A Quick Look at IBM SmartCloud Monitoring Author: Larry McWilliams, IBM Tivoli Integration of Competency Document Version 1, Update: 2012-01-23
Note: Before using this information and the product it supports, read the information in Notices. Copyright International Business Machines Corporation 2012. US Government Users Restricted Rights Use, duplication or disclosure restricted by GSA ADP Schedule Contract with IBM Corporation 2
Overview The IBM Tivoli Monitoring for Virtual Environments product, also known as IBM SmartCloud Monitoring and previously known as IBM Tivoli Monitoring for Virtual Servers, includes a group of Tivoli products you can use for identifying and resolving virtual environment availability and performance issues. This product includes the Linux Kernel-based Virtual Machines agent, VMware VI agent, Virtual Environments Dashboard (new), Virtual Environments Performance and Capacity Management Reports (new) and the Capacity Planner for Virtual Environments (new). The prerequisites for the Virtual Environments Dashboard, Virtual Environments Performance and Capacity Management Reports, and the Capacity Planner for Virtual Environments include the following products and components: Tivoli Netcool/OMNIbus Tivoli Application Dependency Discovery Manager (TADDM) Tivoli Common Reporting Tivoli Integrated Portal The following products are used in the test environment: IBM Tivoli Monitoring V6.2.3 Tivoli Netcool /OMNIbus V7.3 TADDM V7.2.1.1 Tivoli Common Reporting V2.1.1 with Tivoli Integrated Portal V2.2.0.3 IBM Tivoli Monitoring for Virtual Environments V7.1 agents and components: KVM Agents VMware VI Agents Virtual Environments Dashboard Capacity Management Reports Capacity Planner Browsers: Internet Explorer V8 and Firefox V3.6.23 Note: IBM Tivoli Monitoring for Virtual Environments will upgrade the Tivoli Integrated Portal to 2.2.0.3 if the portal is not already at that level. 3
Installation hints and notes Before installing IBM Tivoli Monitoring for Virtual Environments V7.1, you must already have an installed, configured, and operational IBM Tivoli Monitoring, Tivoli Netcool/OMNIbus, TADDM, Tivoli Common Reporting, and Tivoli Integrated Portal. Installing IBM Tivoli Monitoring for Virtual Environments is much easier if all the other products are up and running. For instance, without the Tivoli Integrated Portal already present, the Tivoli Monitoring for Virtual Environments V7.1 installer fails because the portal is a prerequisite. Without IBM Tivoli Monitoring or Tivoli Netcool/OMNIbus, events are not displayed in the virtual dashboard. Make sure you review the prerequisites in the installation guide (http://publib.boulder.ibm.com/infocenter/tivihelp/v15r1/topic/com.ibm.tivoli.itmvs.doc_ 7.1/virtds_aboutthisdoc.html) before installing IBM Tivoli Monitoring for Virtual Environments V7.1. A few notes on prerequisites: - At a minimum, Tivoli Integrated Portal must be at V2.2.0.0 or later. IBM Tivoli Monitoring for Virtual Environments will upgrade the Tivoli Integrated Portal to V2.2.0.3. - You will need a version of IBM DB2 that supports federation, for example, DB2 v9.7. - At a minimum, you must have installed IBM Tivoli Monitoring V6.2.2 Fix Pack 4. - TADDM should be at V7.2.0.6 or V7.2.1 Fix Pack1 with a test fix that includes APAR IV09069. The APAR is available for customers under the following link: ftp://ftp.emea.ibm.com/fromibm/tivoli/efix_recommendedpatch_fp1_201109260 317.zip - For a better experience in the VE Dashboard, you should have the VMware tools installed on the VMs and have the Tivoli Monitoring OS agents installed on the VMs. If you don t, some data will not be available to the Dashboard and you may see periodic error messages. - When installing the IBM Tivoli Monitoring for Virtual Environments Dashboard, the Capacity Planner database, default name TADFDCDB, must already exist. The database can be local or remote. If remote, be sure and catalog the remote connection to the Capacity Planner database from your dashboard server. For a complete list of prerequisites, see the IBM Tivoli Monitoring for Virtual Environments v7.1 documentation ( http://publib.boulder.ibm.com/infocenter/tivihelp/v15r1/index.jsp?topic= %2Fcom.ibm.tivoli.itmvs.doc_7.1%2Fve71_prerequisites.htm). 4
After your dashboard installer completes successfully, make sure your Capacity Planner database includes tables. To check that the database includes tables, use the DB2 command-line facility; connect to the database and run the following list tables command. If you see tables listed, your installation was successful: db2 connect to TADFDCDB Database Connection Information Database server = DB2/LINUXX8664 9.7.0 SQL authorization ID = DB2INST1 Local database alias = TADFDCDB db2 list tables for schema TADFDC Table/View ------------------------------ANL_APP_TAG_MAP 09.10.49.868014 ANL_CORRELATION_GROUPS 09.10.50.170745 Schema --------------TADFDC TADFDC Type ----T T Creation time -----------------2011-10-212011-10-21-129 record(s) selected. Be sure to reference the documentation for completing the remaining postinstallation steps ( http://publib.boulder.ibm.com/infocenter/tivihelp/v15r1/index.jsp?topic= %2Fcom.ibm.tivoli.itmvs.doc_7.1%2Fvirtds_aboutthisdoc.html). 5
VMware agent Data from the VMware agent is displayed in both the Tivoli Enterprise Portal (portal) and the Dashboard. In the navigation tree of the portal, as shown in the following screen capture, you can see all the VMware agent instances at a glance. If the system is a Data Center similar to the systems installed on a workstation named x86-14, you can see multiple ESX servers shown all at once; otherwise, you see only one ESX server shown: From the navigation tree, you can also view situation events. By hovering over the items flagged with an X icon ( ) or an exclamation point icon ( ), you can see the following situation events: 6
You can see at a glance storage conditions on the ESX server (Green: Good; Red: Not Good). In the following screen capture, you can see that DMFstore2 and DMFstore3 are well over 80% used: You can see at a glance which VMs are using up the most CPU and which ones are idle. In the following screen capture, you can see that beta03 is fairly active while beta01 is close to idle: You can see at a glance the number of CPUs assigned to each VM, CPU Utilization, amount of configured memory, and so on. In the following screen capture, you can see that beta03 has four CPUs while the rest have only one CPU assigned: These Tivoli Enterprise Portal views can be accessed by any operator with the proper Tivoli Enterprise Portal credentials. You can view and take actions on a daily basis as necessary. 7
KVM Agent Data from the Linux Kernel-based Virtual Machine or KVM agent can be seen from the Tivoli Enterprise Portal. However, no view in the Dashboard exists for viewing Linux KVM data. In the navigation tree of the Tivoli Enterprise Portal, as shown in the following screen capture, you can see all the Linux KVM agent instances at a glance. For example, the following figure shows metrics such as the host information, storage pool data (if defined), and data about each virtual machine: Click the overall Linux KVM Agent folder to see an overall view of your Linux KVM machines as shown here: 8
Click one of the agents, for example, HSLT39:V1, to access a similar view for that particular KVM as seen here: Click HostName for the KVM to see details such as the number of CPUs, VM CPUs consumed, and number of active VMs. For example, in the following figure, you can see three VMs on one of the hosts: Click Virtual Machine Name to see information about each VM on a selected KVM. Here you see the three VMs listed in detail: As with the VMware agent, an operator with the proper Tivoli Enterprise Portal credentials can view KVM data on a daily basis. 9
Virtual Environments Dashboard Some of the features in Tivoli Monitoring for Virtual Environments within the Tivoli Integrated Portal include the VMware dashboard feature as shown here from the Tivoli Integrated Portal navigation tree: One of the useful features is the Configuration Health Check that shows, in one view, a quick status of the various components that make the dashboard work. This check provides status and availability for Tivoli Monitoring, Tivoli Monitoring EIF enablement, and TADDM. If any of these components are not communicating as expected, an X symbol ( ) is displayed instead of a green check mark ( ). An X symbol ( ) indicates a connection or configuration issue as shown in the following screen capture: 10
The dashboard in the following figure shows a server scorecard where some of the VMs are operating normally and some of the VMs have issues. You can see server CPU, Memory, Storage and Availability for each VM. If a TADDM discovery has been done, you can view detailed information about each ESX server at the bottom: 11
If you hover over one of the status icons in the scorecard, such as an exclamation point icon ( ) or and X icon ( ), you can view situational events showing issues with the server, storage, or networking components of the VM as shown in the following figure: One of the features in the VE portlet is the ability to drill down into Server, Storage, or Network components for a selected VM. By clicking one of the, or icons under each column, you can drill down one more level to see more detail about those components. 12
The following figure shows a VM named VS09. If you click the icon under Server from the Scorecard, a new tab is displayed in the Tivoli Integrated Portal showing data specific to that VS09 ESX Server. This view is tricky because it looks good here but only because two prerequisites were performed on this VM. By using the installed VMware tools, you can view the VM graphs. A Tivoli Monitoring OS agent is also installed that allows data to be displayed in the Guest OS windows. Note that the Situation Event List includes events generated by VMware. These events are not Tivoli Monitoring situation events. And for a last note about this view, no TADDM discovery has been done against this particular VM. As a result, you see this message in the lower right pane: CTJTC0010E The item cannot be found, or the connection to the TADDM Server is refused, or the user does not have required privileges to view the change history: 13
When you have TADDM discovery data for a VM, you see something similar to the following figure in the lower right panel: If data exists for any VMware events, you see data like what is shown here in the Situation Event List panel: Any user with the proper Tivoli Integrated Portal or LDAP authorization credentials can access and view data provided in the Dashboard. Note: When the dashboard was installed on the Tivoli Integrated Portal, a new user role is added. To view and use the Dashboard, you must have assigned the VMwareAdministrator role for the new user. 14
Reports A variety of historical reports are included in the IBM Tivoli Monitoring for Virtual Environments product. These reports are run against summarized data collected in Tivoli Data Warehouse V6.2.2 or later. The predefined reports run against VMware VI agent V7.1 only. For these reports to work, data for certain historical attributes groups must be enabled. For more detailed information of the required attribute groups, see the Historical Data collection and aggregation section in the IBM Tivoli Monitoring for Virtual Environments: Dashboard, Reporting, and Capacity Planning V7.1 User s Guide (http://publib.boulder.ibm.com/infocenter/tivihelp/v15r1/index.jsp?topic= %2Fcom.ibm.tivoli.itmvs.doc_7.1%2FVSwelcome.htm). In the Tivoli Integrated Portal, you can see the following entries for reporting: IBM Tivoli Capacity Analytics Reports and IBM Tivoli Monitoring for Virtual Environments Reports V7.1, as displayed here: 15
When you drill down into the virtual environments reports, you can see the following information: 16
Performance Trends and Resource Forecast reports show resource usage over time for various levels of the virtualized environment, showing trends at the cluster, host server, and virtual machine levels. Some of the reports show linear forecasts in addition to historical trends: A simple what-if analysis tool is available to determine an approximate figure for how many more workloads your environment can accommodate as well as additional resources you might need: 17
Workload right-sizing and Balancing reports are useful for determining the overall performance of the environment: For more detailed information about these reports, see the IBM Tivoli Monitoring for Virtual Environments Performance and Capacity Management Reports section of the IBM Tivoli Monitoring for Virtual Environments: Dashboard, Reporting, and Capacity Planning V7.1 User s Guide. 18
Capacity Planner The Capacity Planner is a uniquely powerful analytical tool that works with the configuration and historical usage data collected by Tivoli Monitoring to provide recommendations for optimizing the virtual environment. Note: Unlike the reports, the Capacity Planner does not support multiple concurrent users. Only one user can run the Capacity Planner tool. The Capacity Planner is accessed from the Tivoli Integrated Portal navigation tree as shown here: 19
Click PlanningCenter to see the PlanningCenter panel as shown here: To use the Capacity Planner, start from the top and work your way down: 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. Click Load Config. Click Set Time. Click Define Scope. Click Size VMs. Click Generate Plan. 20
Then use the generated Capacity Planner Optimized Environment Plan report to adjust your VMware environment. Again, see the Capacity Planner section of the IBM Tivoli Monitoring for Virtual Environments: Dashboard, Reporting, and Capacity Planning V7.1 User s Guide for detailed instructions on using the Capacity Planner. The following example shows what you might see in the Capacity Planner Optimized Environment Plan report. The part of the report shown in the example shows that the current capacity efficiency index is high (95), that is, you have a fair amount of unused capacity. The planner is recommending that you reduce the number of physical servers from 11 to 6. By consolidating some of the resources onto 6 servers, you can lessen the amount of unused capacity, and free up 5 physical servers for other uses: Looking at the example a little deeper from the Tivoli Enterprise Portal, on the VS05 VM, you currently have 4 VMs on the ESX Server: 21
The following report shows that you have capacity to put 7 more VMs on the VS05 ESX Server, which allows you to reduce the overall capacity efficiency index: Note: The Capacity Planner does not account for ESX Server license agreements. If a free copy of an ESX Server is in use, the maximum number of VMs that can be allocated to the server is 8. Conclusion: The IBM Tivoli Monitoring for Virtual Environments V7.1 product provides an administrator with some quick and easy tools to monitor, report on, and manage their virtual environments. 22
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