigned will prevent it from swapping, which means instead of accessing memory, the virtual machine might access the much slower hard drive resources. 3. Click Memory and select Reserve all guest memory. To protect the virtual machine from oversubscribing the disk resources of the physical host, you must prioritize access to disk resources.

13 HiveManager NG Virtual Appliance: vsphere Configuration Click Disk and then set Shares to High. 5. After you are done configuring resource optimization, click OK to finish and save the new settings. You can now power on the virtual machine.

14 HiveManager NG Virtual Appliance: vsphere Configuration 14 Managing the Virtual Machine with vsphere You can use the vsphere client to perform various tasks on the HiveManager NG Virtual Appliance. Here are some of the best practices when working with the HiveManager NG Virtual Appliance in the vsphere environment: Make regular snapshots of your virtual machine. These can server as a backup in case your virtual machine needs to be recovered. Note: Before you take a snapshot of the virtual machine, be sure to power it off gracefully using vsphere. You can use vsphere to take and manage snapshots. Only shutdown or restart the virtual machine from within vsphere. Never use the hard power off or reset, but rather use the graceful option ( Shut Down Guest or Restart Guest ). These two options will instruct the VMtools that are running on the virtual machine to shut down or reboot the HiveManager NG Virtual Appliance gracefully and shut down all the running services. Not using these two options can lead to database corruption.

15 HiveManager NG Virtual Appliance: vsphere Configuration 15 If you see that your virtual machine is not starting up and is stuck on the CentOS boot screen when you open up terminal/console access for the virtual machine inside the vsphere client, press the ESC key to see details. This might provide a clue as to why the virtual machine is not booting successfully (for example, networking not working).