InfoScale™ 9.0 Virtualization Guide - Linux on ESXi

Last Published:
Product(s): InfoScale & Storage Foundation (9.0)
Platform: Linux,VMware ESX
  1. Section I. Overview
    1. About Veritas InfoScale solutions in a VMware environment
      1.  
        Overview of the InfoScale Virtualization Guide
      2. How InfoScale™ solutions work in a VMware environment
        1.  
          How InfoScale™ product components enhance VMware capabilities
        2.  
          When to use Raw Device Mapping and InfoScale
        3.  
          Array migration
        4.  
          InfoScale™ component limitations in an ESXi environment
        5.  
          I/O fencing considerations in an ESXi environment
      3.  
        About InfoScale™ solutions support for the VMware ESXi environment
      4.  
        Virtualization use cases addressed by InfoScale
  2. Section II. Deploying Veritas InfoScale products in a VMware environment
    1. Getting started
      1.  
        Storage configurations and feature compatibility
      2.  
        About setting up VMware with InfoScale™ products
      3.  
        InfoScale™ products support for VMware environments
      4.  
        Installing and configuring storage solutions in the VMware virtual environment
      5.  
        Recommendations for improved resiliency of InfoScale clusters in virtualized environments
    2. Understanding Storage Configuration
      1.  
        Configuring storage
      2.  
        Enabling disk UUID on virtual machines
      3.  
        Installing Array Support Library (ASL) for VMDK on cluster nodes
      4.  
        Excluding the boot disk from the Volume Manager configuration
      5.  
        Creating the VMDK files
      6.  
        Mapping the VMDKs to each virtual machine (VM)
      7.  
        Enabling the multi-write flag
      8.  
        Getting consistent names across nodes
      9.  
        Creating a file system
  3. Section III. Use cases for Veritas InfoScale product components in a VMware environment
    1. Application availability using Cluster Server
      1.  
        About application availability with Cluster Server (VCS) in the guest
      2.  
        About VCS support for Live Migration
    2. Multi-tier business service support
      1.  
        About Virtual Business Services
      2.  
        Sample virtual business service configuration
    3. Improving data protection, storage optimization, data migration, and database performance
      1.  
        Use cases for InfoScale™ product components in a VMware guest
      2. Protecting data with InfoScale™ product components in the VMware guest
        1.  
          About point-in-time copies
        2.  
          Point-in-time snapshots for InfoScale™ products in the VMware environment
      3. Optimizing storage with InfoScale™ product components in the VMware guest
        1. About Flexible Storage Sharing
          1.  
            Limitations of Flexible Storage Sharing
        2.  
          About SmartTier in the VMware environment
        3.  
          About compression with InfoScale™ product components in the VMware guest
        4.  
          About thin reclamation with InfoScale™ product components in the VMware guest
        5.  
          About SmartMove with InfoScale™ product components in the VMware guest
        6.  
          About SmartTier for Oracle with InfoScale™ product components in the VMware guest
      4. Migrating data with InfoScale™ product components in the VMware guest
        1.  
          Types of data migration
      5. Improving database performance with InfoScale™ product components in the VMware guest
        1.  
          About InfoScale™ product components database accelerators
    4. Setting up virtual machines for fast failover using InfoScale Enterprise on VMware disks
      1.  
        About use cases for InfoScale Enterprise in the VMware guest
      2.  
        InfoScale Enterprise operation in VMware virtualized environments
      3.  
        InfoScale functionality and compatibility matrix
      4. About setting up InfoScale Enterprise on VMware ESXi
        1.  
          Planning a InfoScale Enterprise configuration
        2.  
          Enable Password-less SSH
        3.  
          Enabling TCP traffic to coordination point (CP) Server and management ports
        4. Configuring coordination point (CP) servers
          1.  
            Configuring a Coordination Point server for InfoScale Enterprise
          2.  
            Configuring a Cluster Server (VCS) single node cluster
          3.  
            Configuring a Coordination Point server service group
        5.  
          Deploying InfoScale Enterprise software
        6.  
          Configuring InfoScale Enterprise
        7.  
          Configuring non-SCSI3 fencing
  4. Section IV. Reference
    1. Appendix A. Known issues and limitations
      1.  
        Prevention of Storage vMotion
    2. Appendix B. Where to find more information
      1.  
        Arctera InfoScale documentation
      2.  
        Service and support
      3.  
        About Services and Operations Readiness Tools (SORT)

I/O fencing considerations in an ESXi environment

VMware does not support SCSI-3 Persistent Reservations (and hence I/O Fencing) with any other 3rd party clustering software with RDM logical mode or VMDK-based virtual disks. In VMware environments, SFHA and Arctera InfoScale Enterprise support the following methods of fencing:

  • disk-based fencing with RDM-P mode.

    Available starting with SFHA and Arctera InfoScale Enterprise version 5.1 Service Pack 1 Rolling Patch 1.

    See the following tech note for details.

    https://www.veritas.com/support/en_US/article.TECH169366

  • non-SCSI-3 PR-based fencing using the Coordination Point (CP) server.

    The CP server provides arbitration amongst the multiple nodes.

I/O fencing utilizes HBA World Wide Numbers (WWNs) to create registrations on the storage; this has implications in a virtual environment where the HBA is shared between virtual servers on the same physical ESXi host as the WWN used for I/O fencing ends up being the same for each virtual machine. Therefore, Arctera InfoScale Enterprise virtual machines (in the same Arctera InfoScale Enterprise cluster) cannot share physical servers as the I/O fencing behavior will result in all nodes from that physical ESXi host being fenced out if an event triggers the fencing functionality. In short, if I/O fencing is configured, the Arctera InfoScale Enterprise nodes (in the same Arctera InfoScale Enterprise cluster) have to be running on separate physical ESXi hosts.