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DESIGN AND IMPLEMENTATION GUIDE

EMC VSPEX SOLUTION FOR INFRASTRUCTURE AS A SERVICE WITH MICROSOFT SYSTEM CENTER

EMC VSPEX

Abstract

This Design and Implementation Guide describes how to design virtualized Microsoft System Center resources on EMC® VSPEX® private cloud solutions. It also illustrates how to size System Center components using VSPEX guidelines, allocate resources following best practices, and make use of all the benefits that VSPEX offers.

January 2014

2 EMC VSPEX Solution for Infrastructure as a Service with Microsoft System Center Design and Implementation Guide

Copyright © 2014 EMC Corporation. All rights reserved. Published in the USA.

Published January 2014

EMC believes the information in this publication is accurate as of its publication date. The information is subject to change without notice.

The information in this publication is provided as is. EMC Corporation makes no representations or warranties of any kind with respect to the information in this publication, and specifically disclaims implied warranties of merchantability or fitness for a particular purpose. Use, copying, and distribution of any EMC software described in this publication requires an applicable software license.

EMC2, EMC, and the EMC logo are registered trademarks or trademarks of EMC Corporation in the United States and other countries. All other trademarks used herein are the property of their respective owners.

For the most up-to-date listing of EMC product names, see EMC Corporation Trademarks on EMC.com.

EMC VSPEX Solution for Infrastructure as a Service with Microsoft System Center Design and Implementation Guide

Part Number H12502

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Contents


Contents

Chapter 1 Introduction 10

Overview .................................................................................................................. 11

Essential reading ...................................................................................................... 11

Purpose of this guide ................................................................................................ 11

Business value ......................................................................................................... 12

Scope ....................................................................................................................... 12

Audience .................................................................................................................. 12

Terminology.............................................................................................................. 13

Chapter 2 Solution Overview 14

Overview .................................................................................................................. 15

Key components ....................................................................................................... 15

Solution hardware overview ................................................................................. 15

Solution software overview .................................................................................. 15

Microsoft System Center 2012 R2 ........................................................................ 16

EMC VNX .............................................................................................................. 17

EMC integration for System Center ....................................................................... 17

Integration of solution components ..................................................................... 18

Chapter 3 Solution Design 20

Overview .................................................................................................................. 21

Solution architecture ................................................................................................ 21

High-level solution architecture ........................................................................... 21

High availability of infrastructure components for System Center ......................... 22

Storage design ......................................................................................................... 23

VNX storage tiering and FAST VP .......................................................................... 23

Storage mapping ................................................................................................. 24

System Center design ............................................................................................... 25

Virtual Machine Manager ..................................................................................... 25

App Controller...................................................................................................... 26

Operations Manager ............................................................................................ 26

Orchestrator ........................................................................................................ 26

Service Manager .................................................................................................. 27

Design considerations and best practices ................................................................ 27

Network design .................................................................................................... 27

Contents


Storage design..................................................................................................... 28

Virtualization design ............................................................................................ 28

Chapter 4 Solution Implementation 29

Overview .................................................................................................................. 30

Installing and configuring System Center infrastructure cluster ................................. 30

Install Windows on hosts ..................................................................................... 31

Add Hyper-V role and Failover Clustering feature .................................................. 31

Create LUNs on storage pool created for VSPEX ................................................... 31

Connect Hyper-V datastores to Windows hosts .................................................... 31

Create a failover cluster ....................................................................................... 31

Create CSV for cluster storage .............................................................................. 32

Setting up and configuring SQL Server ...................................................................... 32

Create virtual machines for SQL Server failover cluster ......................................... 32

Install Windows on the virtual machines .............................................................. 32

Create a failover cluster ....................................................................................... 32

Present LUNs for database and log files ............................................................... 33

Configure additional SQL Server instances........................................................... 33

Deploying SCVMM .................................................................................................... 33

Create and configure host virtual machines ......................................................... 33

Install the SCVMM server ..................................................................................... 34

Install the SCVMM server on additional cluster nodes .......................................... 34

Install the SCVMM Administrator Console ............................................................ 34

Preparing the SCVMM fabric ..................................................................................... 34

Add VNX storage .................................................................................................. 34

Prepare hosts and clusters .................................................................................. 38

Configure networking ........................................................................................... 44

Create virtual machine templates ........................................................................ 44

Deploying SCAC ........................................................................................................ 45

Create the host virtual machine ........................................................................... 46

Install the guest OS ............................................................................................. 46

Create the domain accounts and groups .............................................................. 46

Add the .NET Framework feature .......................................................................... 46

Install Silverlight Runtime .................................................................................... 46

Install the SCVMM Console .................................................................................. 46

Install the SCAC portal server ............................................................................... 46

Connecting to clouds ................................................................................................ 47

Connect to a private cloud ................................................................................... 47

Connect to Windows Azure .................................................................................. 48

Contents


Provide access to subscriptions ........................................................................... 48

Configuring SCOM .................................................................................................... 49

SCOM overview .................................................................................................... 49

Create the host virtual machines .......................................................................... 49




Install the SQL Server Reporting Services and Analysis Services .......................... 50

Install Microsoft Report Viewer ............................................................................ 50

Configure the SQL Server prerequisites ................................................................ 50

Install management servers ................................................................................. 50

Install the SCOM reporting server ......................................................................... 51

Installing ESI Service and EMC SCOM Management Packs ........................................ 51

ESI Service overview ............................................................................................ 51

Install the ESI Service .......................................................................................... 51

ESI SCOM Management Packs overview ............................................................... 52

Install the ESI SCOM Management Packs ............................................................. 52

Integrating SCOM with SCVMM ................................................................................. 53

Deploying SCO ......................................................................................................... 53




Add the .NET Framework feature with WCF HTTP activation ................................... 54

Install Silverlight Runtime .................................................................................... 54

Install SCO on the first virtual machine ................................................................ 54

Install an additional runbook server..................................................................... 55

Install the SCVMM Console .................................................................................. 55

Install Report Viewer ............................................................................................ 55

Install the SCOM Operations Console .................................................................. 55

Install and deploy Integration Packs .................................................................... 55

Installing ESI for SCO integration .............................................................................. 57

Deploying SCSM ....................................................................................................... 57





Install the Authorization Manager hotfix .............................................................. 59

Install Microsoft Report Viewer 2012 Redistributable security update .................. 59

Install SQL Server 2012 Native Client ................................................................... 59

Contents


Install SQL Server Analysis Management Object .................................................. 59

Install SQL Server Reporting Services ................................................................... 60

Configure SCSM environmental prerequisites ...................................................... 60

Install the management servers ........................................................................... 60

Install the data warehouse server ........................................................................ 60

Integrating SCSM with other System Center components .......................................... 60

SCVMM connector ............................................................................................... 60

SCOM connectors ................................................................................................ 61

SCO connector ..................................................................................................... 61

Chapter 5 Solution Verification 62

Overview .................................................................................................................. 63

Deploying SCVMM private clouds ............................................................................. 63

Private cloud (SCVMM) ........................................................................................ 63

User roles in SCVMM............................................................................................ 65

Verifying SCAC operations ........................................................................................ 67

Deploy virtual machines using SCAC .................................................................... 67

Move the virtual machine from SCVMM to Windows Azure ................................... 68

Verifying SCOM activities .......................................................................................... 68

Virtual machine health ......................................................................................... 68

VNX health ........................................................................................................... 70

SCVMM topology ................................................................................................. 71

VNX topology ....................................................................................................... 73

SCVMM performance ........................................................................................... 73

SCVMM reports .................................................................................................... 75

VNX reports.......................................................................................................... 77

Customizing SCOM information delivery ................................................................... 79

Alerts ................................................................................................................... 79

Monitors and rules ............................................................................................... 80

Management groups ............................................................................................ 80

Views ................................................................................................................... 81

Using SCO ................................................................................................................ 83

Start or stop virtual machines in a cloud .............................................................. 83

Create virtual machine from template and provision storage ................................ 84

Reconfigure virtual machine ................................................................................ 87

Verifying SCSM operations ....................................................................................... 88

Chargeback ......................................................................................................... 88

Chapter 6 Resource Sizing Guide 92

Overview .................................................................................................................. 93

Contents


Cloud management environment sizing .................................................................... 93

Summary .................................................................................................................. 94

Appendix A Storage Design with Multiple Service Levels 96

Overview .................................................................................................................. 96

Storage service levels ............................................................................................... 96

Storage levels consumable by tenants ................................................................. 96

Storage service-level offerings ............................................................................. 97

Contents


Figures Figure 1. Integration of solution components ..................................................... 19

Figure 2. Logical architecture: VSPEX solution for IaaS with System Center ........ 22

Figure 3. EMC VNX sub-LUN tiering of production LUN data across two disk types ............................................................................................ 24

Figure 4. Organization mappings for storage service levels ................................ 25

Figure 5. Storage classifications in SCVMM ........................................................ 35

Figure 6. SCVMM host groups ............................................................................ 38

Figure 7. Cloud capacity in SCVMM .................................................................... 64

Figure 8. Allocate resources for private cloud in SCVMM .................................... 65

Figure 9. User scope in SCVMM .......................................................................... 66

Figure 10. Allocate quotas for SCVMM private cloud and user roles ..................... 66

Figure 11. SCAC Overview page ............................................................................ 67

Figure 12. Resource catalog on SCAC Library tab .................................................. 67

Figure 13. View of virtual machines in SCAC ......................................................... 68

Figure 14. Virtual machine health ........................................................................ 69

Figure 15. SCOM Management Pack Health Explorer ............................................ 69

Figure 16. Storage system health ......................................................................... 70

Figure 17. Health Explorer for VNX Block system .................................................. 70

Figure 18. Topological view of Manufacturing Production cloud ........................... 71

Figure 19. Topological view of Manufacturing host group ..................................... 72

Figure 20. Topological view of VNX storage array.................................................. 73

Figure 21. SCVMM private cloud performance ...................................................... 74

Figure 22. Performance of System Center components ......................................... 74

Figure 23. Host Utilization report ......................................................................... 75

Figure 24. Virtual Machine Utilization report ........................................................ 76

Figure 25. VNX Storage Pool Available Capacity report ......................................... 77

Figure 26. VNX Storage Pool Available Capacity detail ......................................... 78

Figure 27. VNX physical resources availability ..................................................... 79

Figure 28. Management group explicit members .................................................. 81

Figure 29. View for Manufacturing_Prod_Cloud group in SCOM ............................ 82

Figure 30. Runbook request for virtual machine status ......................................... 83

Figure 31. Runbook diagram: Create template and provision storage ................... 84

Figure 32. Runbook activity: Create VM From Template Properties ....................... 84

Figure 33. Runbook activity: Create Disk with ESI Properties ................................ 85

Figure 34. Runbook activity: Add Disk to VM using ESI PowerShell Properties ...... 86

Figure 35. Runbook request to update virtual machines ....................................... 87

Figure 36. Reconfigure VM details in SCO web portal ........................................... 87

Figure 37. Runbook parameters: Reconfigure VM ................................................. 88

Contents


Figure 40. Storage service-level positioning for VSPEX management and orchestration ....................................................................................... 97

Figure 41. Storage service levels on VNX systems ................................................ 97

Figure 42. Storage service-level mapping from applications to storage array ........ 99

Tables Table 1. Terminology......................................................................................... 13

Table 2. Solution software ................................................................................ 15

Table 3. High-availability for System Center components .................................. 22

Table 4. Deployment process stages and procedures ....................................... 30

Table 5. System Center component sizing ......................................................... 93

Table 6. Storage service levels example ............................................................ 98

Chapter 1: Introduction


Chapter 1 Introduction

This chapter presents the following topics:

Overview .................................................................................................................. 11

Essential reading ..................................................................................................... 11

Purpose of this guide ............................................................................................... 11

Business value ......................................................................................................... 12

Scope ....................................................................................................................... 12

Audience .................................................................................................................. 12

Terminology ............................................................................................................. 13



Overview

EMC has joined forces with the industry-leading providers of IT infrastructure to create a complete virtualization solution that accelerates deployment of cloud infrastructure. Built with the best available technologies, EMC® VSPEX® enables faster deployment, more simplicity, greater choice, higher efficiency, and lower risk. Validation by EMC ensures predictable performance and enables customers to select technology that uses their existing IT infrastructure while eliminating planning, sizing, and configuration burdens. VSPEX provides a proven infrastructure for customers who want to gain the simplicity that is characteristic of truly converged infrastructures and have more choice in individual solution components.

This VSPEX cloud management solution is designed to enable customers to implement an on-site infrastructure-as-a-service (IaaS) offering for their internal users. This solution is designed and implemented on a VSPEX Proven Infrastructure and hence uses the same hardware and software resources as defined in the VSPEX Proven Infrastructure collateral. Along with the software mentioned in the Proven Infrastructure guide, this solution also uses additional cloud management software to enable delivery of IT as a service. As more organizations attempt the transformation from the traditional “IT-as-a-cost-center” model to a more mature model of acting as a “service broker,” IaaS is the area where most customers focus their initial efforts.

Essential reading

EMC recommends reading the following related document and article before proceeding:

• Proven Infrastructure: EMC VSPEX Private Cloud—Microsoft Windows Server 2012 with Hyper-V for up to 1,000 Virtual Machines—Enabled by EMC Next-Generation VNX and EMC Backup

• System Center 2012 (Microsoft TechNet article):

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/hh546785.aspx

Purpose of this guide

The purpose of this guide is to demonstrate how to implement an IaaS environment on an existing VSPEX private cloud using management and orchestration tools from Microsoft. This document provides an introduction to the Microsoft System Center product and the EMC VSPEX solutions, and demonstrates integrations that exist in a VSPEX private cloud solution. This document should be used as an enablement reference to begin the planning and design process for your management and orchestration deployment, and to set the stage for a successful implementation.




Business value

Microsoft System Center gives customers the ability to build secure internal private clouds that dramatically increase data center efficiency and business agility.

VSPEX solutions are built with proven technologies to create complete virtualization solutions that enable you to make an informed decision in the hypervisor, server, and networking layers. VSPEX solutions accelerate IT transformation by enabling faster deployments, greater choice, greater efficiency, and lower risk.

Coupled with the VSPEX private cloud solution, System Center delivers cloud computing for existing data centers by pooling virtual infrastructure resources and delivering them to users as catalog-based services.

Scope

This guide describes the high-level steps required to deploy Microsoft System Center components on a VSPEX private cloud with Microsoft Hyper-V and EMC VNX®. It also provides guidance for using System Center components to simplify and efficiently manage the VSPEX private cloud. It assumes that the reader is familiar with VSPEX private cloud solutions and that a VSPEX private cloud architecture already exists in the customer environment.

Audience

This document targets partners, technical architects, and cloud solutions engineers who are considering an IaaS transformation and want to align the daily operational tasks of managing and monitoring the private cloud with the skill sets required to ensure success. Readers should have a background in EMC and Microsoft solutions. They should understand Microsoft System Center solutions, and be familiar with the EMC VNX storage platform and data protection solutions that they are planning to use as the enabling platforms hosting the IaaS offering.

The audience should also have a clear understanding of the provisioning and operational processes that are implemented within their own environments and recognize the general requirements that their end users have for an IaaS solution.

This guide provides external references where applicable. EMC recommends that partners implementing this solution be familiar with these documents.



Terminology

Table 1 lists terminology used in this guide.

Table 1. Terminology

Term Definition

Runbook Compilation of procedures and activities executed to automate tasks in System Center Orchestrator

SCVMM private cloud

Cloud created and managed on location by a business, using a subset of the business’s hardware resources (Manufacturing Production group or Manufacturing Test group, for example) through System Center Virtual Machine Manager

Chapter 2: Solution Overview


Chapter 2 Solution Overview


Overview .................................................................................................................. 15

Key components ...................................................................................................... 15



Overview

This solution, which is built on top of a VSPEX private cloud architecture, provides the customer with a modern system capable of deploying a managed cloud platform. The platform uses Microsoft System Center components for the management and orchestration function and VSPEX private clouds as the physical infrastructure. This solution runs on the Microsoft Hyper-V virtualization layer backed by highly available EMC VNX family storage. The compute and network components, which are defined by the VSPEX partners, are laid out to be redundant and are sufficiently powerful to handle the processing and data needs of the virtual machine environment.

This chapter introduces the components that were used in building, validating, and providing IaaS on top of a VSPEX private cloud Proven Infrastructure using Microsoft System Center.

Key components

This section presents the key components used in this solution to enable complete management of a VSPEX stack through System Center. This section also explains integration points for EMC and System Center components that simplify the management and orchestration tasks.

This solution is built on top of a VSPEX configuration and assumes that the required hardware is installed and set up according to the configuration guidelines presented in the following VSPEX Proven Infrastructure document:

EMC VSPEX Private Cloud: Microsoft Windows Server 2012 with Hyper-V for up to 1,000 Virtual Machines—Enabled by EMC Next-Generation VNX and EMC Backup

Table 2 lists the software requirements for this solution.

Table 2. Solution software

Software Configuration

Microsoft

Microsoft Windows Server Windows Server 2012 R2 Datacenter

Microsoft System Center Virtual Machine Manager

Version 2012 R2

Microsoft System Center App Controller

Version 2012 R2

Microsoft System Center Operations Manager

Version 2012 R2

Microsoft System Center Orchestrator Version 2012 R2

Solution hardware overview

Solution software overview



Software Configuration

Microsoft System Center Service Manager

Version 2012 R2

Microsoft SQL Server Version 2012 Enterprise Edition

EMC

EMC VNX OE for file 8.1

EMC VNX OE for block 05.33

EMC Storage Integrator 3.0.1 or later

EMC SMI-S Provider 4.6.1.1

EMC PowerPath PowerPath for Windows 5.7

Virtual machines (used for validation, not required for deployment)

Base operating system Microsoft Windows Server 2012 R2 Datacenter

Microsoft System Center 2012 R2 is a comprehensive, unified management platform that enables easy and efficient management of IT environments, including virtual and physical server infrastructures and client devices, for both traditional data centers and private clouds.

System Center Virtual Machine Manager

System Center Virtual Machine Manager (SCVMM) is a management solution for the virtualized data center. SCVMM enables you to configure and manage your virtualization host, networking, and storage resources to create and deploy virtual machines and services across the virtual infrastructure.

System Center App Controller

System Center App Controller (SCAC) provides a common self-service experience to help you easily configure, deploy, and manage virtual machines and services across private and public clouds. System Center Operations Manager

System Center Operations Manager (SCOM) provides organizations with a flexible and cost-effective solution for monitoring storage, computers, networks, and applications in a single console view. Operators can gain rapid insight into the state of their environment as well as receive alerts generated for availability, performance, configuration, and security situations.

System Center Orchestrator

System Center Orchestrator (SCO) provides a workflow management solution for the data center. It enables administrators to automate the creation, monitoring, and deployment of resources in the environment.

Microsoft System Center 2012 R2



System Center Service Manager

System Center Service Manager (SCSM) provides an integrated platform for automating and adapting an organization’s IT service management best practices, such as those found in Microsoft Operations Framework (MOF) and Information Technology Infrastructure Library (ITIL). SCSM provides built-in processes for incident and problem resolution, change control, and asset lifecycle management.

The EMC VNX storage system is a powerful, trusted, and smart storage array platform that provides a high level of performance, availability, and intelligence. VSPEX private cloud customers can use the advanced storage tiering features and efficiencies of the VNX storage array to deliver multiple storage service levels to their various organizations, accelerating and simplifying their as-a-service offerings in their private cloud environment.

Virtual Provisioning

EMC Virtual Provisioning™ can reduce cost, improve capacity utilization, and simplify storage management. Users can present large capacity to a host and then consume space only as needed from a shared pool, reducing initial over-allocation of storage capacity. Virtual Provisioning can reduce labor costs by simplifying data layout and reducing the steps required to accommodate capacity growth.

Fully Automated Storage Tiering

EMC Fully Automated Storage Provisioning for Virtual Pools (FAST™ VP) for EMC VNX optimizes array efficiency across all drive types in the array to improve system performance while reducing cost. FAST VP dynamically allocates workloads based on the configured service level and nondisruptively moves workloads across drive types, optimizing overall system performance. FAST VP moves the most active parts of the workload to high-performance flash disks and the least frequently accessed data to lower-cost drives, using the best performance and cost characteristics of the different drive types.

Unisphere

EMC Unisphere® is an intuitive management interface that allows IT managers to dramatically reduce the time required to provision, manage, and monitor storage assets. Unisphere delivers the simplification, flexibility, and automation that accelerate the transformation to the private cloud.

This solution uses additional EMC components that tightly integrate EMC storage with Microsoft System Center and simplify the management and orchestration tasks.

ESI for Windows Suite

EMC Storage Integrator (ESI) for Windows Suite includes the ESI PowerShell Toolkit, SCOM Management Packs, and the SCO Integration Pack.

ESI PowerShell Toolkit The ESI PowerShell Toolkit allows provisioning of EMC storage to Windows hosts. The toolkit includes a set of PowerShell cmdlets that can be executed from the command line to provision storage.

EMC VNX

EMC integration for System Center



ESI SCOM Management Packs ESI management packs for SCOM enable storage discovery, monitoring, and reporting. The management packs use ESI Service to communicate with the storage array.

ESI SCO Integration Pack The ESI SCO Integration Pack enables the management and provisioning of storage through SCO. SCO uses the ESI PowerShell cmdlets to create activities that can be used in runbooks. The ESI SCO Integration Pack enables you to create runbooks with EMC objects.

EMC SMI-S Provider

EMC SMI-S Provider enables the discovery and management of storage through SCVMM, which provides management for both Microsoft Hyper-V and VMware ESXi clusters. In addition to discovering and managing EMC storage, SCVMM enables the provisioning of virtual machines through SMI-S.

Figure 1 shows the relationship and integration among the System Center and EMC components that are used in this solution. The diagram shows the different types of connectors, management packs, and integration packs that enable integration of the System Center components used within the solution. It also depicts how Virtual Machine Manager integrates with the VNX array to simplify management. The integration points for each component are discussed in detail in Chapter 5 and Chapter 6.

Integration of solution components



Figure 1. Integration of solution components

Chapter 3: Solution Design


Chapter 3 Solution Design


Overview .................................................................................................................. 21

Solution architecture ............................................................................................... 21

Storage design ......................................................................................................... 23

System Center design .............................................................................................. 25

Design considerations and best practices ................................................................ 27



Overview

This chapter explains the design and layout of this cloud management solution, which is implemented on a VSPEX private cloud architecture to deliver IaaS. It includes information about the functions served by the different components along with their use cases in this solution.

Solution architecture

This solution was designed with a separate Hyper-V cluster to host virtual machines for System Center components and other virtual server components that enable VSPEX private cloud management.

The VSPEX private cloud includes additional Hyper-V clusters, each with a one-to-one mapping between it and a department within the organization using VSPEX (finance, accounting, and so on).

Figure 2 shows the architecture of a VSPEX private cloud environment for up to 1,000 virtual machines integrated with Microsoft System Center components.

Note: SCVMM can manage Hyper-V as well as ESXi environments.

High-level solution architecture



Figure 2. Logical architecture: VSPEX solution for IaaS with System Center

This solution provides high availability for the infrastructure components that are required for System Center and deployed in this solution. Table 3 shows the type of high-availability techniques used for the components.

Note: By default, all components have host clustering high availability because they are deployed on the same infrastructure cluster.

Table 3. High-availability for System Center components

High availability technology

System Center infrastructure: Cluster Node 1


Guest clustering SQL Server Failover Cluster Node 1

SQL Server Failover Cluster Node 2

Virtual Machine Manager Failover Cluster Node1

Virtual Machine Manager Failover Cluster Node 2

High availability of infrastructure components for System Center



High availability technology



Application high availability

Operations Manager Management Server 1

Operations Manager Management Server 2

Service Manager Management Server 1

Service Manager Management Server 2

Orchestrator Management Server, Runbook Server, Web Service

Orchestrator Runbook Server

Host clustering

Service Manager Data Warehouse Server

Operations Manager Reporting Server

App Controller

Storage design

The VNX storage array provides many features that allow provisioning of IaaS. This solution is built on top of a VSPEX private cloud and, therefore, uses the same storage configuration as described in the VSPEX private cloud Proven Infrastructure document. Accordingly, this solution uses a single storage service level as the base storage configuration to support up to 1,000 reference virtual machines.

Additional storage service levels can be created within a VNX array to achieve different levels of performance and most effectively align resources with performance requirements. Appendix A on page 96 provides information on creating additional storage service levels. If other storage levels are used, however, the number of supported reference virtual machines might be less than that specified in the VSPEX Proven Infrastructure document.

As validated in the VSPEX Proven Infrastructure, this solution uses EMC FAST VP technology, which enables storage tiering within the storage service level. Storage tiering is the assignment of data to different types (tiers) of storage media to reduce total storage cost. FAST VP makes automatic storage tiering possible on VNX storage arrays. FAST VP operates by periodically relocating the most active data to the highest performance storage tier, while relocating less active data to the lower performing storage tiers, as appropriate, when new data is promoted.

FAST VP uses intelligent algorithms to continuously analyze devices at the sub-LUN level. This enables it to identify and relocate the specific parts of a LUN that are most active and would benefit from being moved to higher-performing storage such as enterprise flash drives. It also identifies the least active parts of a LUN and relocates that data to higher-capacity, more cost-effective storage.

Performance measurement and user-defined policies determine data movement between tiers. FAST VP moves the data automatically and nondisruptively.

The VSPEX private cloud uses two disk types within the storage pool, with each providing a different tier of performance and capacity, as shown in Figure 3.

VNX storage tiering and FAST VP



Figure 3. EMC VNX sub-LUN tiering of production LUN data across two disk types

Figure 4 on page 25 shows how the storage pools and LUNs are mapped to the various SCVMM private clouds, which are built from clusters mapped to organizations within the business.

• Production clouds are organizational clouds for virtual machines with maximum performance requirements.

• Test and Development clouds are organizational clouds for virtual machines with medium performance requirements.

• Archive/low-cost clouds are organizational clouds for virtual machines with the lowest performance requirements.

Storage mapping



Figure 4. Organization mappings for storage service levels

System Center design

The combination of standardization, workflow automation, and self-service gives businesses the agility they need to offer IaaS on virtual infrastructures at reduced cost. The Management and Orchestration Workflow Automation solution combines the converged infrastructure of VSPEX with service catalog and process automation capabilities of System Center that enable IT organizations to deliver services rapidly, efficiently, and cost-effectively.

System Center components possess attributes that are necessary for successful management and orchestration of a private cloud. These System Center components along with EMC VNX and EMC integration software for System Center enable the provisioning of IaaS on a VSPEX private cloud.

SCVMM provides a management interface and multitenancy in a VSPEX private cloud environment. Multitenancy is an architecture in which a single instance of a software application serves multiple users. Each user is called a tenant. Although tenants are using the same building blocks in their configurations, the appearance or workflow of the application, as well as the service-level agreement (SLA), can be different for each tenant.

Virtual Machine Manager



Use Case

SCVMM enables private cloud management for both Hyper-V and VMware environments. This solution uses SCVMM to consume the VSPEX infrastructure by preparing a fabric from the server, network, and storage resources through EMC SMI-S Provider. The fabric includes network segregation, storage classification, and server clustering. Through SCVMM, a set of resources can be reserved from the fabric and user roles can be assigned to create SCVMM private clouds and enable multitenancy.

With System Center, tenants have another way to consume IT services and resources, rather than having users follow the tradition of filing service desk tickets and waiting in queues.

Tenants can use self-service portals from SCAC to access their own virtual data centers and consume these resources as a catalog-based service through a Web portal and programmatic interfaces.

Use Case

SCAC provides users a web-based self-service portal to provision virtual machines and services using a catalog on the resources allocated to the SCVMM private cloud within the user’s scope. SCAC establishes a connection to Windows Azure to allow for connecting the private cloud to the public cloud, enabling users to migrate virtual machines from the SCVMM to Azure.

Managing, monitoring, and maintaining physical and virtual components in a growing datacenter can be tedious. Microsoft System Center provides operation monitoring and management through SCOM, which uses flexible and cost-effective methods to ensure that performance and high availability are maintained for business-critical applications.

Use Case

This solution uses SCOM to monitor the health of objects (servers, virtual machines, SCVMM private clouds) within SCVMM (through SCOM integration for SCVMM) as well as the health of the VNX storage array (through the ESI SCOM Management Pack). SCOM is used to alert the administrator if faults occur or thresholds are exceeded within the VSPEX private cloud. Reports can be run through SCOM that enable the administrator to understand the performance of objects within the environment. Specific views can be created in SCOM to monitor objects and resources within an SCVMM private cloud only. By implementing user roles in SCOM, SCVMM private cloud administrators and users can monitor and manage resources only under their scope and profile, thus supporting multitenancy.

To minimize the time required to perform certain tasks, workflows can be created using SCO to automate the creation and deployment of resources within the VSPEX private cloud.

Use Case

This solution uses SCO to create workflows that automate certain SCVMM private cloud activities. ESI PowerShell and ESI SCO Integration Pack enable the automation

App Controller

Operations Manager

Orchestrator



of VNX tasks and activities to create workflows within SCO. Thus, storage activities and virtual machine activities can be grouped together to create end-to-end automated workflows. This solution presents a method, currently not supported through SCAC, to use the SCO web portal to reconfigure existing virtual machine properties.

Implementing chargeback and billing enables businesses to analyze how they provide IT services to the organization. Chargeback allows IT to bill departments for the services they consume. Through chargeback, businesses can allow departments to use resources effectively and reduce IT costs. SCSM enables construction of detailed cost models that are applied to resources delivered within the organization.

Use Case

This solution uses SCSM to create a price sheet that is then applied to one or more SCVMM private clouds based on service level. Chargeback reports are analyzed and created through an Excel cube in SCSM.

Design considerations and best practices

This section presents design consideration and best practices that should be followed to efficiently deliver IaaS to organizations and to simplify management for system and cloud administrators.

This solution is built on top of the VSPEX private cloud solution for Hyper-V. Therefore, the network design considerations are the same as detailed in that solution. This solution expands upon networking for virtual machines to provide individual virtual machine networks for various SCVMM private clouds within the business. For more information, refer to the following Proven Infrastructure document:


A self-service-based private cloud environment has separate tiers and levels of users. Therefore, certain network practices should be deployed to simplify management:

• Network virtualization

Create separate logical networks for Production clouds, Test and Development clouds, and Archive clouds. If additional network adapters are available, use the fastest network adapters for Production clouds and the slowest adapters for Archive clouds.

Create virtual machine networks on the logical networks for each Production, Test and Development, and Archive cloud.

• VLAN-based networking

Create separate logical networks for Production clouds, Test and Development clouds, and Archive clouds. If additional network adapters are

Service Manager

Network design



available, use the fastest network adapters for Production clouds and the slowest adapters for Archive clouds.

Create separate network sites with unique VLANs within each logical network for each Production cloud, Test and Development cloud, and Archive cloud.

Create virtual machine networks as needed for the SCVMM private clouds.

This solution is built on top of the VSPEX private cloud solution for Hyper-V; therefore, the storage design for the Production-level storage is the same as detailed in that solution. Appendix A on page 96 details the design for two additional storage levels—the Test and Development storage level and the Archive storage level. The two additional storage levels described in the appendix are provided only as examples. VSPEX recommends using only the storage layout described in the VSPEX private cloud solution for Hyper-V.

Storage layout

• The Production, Test and Development, and Archive clouds of each organization use the storage configuration as outlined in the Proven Infrastructure: EMC VSPEX Private Cloud—Microsoft Windows Server 2012 with Hyper-V for up to 1,000 Virtual Machines—Enabled by EMC Next-Generation VNX and EMC Backup. The three clouds will be supporting different performance profiles, so EMC FAST VP technology would automatically tier the data within the storage pool to achieve optimal performance.

• To simplify storage management and to achieve separation of resources for each cloud, EMC recommends dedicating one LUN to each SCVMM private cloud. Do not use the same LUN as storage for different SCVMM private clouds.

For virtualization design considerations, refer to the VSPEX private cloud Proven Infrastructure document for Hyper-V.

To simplify management and efficiently utilize resources, follow these practices:

• Create separate clusters (Hyper-V or ESXi) for each organization (Manufacturing, Finance, Accounting, and so on).

• Create separate host groups in SCVMM for servers and clusters dedicated to each organization.

• Create SCVMM private clouds for a particular organization on the host group created for that organization.

Note: You can create additional host groups under the parent host group if you want to separate Production, Test and Development, and Archive clouds.

• Dedicate a LUN to one specific cloud only.

Storage design

Virtualization design

Chapter 4: Solution Implementation


Chapter 4 Solution Implementation


Overview .................................................................................................................. 30

Installing and configuring System Center infrastructure cluster .............................. 30

Setting up and configuring SQL Server..................................................................... 32

Deploying SCVMM ................................................................................................... 33

Preparing the SCVMM fabric .................................................................................... 34

Deploying SCAC ....................................................................................................... 45

Connecting to clouds ............................................................................................... 47

Configuring SCOM .................................................................................................... 49

Installing ESI Service and EMC SCOM Management Packs ....................................... 51

Integrating SCOM with SCVMM ................................................................................ 53

Deploying SCO ......................................................................................................... 53

Installing ESI for SCO integration ............................................................................. 57

Deploying SCSM ...................................................................................................... 57

Integrating SCSM with other System Center components ........................................ 60



Overview

Table 4 lists the main stages in the solution deployment process and links to the relevant information and procedures.

Table 4. Deployment process stages and procedures

Stage Description Reference

1 Install and configure System Center infrastructure cluster

Installing and configuring System Center infrastructure cluster on page 30

2 Set up and configure SQL Server Setting up and configuring SQL Server on page 32

3 Deploy SCVMM Deploying SCVMM on page 33

4 Prepare SCVMM fabric Preparing the SCVMM fabric on page 34

5 Deploy SCAC Deploying SCAC on page 45

6 Connect to clouds Connecting to clouds on page 47

7 Configure SCOM Configuring SCOM on page 49

8 Install ESI Service and SCOM Management Packs

Installing ESI Service and EMC SCOM Management Packs on page 51

9 Integrate SCOM with SCVMM

Integrating SCOM with SCVMM on page 53

10 Deploy SCO Deploying SCO on page 53

11 Install ESI for SCO integration Installing ESI for SCO integration on page 57

12 Deploy SCSM Deploying SCSM on page 57

13 Integrate SCSM with other System Center components

Integrating SCSM with other System Center components on page 60

Installing and configuring System Center infrastructure cluster

The System Center infrastructure cluster hosts the components of System Center and the servers that are required to make the components highly available. This cluster also hosts other virtual servers that are required for complete management and orchestration of a VSPEX configuration.

You can create the infrastructure cluster for System Center either manually through Windows Server 2012 or automatically through SCVMM.

Complete the following tasks to install and configure the Windows hosts and infrastructure servers to support the System Center components. The subsequent sections provide information to assist you in completing the tasks.



1. Install Windows Server 2012 R2 on the physical servers that are deployed for the solution.

2. Add the Hyper-V Server role, add the Failover Clustering feature, and create and configure the Hyper-V cluster.

3. Provision storage to the infrastructure cluster by creating LUNs on the VSPEX storage pool and masking them to the Windows hosts.

4. Connect the Hyper-V datastores to the Windows hosts as the Cluster Shared Volumes (CSVs) to the Hyper-V failover cluster.

5. Create a failover cluster.

6. Add cluster disks as CSV disks to the failover cluster.

Install Windows Server 2012 R2 on the physical servers that are deployed for the solution.

The Microsoft TechNet article Installing Windows Server 2012 provides instructions:

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/jj134246.aspx

To install the Hyper-V role and the Failover Clustering feature, complete these steps:

1. Install and patch Windows Server 2012 R2 on each Windows host.

2. Configure the Hyper-V role and the Failover Clustering feature.

The Microsoft TechNet article Installing Windows Server 2012 provides instructions:


To create LUNs on the VSPEX storage pool for System Center components, refer to the sizing guide for System Center components in Chapter 6. The following Proven Infrastructure document provides additional information:


Add the newly created LUNs to appropriate storage groups on the VNX so that the hosts to be clustered have access to the LUNs.VNX Unisphere online Help provides information on how to create storage groups on the VNX system.

The Microsoft TechNet article Use Cluster Shared Volumes in a Failover Cluster provides additional information:


Create the failover cluster in accordance with the instructions in the Microsoft TechNet article Deploy a Hyper-V Cluster:

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/jj863389.aspx#BKMK_step5

Install Windows on hosts

Add Hyper-V role and Failover Clustering feature

Create LUNs on storage pool created for VSPEX

Connect Hyper-V datastores to Windows hosts

Create a failover cluster




http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/jj863389.aspx#BKMK_step5



After the LUNs are connected and formatted on one of the hosts, add the clustered disks as CSV disks to the failover cluster.

The Microsoft TechNet article Use Cluster Shared Volumes in a Failover Cluster provides information:


Setting up and configuring SQL Server

The databases for System Center components are hosted on a SQL Server host server. Different components of System Center require separate instances of SQL Server.

Complete the following tasks to set up and configure a SQL Server database for the solution. The subsequent sections provide information to assist you in completing the tasks.

1. Create virtual machines to host SQL Server on the System Center infrastructure cluster. Verify that the virtual server meets the hardware and software requirements.

2. Install Windows Server 2012 R2 on the virtual machines created to host SQL Server.

3. Create a SQL Server failover cluster.

4. Create LUNs on the VNX and present them to SQL Server to store database and LOF files.

5. Create additional SQL Server instances for required components.

After you complete these tasks, you will have Microsoft SQL Server installed on a virtual machine with instances required for System Center components.

Create two virtual machines with enough computing resources on the System Center infrastructure cluster designated for infrastructure virtual machines, and use the block or file storage assigned to the cluster to host the virtual machine. Chapter 6 on page 92 provides information about sizing of compute resources.

The SQL Server service must run on Microsoft Windows. Install the required Windows version on the virtual machines, and configure the appropriate network, time, and authentication settings.

Prepare the virtual machine for SQL Server failover clustering and install the SQL Server failover cluster. The Microsoft TechNet article Create a New SQL Server Failover Cluster (Setup) provides instructions:

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms179530.aspx

Create CSV for cluster storage

Create virtual machines for SQL Server failover cluster

Install Windows on the virtual machines

Create a failover cluster





Create LUNs on the VNX and present them to the SQL Server to store database and LOF files of System Center components. Chapter 6 on page 92 provides information on sizing of database and log LUNs. To change the default storage path for database and log files, right-click the server object in SSMS and select Database Properties. This action opens a properties interface from which you can change the default data and log directories for new databases created on the server.

Configure separate SQL Server instances for the following System Center components:

• SCVMM

• SCOM

• SCO and SCAC

• SCSM

• SCOM data warehouse

• SCSM data warehouse

The Microsoft TechNet article Add Features to an Instance of SQL Server 2012 (Setup) provides instructions:

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc281940.aspx

Deploying SCVMM

Complete the following tasks to install and deploy SCVMM on a virtual server in a failover cluster. The subsequent sections provide information to assist you in completing the tasks.

1. Create at least two SCVMM host virtual machines, each with Windows Server 2012 R2 and Failover Clustering.

2. Install the SCVMM server on the first node of the cluster.

3. Install the SCVMM server on additional nodes of the cluster.

4. Install the SCVMM Administrator Console on a centralized management server, if required.

Create a minimum of two virtual machines on the Infrastructure cluster with the customer’s guest OS configuration by using the infrastructure server data store presented from the storage array.

The memory and processor requirements for the SCVMM server depend on the number of the managed Hyper-V hosts and virtual machines.

The Microsoft TechNet article Installing a Highly Available VMM Management Server provides instructions:

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/gg610675.aspx

Present LUNs for database and log files

Configure additional SQL Server instances

Create and configure host virtual machines

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc281940.aspx




Install the guest OS on the SCVMM host virtual machine on the first node of the cluster. Install the required Windows Server version on the virtual machine and select the appropriate network, time, and authentication settings. Configure the two virtual machines as a failover cluster.

The Microsoft TechNet article Server Operating Systems in System Center 2012 SP1 provides information about operating system requirements:


The Microsoft TechNet article Installing the VMM Server provides instructions:


SCVMM Management Console is a client tool to manage SCVMM server. Install the Management Console on the same computer as the SCVMM server.

The Microsoft TechNet article How to Install a VMM Management Server on an Additional Node of a Cluster provides instructions:


By default, the SCVMM Administrator Console is installed along with the management server. If you need to install the Administrator Console on a centralized management server, follow the steps outlined in the Microsoft TechNet article How to Install the VMM Console:


Preparing the SCVMM fabric

Complete the following tasks to prepare the fabric in SCVMM. The subsequent sections provide information to assist you in completing the tasks.

1. Add VNX storage to be managed from SCVMM.

2. Add servers to host groups in SCVMM and create clusters.

3. Configure logical networks for virtual machines.

4. Create virtual machine templates and deploy virtual machines.

Virtualized workloads in SCVMM require storage resources to meet capacity and performance requirements. SCVMM recognizes local and remote storage.

SCVMM allows administrators to create storage classifications so that faster-performing storage can be logically distinguished, as shown in Figure 5, and then provisioned to hosts, clusters, and clouds based on organizational requirements.

Install the SCVMM server

Install the SCVMM server on additional cluster nodes

Install the SCVMM Administrator Console

Add VNX storage


http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/bb740750.aspx





Figure 5. Storage classifications in SCVMM

The following storage classifications are provided as an example. For this solution, only the Gold storage level was used.

• Gold storage is created for storage pools whose configurations are based on the VSPEX private cloud solution.

• Silver storage is created for storage with all SAS drives (refer to Appendix A on page 96).

• Bronze storage is created for storage pools with all NL-SAS drives (refer to Appendix A on page 96).

Note: EMC recommends using only the VSPEX storage layout for supporting a specific number of reference virtual machines. If other storage layouts are used, then the number of reference virtual machines supported might be lower.

The Microsoft TechNet article Configuring Storage in VMM provides an overview of configuring storage in SCVMM:


EMC SMI-S

The EMC SMI-S Provider aligns with the Storage Networking Industry Association (SNIA) goal to design a single interface that supports unified management of multiple types of storage arrays. The one-to-many model enabled by the SMI-S standard makes it possible for SCVMM to interoperate with multiple storage arrays. In this solution, SCVMM uses the EMC SMI-S Provider to manage disparate storage systems from the same SCVMM Administrator Console that is used to manage all other SCVMM private cloud components.

Adding and Managing VNX Block To add VNX Block storage to SCVMM, install the EMC SMI-S Provider on a separate server and add the VNX storage system to the SMI-S Provider. EMC SMI-S Provider Release Notes provides more information on installing and configuring EMC SMI-S Provider:

https://developer-content.emc.com/developer/devcenters/storage/snia/smi-s/downloads/SMI_Provider_RN.pdf






Add the VNX system to the SMI-S Provider as follows to enable discovery and management of the VNX system using SCVMM:

1. Under Storage, right-click Providers and select Add Storage Device.

2. In the Add Storage Devices wizard, select SAN and NAS devices discovered and managed by the SMI-S Provider, and then click Next.

3. Enter the IP address of the server where the EMC SMI-S Provider is installed and select the appropriate Run As account.

4. After the arrays added to the SMI-S Provider have been discovered, select the pools you want to manage through SCVMM, and select the appropriate classification for the each pool.



5. Click Next, and then click Finish on the summary page.

The pools are displayed under Storage > Classification and Pools.

Adding and Managing VNX File The SMI-S Provider for VNX File is already embedded in the control station of VNX2 storage arrays. To add a VNX File array to be managed in SCVMM, follow these steps:

1. Install the Control Station Root CA certificate on the SCVMM server:

a. Display the contents of the Root CA certificate on the Control Station:

# /nas/sbin/nas_ca_certificate –display

b. Copy the entire contents from the “-----BEGIN CERTIFICATE-----” to the “-----END CERTIFICATE-----” lines to the clipboard.

c. Open Notepad on the Microsoft Windows 2012 SCVMM server, paste the contents of the certificate, and save the file as root.cer.

d. Double-click the root.cer file, or select Open with > Crypto Shell Extensions), select Install Certificate, and select Local Machine as the Store Location.

e. Select Place all certificates in the following store, browse and select Trusted Root Certification Authorities, click OK, and click Next.

f. Click Finish.

2. Under Storage, right-click File servers and select Add storage device.

3. In the Add Storage Devices wizard, select SAN and NAS devices discovered and managed by a SMI-S Provider, and click Next.

4. At Specify protocol and address of the storage SMI-S provider, follow these steps:

a. Enter the IP address or FQDN of the Control Station.

b. Change the TCP/IP port to 5989.

c. Select Use Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) connection.

d. Choose the appropriate Run As account.

e. Click Next.



After the scan is complete, the file shares from VNX File are displayed under Storage Devices.

5. Select the file shares to be managed, click Next, and then click Finish.

The file shares and CIFS server are displayed under File Servers.

SCVMM 2012 R2 provides the capability of managing Hyper-V and ESX servers within the business. Services that are offered through Hyper-V hosts and clusters are the same for ESX hosts and clusters.

Host groups

With SCVMM 2012 R2, you can create host-group logical containers so that servers dedicated for a particular organization can be logically separated within SCVMM, as shown in Figure 6. This allows specific settings and resources meant for the organization to be applied to servers for that organization only.

Figure 6. SCVMM host groups

Prepare hosts and clusters



The Microsoft TechNet article Creating Host Groups in VMM provides more information:


Windows and Hyper-V hosts and clusters

Add the previously created infrastructure cluster to SCVMM to simplify management under a single interface.

The Microsoft TechNet article How to Add a Node to a Hyper-V Host Cluster in VMM provides instructions:


In this solution, additional host clusters are created for different organizations within the business. Each organization will have its own set of hosts configured as highly available clusters.

With SCVMM 2012 R2, you can add Windows servers directly to SCVMM without having to manually enable the Hyper-V role. SCVMM automatically enables the Hyper-V role for the server being added before adding the server to the inventory. You can place the Windows server being added directly in the host group container for a particular organization.

The Microsoft TechNet article Adding Windows Server as Hyper-V Hosts in VMM Overview provides more information:


Create Hyper-V Cluster in SCVMM SCVMM 2012 R2 allows user to add pre-existing Hyper-V clusters under SCVMM hosts. It also enables the creation of Hyper-V clusters from within SCVMM. SCVMM automatically configures the Windows servers with the failover cluster feature.

To use EMC storage as shared storage for the cluster, you must create LUNs or SMB 3.0 file shares and present them to the host group containing the servers meant for clustering before you create a cluster.

To create a LUN in SCVMM and assign it to a host group, follow these steps:

1. Select the storage pool and classification.

2. Specify a description and LUN size.

3. Click OK.






4. After the job finishes, right-click the host group and click Properties.

5. On the Storage tab, click Allocate Logical Units.



6. Under Available logical units, select the LUN that was created.

7. Click OK.

You can create SMB 3.0 file shares and add them to the cluster after it is created. To create a SMB 3.0 file share, follow these steps:

1. Under Storage, right-click File Server and click Create File Share.

2. Select the CIFS server and provide a name for the file share.

3. Click Finish.

The Microsoft TechNet article How to Assign SMB 3.0 File Shares to Hyper-V Hosts and Clusters in VMM provides instructions for assigning a file share to a cluster:





The Microsoft TechNet article Creating a Hyper-V Host Cluster in VMM Overview provides a complete list of prerequisites for creating a cluster and the configuration steps required to create a cluster:


ESXi hosts and clusters

SCVMM 2012 R2 provides the capability of managing VMware vCenter 5.1 (and earlier) environments.

To add a vCenter server to SCVMM, follow these steps:

1. On the Fabric tab, right-click vCenter Servers and click Add vCenter Server.

2. At Computer name, enter the name or IP address of the vCenter server.

3. Specify the Run As account that has administrative privileges on the vCenter server.

4. Click OK.

5. After the vCenter Server is added, on the Fabric pane select Add Resource and select VMware ESX Hosts and Clusters.

A window with the ESXi hosts and clusters managed by the vCenter Server that was added is displayed.

6. Select the clusters/hosts you want to add to SCVMM.




7. Click Next.

The selected ESXi servers appear under All Hosts in the fabric pane.

Note: The services that are offered through Hyper-V hosts and clusters can be offered through VMware ESXi clusters in SCVMM.



The Microsoft TechNet article Managing VMware ESX Hosts Overview provides more information on support for ESXi hosts and clusters in SCVMM:


To enable virtual machines created within SCVMM to communicate within an organization or outside, you must define and configure networking in SCVMM.

Logical network and network sites

A logical network in SCVMM is mapped to a physical adapter on the Hyper-V host. A logical network consists of one or more network sites. A network site associates one or more subnets, VLANs, and subnet and VLAN pairs with a logical network. It also enables you to define the host groups to which the network site is available. For example, you can make a Production logical network available to both Finance and Manufacturing organizations by creating network sites for each organization with its own scope of VLANs and subnets.

The Microsoft TechNet article Configuring Logical Networking in VMM Overview provides information about configuring logical networking in SCVMM:


Virtual machine networks

Virtual machine networks enable you to use network virtualization, which extends the concept of server virtualization to make it possible to deploy multiple virtual networks on the same physical network.

The Microsoft TechNet article Configuring VM Networks and Gateways in VMM provides information on configuring virtual machine networks:


A virtual machine template is a standardized group of hardware and software settings stored in the SCVMM library. Multiple virtual machines can be deployed from the same template so that virtual machines do not have to be individually configured.

Create a virtual machine in SCVMM

When you create a virtual machine in SCVMM, SCVMM converts it to a virtual machine template. After the virtual machine is installed, install the software, and change the Windows and application settings.

The Microsoft TechNet article How to Create and Deploy a Virtual Machine from a Blank Virtual Hard Disk provides information about creating a virtual machine in SCVMM:


Configure networking

Create virtual machine templates







Create a virtual machine template

The virtual machine is removed after the virtual machine is converted into a template. Back up the virtual machine, because the virtual machine might be destroyed during template creation.

Create a hardware profile and a guest operating system profile while you create a template. You can use the profiler to deploy the virtual machines.

The Microsoft TechNet article How to Create a Virtual Machine Template provides information about creating a virtual machine template in SCVMM:


Deploy virtual machines from the template virtual machine

The Microsoft TechNet article How to Deploy a Virtual Machine provides instructions for deploying the virtual machines:

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/hh240236.aspx.

When using the deployment wizard, you can save the PowerShell scripts and reuse them to deploy the other virtual machines if the virtual machine configurations are the same.

Deploying SCAC

Microsoft System Center App Controller (SCAC) provides a common self-service experience that can help you easily configure, deploy, and manage virtual machines and services across private and public clouds.

Through SCAC you can establish a connection to a Windows Azure subscription, through which you can manage virtual machines on both public clouds and private clouds from a single interface. Authorized users can copy files such as virtual machines, images, and virtual hard disks (VHDs) from SCVMM libraries to Windows Azure.

Complete the following tasks to configure SCAC. The subsequent sections provide information to assist you in completing the tasks.

1. Create the host virtual machine to be used for SCAC.

2. Install Windows Server 2012 Datacenter Edition on the SCAC host virtual machine.

3. Create the domain accounts and groups used in the installation and configuration.

4. Add the .NET Framework feature in the server.

5. Install the Silverlight Runtime software.

6. Install the SCVMM Console.

7. Install the SCAC portal server.





Create a virtual machine on the infrastructure cluster with the customer’s guest OS configuration by using the infrastructure server data store presented from the storage array.

The memory and processor requirements for the SCAC server depend on the number of managed Hyper-V hosts and virtual machines.

Install the guest OS on the SCAC host virtual machine. Install the required Windows Server version on the virtual machine and select the appropriate network, time, and authentication settings.



The Microsoft TechNet article App Controller Deployment Checklist provides information on SCAC accounts and requirements.


Install the required .NET framework. The Microsoft TechNet article .NET Framework in System Center 2012 SP1 provides information on .NET Framework requirements:


Install Silverlight Runtime on the SCAC virtual machine.

From the installation media source, right-click Silverlight.exe and select Run as administrator from the context menu to begin setup.

Log on to the SCAC server with a privileged user account that has Administrator privileges, and install the SCVMM Console.

The Microsoft TechNet article How to Install the VMM Console provides instructions for installing the SCVMM Console on the SCAC virtual machine:


The Microsoft TechNet article Installing App Controller provides instructions for completing the steps to install SCAC:


Create the host virtual machine

Install the guest OS

Create the domain accounts and groups

Add the .NET Framework feature

Install Silverlight Runtime

Install the SCVMM Console

Install the SCAC portal server








Connecting to clouds

Before using SCAC, you must establish a connection to the private cloud (SCVMM) and public cloud (Windows Azure). Only a user in the administrator role can manage public and private cloud connections. Migrations of virtual machines and copying of files from the private cloud to the public cloud are explained in Chapter 5, Solution Verification, on page 62.

To connect to a SCVMM server, follow these steps:

1. From the SCAC Connections tab, click Connect.

2. Select SCVMM.

The Add a new VMM connection dialog box is displayed.

3. For Connection name, specify a name for the connection and, optionally, type a description in the Description field.

4. For Server name, specify the FQDN of the SCVMM server.

5. For Port, specify the port number.

6. Select Automatically import SSL certificates.

7. Click OK.

Connect to a private cloud



The SCVMM server appears under the Connections page.

To connect to a Windows Azure subscription, follow these steps:

1. Create a Management certificate and export it twice, once as .cer and once as .pfx.

2. Add the management certificate (.cer) to the Windows Azure subscription.

The Microsoft TechNet article Create and Upload a Management Certificate for Windows Azure provides information on adding the certificate:

http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/windowsazure/gg551722.aspx

3. Log in to SCAC as an Administrator.

4. Under Settings, select Subscription and click Add.

5. Enter a name for the subscription, along with an optional description.

6. Add the subscription ID and the Management Certificate (.pfx).

7. Enter the password for the Management Certificate and click OK.

The new subscription appears under the Subscription tab.

An administrator can make the Windows Azure subscription available to users as follows:

1. Under User Roles, select the user to whom the subscription is to be made available, and click Properties.

2. Under Scope, select the Windows Azure subscription.

Connect to Windows Azure

Provide access to subscriptions

http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/windowsazure/gg551722.aspx



Configuring SCOM

Follow these procedures to set up SCOM to monitor the VSPEX private cloud environment:

1. Configure SCOM.

2. Install ESI Service and EMC SCOM Management Packs.

3. Integrate SCOM with SCVMM.

SCOM provides an interface that delivers information on the health, state, and performance of objects that are monitored. It generates alerts when rules are violated and thresholds are exceeded. You can generate reports through SCOM that provide historical as well as current statistics of monitored resources.

Complete the following steps to configure SCOM. The subsequent sections provide information to assist you in completing the tasks.

1. Create three virtual machines to be used for SCOM.

2. Install Window Server 2012 R2 Edition on the SCOM host virtual machine.



5. Install the SQL Server Reporting Services and Analysis Services on the server.

6. Install Microsoft Report Viewer 2012.

7. Configure SQL Server prerequisites for SCOM.

8. Install two SCOM management servers.

9. Install the SCOM reporting server.

Create three virtual machines on the infrastructure cluster: two for SCOM management servers and one for the SCOM reporting server.

For memory and processor requirements for the SCOM servers, refer to Chapter 6 on page 92.

Install the guest OS on the SCOM host virtual machines. Install the appropriate Windows Server version on the virtual machines, selecting appropriate network, time, and authentication settings.

The Microsoft TechNet article Server Operating Systems in System Center 2012 R2 provides operating system requirements:

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/dn281935.aspx

SCOM overview

Create the host virtual machines





Create the domain accounts and groups according to the requirements described in the Microsoft TechNet article Operations Manager Accounts:




The SCOM installation requires that the SQL Server Reporting Services and SQL Server Analysis Services (split configuration) be installed to support the SCOM reporting features and integration with SCVMM.

The following Microsoft TechNet articles provide instructions:

• SQL Server Reporting Services (SSRS) at http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms159106.aspx

• Install SQL Server 2012 Business Intelligence Features (includes instructions for installing SQL Server Analysis Services) at http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/hh231681.aspx

The SCOM installation also requires that the Microsoft Report Viewer 2012 package be installed prior to the installation of SCOM.

Install Report Viewer 2012 from the Microsoft Report Viewer 2012 Runtime web page in the Microsoft Download Center:

http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=35747

The Microsoft TechNet article Deploying System Center 2012 – Operations Manager provides instructions for configuring SQL Server prerequisites for assigning roles in SCOM:

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/d81818d2-534e-475c-98e1-65496357d5a5

In SCOM 2012 R2, the management server is the first feature that is installed. The operational database and data warehouse database are created during this setup.

For high availability, install an additional SCOM management server on the second virtual machine using the same management group name that was used during the installation of the root management server.



Install the SQL Server Reporting Services and Analysis Services

Install Microsoft Report Viewer

Configure the SQL Server prerequisites

Install management servers












The following Microsoft TechNet articles provide information:

• How to Install the First Management Server in a Management Group at http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/hh301922.aspx

• How to Install Additional Management Servers at http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/hh284673.aspx

Install the SCOM reporting server on the SCOM reporting server virtual machine.

The Microsoft TechNet article How to Install the Operations Manager Reporting Server provides instructions for installing the reporting server and configuring the reporting server role:


Installing ESI Service and EMC SCOM Management Packs

The ESI Service and the ESI SCOM Management Packs work in conjunction with Microsoft SCOM for centralized discovery and monitoring of all supported EMC storage systems and storage system components.

ESI Service is the communications link between ESI and the ESI SCOM Management Packs. You can use ESI Service to view and report on all registered EMC storage systems and storage system components connected to the ESI host system. ESI Service then pushes this data to SCOM. You can also use the ESI Service as a stand-alone tool without SCOM to collect, view, and report this same system data.

The ESI Service provides the following functionality:

• A common repository for all registered storage systems and related storage-system connection information

• Configuration and secure storage of the settings and access control policies for all the registered storage systems

• Authorization of storage system access with the Windows Authentication access control settings

• An entity graph, a meta model, and a query engine for discovering systems and related components

• An HTTP API for remotely accessing the entity graph and viewing policy and configuration information

• A named HTTP API for configuration operations

ESI is distributed as a Zip file that is available for download on EMC Online Support at https://support.EMC.com. During the ESI installation, you can choose to install the ESI Service on the same ESI host system. When you install the ESI Service, the ESI Service PowerShell Toolkit is also installed on the ESI host system.

Install the SCOM reporting server

ESI Service overview

Install the ESI Service




https://support.emc.com/



The EMC Storage Integrator for Windows Suite Release Notes and Online Help provide ESI installation instructions.

You can use the ESI Service PowerShell Toolkit to set up or update the ESI Service entity graph, service configuration, and system registration or published connection information. The ESI for Windows Suite Online Help provides instructions for using the ESI Service PowerShell Toolkit.

The ESI SCOM Management Packs enable you to manage EMC storage systems with SCOM by providing consolidated and simplified dashboard views of storage entities. These views enable you to do the following:

• Discover and monitor the health status and events of EMC storage systems and storage system components in SCOM

• Receive alerts for possible problems with disk drives, power supplies, storage pools, and other physical and logical components in SCOM

The ESI Zip file, which is available on EMC Online Support, contains the ESI SCOM Management Packs installer. The management packs must be installed on the SCOM Management group that is connected to the ESI SCOM monitoring agents. The ESI SCOM agents are connected to the same Windows domain as the ESI host system that has the ESI Service installed.

To install and import the ESI SCOM Management Packs, follow these steps:

1. On the SCOM Management group server that is connected to the ESI SCOM agents, download the ESI Zip file.

2. In the ESI Zip file, locate and double-click the ESI SCOM ManagementPacks.*.Setup file.

By default, the setup file installs the Management Pack files to the C:\Program Files (x86)\EMC\Management Packs folder. If you are upgrading from ESI version 2.1, delete the existing EMC.SI.Presentation.mp file from SCOM before importing the new management pack files.

3. Import each ESI Management Pack file in SCOM; however, if you have previously imported the management packs and are performing an update, do not import the EMC.SI.Customization.xml file.

Note: The customization file contains your overrides and customizations. You will lose your override settings if you import this file again. This file is installed as version number 1.0.0.0. You can increment the version number when you make changes.

The Microsoft TechNet article How to Import an Operations Manager Management Pack provides information about importing management packs in SCOM:


ESI SCOM Management Packs overview

Install the ESI SCOM Management Packs




Integrating SCOM with SCVMM

To monitor virtual machines, clouds, and other resources under SCVMM, you can connect SCOM with SCVMM so that they can work in an integrated way.

The Microsoft TechNet article Configuring Operations Manager Integration with VMM provides instructions for successfully integrating SCOM with SCVMM:

http://technet.microsoft.com/library/hh427287

Deploying SCO

Microsoft System Center Orchestrator (SCO) is a workflow management solution for the data center. Orchestrator lets you automate the creation, monitoring, and deployment of resources in your environment.

Orchestrator uses runbooks to automate processes. Runbooks contain the instructions for an automated task or process. The individual steps throughout a runbook are called activities. Within the runbook, additional controls provide information and instructions to control the sequence of activities in the runbook.

The Microsoft TechNet article Using Runbooks in System Center 201 – Orchestrator provides additional details:


This section provides information on how to deploy SCO in a VSPEX environment.

Complete the following steps to configure SCO. The subsequent sections provide information to assist you in completing the tasks.

1. Create virtual machines for the SCO server and an additional runbook server.

2. Install Windows Server 2012 R2 Datacenter Edition on the SCO host virtual machine.


4. Add the .NET Framework feature with WCF HTTP activation on the server.

5. Install the Silverlight Runtime software.

6. Install the SCO management server, runbook server, web service, and designer server on the first virtual machine.

7. Install an additional runbook server on the second virtual machine.

8. Install a SCVMM Console on the SCO virtual machine.

9. Install Microsoft Report Viewer 2012 on the target runbook servers.

10. Install the SCOM Operations Console on the target runbook servers.

11. Install and deploy Integration Packs on the target runbook servers.

http://technet.microsoft.com/library/hh427287




Create two virtual machines on the System Center infrastructure cluster. The first virtual machine will host the SCO management server, runbook server, web service, and runbook designer. The second virtual machine will be used as an additional runbook server.

Chapter 6 on page 92 provides memory and processor requirements for the SCO server.

Install the guest OS on the SCO host virtual machine. Install the required Windows Server version on the virtual machine, selecting the appropriate network, time, and authentication settings.

The Microsoft TechNet article Server Operating Systems in System Center 2012 SP1 provides information about OS requirements:


The Microsoft TechNet article Server Operating Systems in System Center 2012 R2 provides information on OS compatibility:


Create the domain accounts and groups according to the requirements outlined in the Microsoft TechNet article Orchestrator Security Planning:




To install Silverlight Runtime on the SCO virtual machines, from the installation media source, right-click Silverlight.exe and select Run as administrator from the context menu.

Install the SCO management server, runbook server, web service, and designer server on the first virtual machine. The Microsoft TechNet article How to Install Orchestrator on a Single Computer provides information:


The Microsoft TechNet article Using Windows Firewall with Orchestrator provides information on how to configure the Windows firewall on the SCO runbook server:





Add the .NET Framework feature with WCF HTTP activation

Install Silverlight Runtime

Install SCO on the first virtual machine









Install a runbook server on the second virtual machine.

The Microsoft TechNet article How to Install a Runbook Server for System Center 2012 —Orchestrator provides instructions:


Log on to the SCO server with Administrator privileges and install the SCVMM Console.

The Microsoft TechNet article How to Install the VMM Console provides instructions:


The Microsoft Report Viewer 2012 package also must be installed on the target runbook servers because the SCVMM Console is required. Install Report Viewer 2012 as follows:

1. From the installation media source, right-click ReportViewer.exe and select Run as administrator from the context menu to begin setup.

2. Refer to the Microsoft TechNet article How to Install the Microsoft Report Viewer Redistributable Security Update to continue with the installation of the Report Viewer:


The Microsoft TechNet article How to Install the Operations Console provides information on how to install the SCOM Operations Console on the SCO virtual machine:


System Center 2012 R2 – Orchestrator includes a set of standard activities that are automatically installed with SCO. You can expand the functionality and ability of SCO to integrate platforms and products by Microsoft and other companies by installing integration packs. Each integration pack contains activities that provide unique functions. Microsoft provides integration packs for all of the System Center components, a number of other Microsoft products, and technologies and products from other companies.

This solution requires the following System Center integration packs:

• System Center 2012 Virtual Machine Manager

• System Center 2012 Operations Manager

• System Center 2012 Service Manager

Install an additional runbook server

Install the SCVMM Console

Install Report Viewer

Install the SCOM Operations Console

Install and deploy Integration Packs







Download the System Center 2012 SP1 integration packs from the System Center 2012 Service Pack 1 Orchestrator Component Add-ons and Extensions web page in the Microsoft Download Center:


The Microsoft TechNet article How to Install an Integration Pack provides information on how to install and deploy the System Center integration packs:


Integration with System Center components

This section provides information on the required integration packs for this solution.

Virtual Machine Manager Integration Pack The System Center Integration Pack for System Center 2012 Virtual Machine Manager is an add-in for System Center 2012 R2–Orchestrator that enables automation of several activities including the following:

• Update and modify virtual machine configuration

• Deploy virtual machines from templates and virtual hard drives

• Power on and off, restart, and migrate virtual machines

• Create and restore virtual machine checkpoints The Microsoft TechNet article System Center Integration Pack for System Center 2012 Virtual Machine Manager provides detailed information:


Operations Manager Integration Pack The System Center Integration Pack for System Center 2012 Operations Manager is an add-in for System Center 2012 R2–Orchestrator. It helps to connect a SCO runbook server to an SCOM management server to automate various actions.

The Microsoft TechNet article System Integration Pack for System Center 2012 Operations Manager provides detailed information:


Service Manager Integration Pack The System Center Integration Pack for System Center 2012 Service Manager is an add-in for System Center 2012 R2–Orchestrator. It helps to coordinate and use operational data in an existing IT environment comprising service desk systems, configuration management systems, and event monitoring systems.

The Microsoft TechNet article System Integration Pack for System Center 2012 Service Manager provides detailed information:









Installing ESI for SCO integration

The ESI SCO Integration Pack enables the management and provisioning of storage for interoperable storage management and process consistency across a data center. ESI maps application resources to Windows. ESI PowerShell cmdlets provide block storage provisioning for Windows hosts, clusters, and virtual machines. SCO consumes the provisioning cmdlets as activities that can be employed in SCO runbooks.

Before deploying the integration pack, you must install ESI and the ESI SCO Integration Pack on each SCO runbook server and SCO runbook designer.

To install and deploy ESI and the ESI SCO Integration Pack, follow these steps:

1. On each SCO runbook server and designer that is connected to the same Windows domain as the ESI host system, download the ESI version 3.0 for Windows Zip file.

2. Locate and double-click ESI.*.Setup.X86.exe.

3. In the InstallShield Wizard, click Next.

4. When the EMC Software License Agreement appears, read and accept the license agreement, and then click Next.

5. In the Setup window, confirm or change the options to be installed and click Next.

Note: Click Change to change the installable path to a drive other than the default drive.

6. In the Ready to Install the Program window, click Install.

7. Click Finish.

Note: The ESI installer attempts to add a firewall exception rule to enable Remote Volume Management on the host where ESI is being installed. The installer also attempts to enable PS Remoting on the same host. If the installer encounters a problem during these steps, you are instructed to perform these steps manually after the installation is complete.

8. In the ESI Zip file, double-click ESI SCO Integration Pack*.Setup.exe.

The ESIforSCOIntegrationPack.*.OIP integration pack file is installed to the default C:\Program Files (x86)\EMC\ESI SCO Integration Pack folder.

Deploying SCSM

Microsoft System Center Service Manager (SCSM) provides an integrated platform for automating and adapting an organization’s IT service management best practices, such as Information Technology Infrastructure Library (ITIL). It provides built-in processes for incident and problem resolution, change control, and asset lifecycle management including showback and chargeback reporting as well as self-service portal capabilities through a SharePoint website.



This chapter provides information on how to install, deploy, and configure System Center Service Manager in a VSPEX environment for billing and chargeback of virtual machines deployed in a SCVMM private cloud.

Complete the following steps to configure SCSM. The subsequent sections provide information to assist you in completing the tasks.

1. Create three virtual machines for SCSM.

2. Install Windows Server 2012 Datacenter Edition on the SCSM host virtual machines.



5. Install the Authorization Manager hotfix on both virtual machines.

6. Install the Microsoft Report Viewer 2012 Redistributable security update on both virtual machines.

7. Install the SQL Server 2012 Native Client software on the management and data warehouse servers.

8. Install SQL Server 2012 SP1 Analysis Management Object.

9. Install the SQL Server Reporting Services (split configuration) on the data warehouse server.

10. Configure the SCSM environment.

11. Install the SCSM management server.

12. Install the data warehouse server and register it with the SCSM source.

Create three virtual machines—two for the SCSM management servers and one for the SCSM data warehouse server. Chapter 6 on page 92 provides sizing and requirements for the virtual machine.

Install the guest OS on the SCSM host virtual machines. Install the required Windows Server version on the virtual machines, selecting the appropriate network, time, and authentication settings.



Create the required domain accounts and groups. The Microsoft TechNet article Accounts Required During Setup provides information about the domain accounts and groups that are required for SCSM:











Install the Authorization Manager hotfix to re-establish SCSM Server connections to the SQL Server in case the connection is lost.

The Microsoft TechNet article How to Download and Install the Authorization Manager Hotfix provides instructions:


The SCSM management and data warehouse server installations also require that the Microsoft Report Viewer 2012 Redistributable security update be installed on the management and data warehouse servers prior to installation.

Install Report Viewer 2012 as follows:

1. From the installation media source, right-click ReportViewer.exe and select Run as administrator from the context menu to begin setup.

2. Refer to the Microsoft TechNet article How to Install the Microsoft Report Viewer Redistributable Security Update to continue with the installation of the Report Viewer:


The SCSM management and data warehouse server installations also require that the SQL Server 2012 Native Client be installed on the management and data warehouse servers prior to installation.

From the installation media source, right-click SQLNCLI.MSI and select Install from the context menu to begin setup.

The Microsoft TechNet article Installing SQL Server Native Client provides detailed information about installing the Native Client:


Note: You can download the SQL Server 2012 SP1 Native Client installer, 1033\x64\sqlncli.msi, from the Microsoft SQL Server 2012 SP1 Feature Pack web page in the Microsoft Download Center: http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=35580

The SCSM management and data warehouse server installations also require that the SQL Server 2012 SP1 Analysis Management Object be installed prior to installation.

From the SQL Server 2012 SP1 Analysis Management Objects installation media source, double-click SQL_AS_AMO.MSI to begin setup.


Install the Authorization Manager hotfix

Install Microsoft Report Viewer 2012 Redistributable security update

Install SQL Server 2012 Native Client

Install SQL Server Analysis Management Object








The SCSM data warehouse installation requires SQL Server Reporting Services to be installed to support the SCSM reporting features. Install the Reporting Services on the data warehouse server (split configuration).

The Microsoft TechNet article SQL Server Reporting Services provides information on how to install the SQL Server Reporting Services on the data warehouse server:

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms159106(v=sql.105).aspx

The Microsoft TechNet article Deploying System Center 2012 – Service Manager provides information on how to complete the configurations:


The Microsoft TechNet article How to Install the Service Manager Management Server (Two-Computer Scenario) provides information on how to install the SCSM management servers:


Install the data warehouse server and register it to the SCSM source.

The Microsoft TechNet article How to Install the Service Manager Data Warehouse (Two-Computer Scenario) provides information on how to install the SCSM data warehouse server:


The Microsoft TechNet article How to Register the System Center Data Warehouse to a Service Manager Source provides information on how to register the data warehouse to a SCSM source:


Integrating SCSM with other System Center components

SCSM uses connectors to import data from other system center components.

Objects created in SCVMM, such as templates, service templates, and storage classifications, can be imported into the SCSM database through the SCVMM connector. The Microsoft TechNet article Importing Data from System Center Virtual Machine Manager provides information on how to create and configure the SCVMM connector:


Install SQL Server Reporting Services

Configure SCSM environmental prerequisites

Install the management servers

Install the data warehouse server

SCVMM connector

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms159106(v=sql.105).aspx








SCSM uses the following SCOM connectors to import data from SCOM to the SCSM database:

• CI connector—To import data discovered by operations manager into the SCSM database

• Alert connector—To create incidents in SCSM based on alerts

The Microsoft TechNet article Importing Data and Alerts from System Center Operations Manager provides information on how to configure and set up the SCOM connectors:


SCSM integrates with SCO through a connector that allows SCSM to invoke runbooks synchronously through the use of workflows.

The Microsoft TechNet article Importing Runbooks from System Center Orchestrator 2012 provides information on how to create the SCO connector:


Note: Active Directory objects can also be imported through the Active Directory connector. The Microsoft TechNet article About Importing Data from Active Directory Domain Services provides details: http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/hh519742.aspx

SCOM connectors

SCO connector




Chapter 5: Solution Verification


Chapter 5 Solution Verification


Overview .................................................................................................................. 63

Deploying SCVMM private clouds ............................................................................ 63

Verifying SCAC operations ....................................................................................... 67

Verifying SCOM activities ......................................................................................... 68

Customizing SCOM information delivery .................................................................. 79

Using SCO ................................................................................................................ 83

Verifying SCSM operations ...................................................................................... 88



Overview

This chapter provides guidance on verifying that the solution has been implemented correctly and that the VSPEX private cloud can be managed successfully to deliver IaaS.

Deploying SCVMM private clouds

An SCVMM private cloud is a cloud created by a business for a particular group of users by using its own underlying hardware resources.

An SCVMM private cloud provides many benefits, including the following:

• Self service—Users do not have to contact IT departments for required IT services.

• Resource pooling—SCVMM private clouds and tenants can be assigned a set quota of resources from underlying hardware.

• Opacity—Users of SCVMM private clouds have no knowledge of the underlying infrastructure.

• Elasticity—More resources can be added as the need for users in an SCVMM private cloud grows.

• Optimization—Resources can be optimized to meet performance requirements without affecting the experience of SCVMM private cloud users.

As shown in Figure 7, an SCVMM private cloud is assigned a specific amount of resources from the fabric, such as CPU, memory, storage, network, and virtual machine templates. SCVMM private cloud users (tenants) have defined quotas and permissions on the resources that they can use.

Private cloud (SCVMM)



Figure 7. Cloud capacity in SCVMM

Each cloud can be assigned a library share for its users to store virtual machines. You can create library shares from CIFS file shares on the VNX as follows:

1. Under Storage, right-click File Server and click Create File Share.

2. Select the CIFS server and provide a name for the file share.

3. Click Finish. The Microsoft TechNet article How to Add a VMM Library Server or VMM Library Share provides information on adding the file share as a library share in SCVMM:





For example, the Manufacturing organization might want to create SCVMM private clouds for sub-organizations like Manufacturing Production, Manufacturing Test, and Manufacturing Archive. The resources assigned to these clouds would directly reflect the performance and cost requirements for these sub-organization users.

Figure 8 shows that the Manufacturing Production cloud is being created on the Manufacturing host group. The virtual machines created in this cloud will use the resources of the manufacturing cluster within the host group.

Figure 8. Allocate resources for private cloud in SCVMM

The Manufacturing Production cloud can be assigned the Gold classification of storage (the same storage configuration used for the underlying VSPEX private cloud), 10 GbE virtual machine networks, and relatively high capacity of CPU and memory. Similarly, the Manufacturing Test cloud can be assigned Silver storage classification (refer to Appendix A on page 96), 1 GbE virtual machine networks, and a smaller quota of CPU and memory.

The Microsoft TechNet article Creating a Private Cloud in VMM provides detailed information about creating a private cloud in SCVMM:


SCVMM has different roles to define the objects that users can manage and the management operations that users can perform.

You can define the scope of a particular user role within SCVMM, as shown in Figure 9. For example, you can give a tenant administrator role to a Manufacturing

User roles in SCVMM




Production administrator and a self-service administrator role to the organization’s users on the Manufacturing Production cloud.

Figure 9. User scope in SCVMM

As shown in Figure 10, you can apply quotas to resources that can be used by a user role or a user group for a specific cloud.

Figure 10. Allocate quotas for SCVMM private cloud and user roles



The Microsoft TechNet article Creating User Roles in VMM provides detailed information about creating user roles in SCVMM:


Verifying SCAC operations

A self-service user can log into SCAC to manage clouds and deploy virtual machines and services. The Overview page, shown in Figure 11, provides information on the resources remaining in the user’s quota as well as the clouds, both public and private, that are under the user’s management scope.

Figure 11. SCAC Overview page

On the SCAC Library tab, a user can view the catalog of resources (templates, services, and so on) that have been made available to the user’s role. There the user can select a virtual machine template or service and deploy it within the cloud, as shown in Figure 12.

Figure 12. Resource catalog on SCAC Library tab

Deploy virtual machines using SCAC




Through SCAC users can move virtual machines from the private cloud (SCVMM) to the public cloud (Windows Azure). The virtual machine must first be stored before it can be copied to Windows Azure. After the virtual machine is stored, it can be viewed under the list of virtual machines from which it can be copied to the Windows Azure public cloud, as shown in Figure 13. Before copying the virtual machine, the user specifies the configuration and placement of the virtual machine in Windows Azure.

Figure 13. View of virtual machines in SCAC

Verifying SCOM activities

SCOM enables authorized users to successfully monitor VSPEX private cloud objects by providing them insights into the following:

• Health of resources

• Topology of resources in the environment

• Performance of resources

• Utilization and availability of hosts, virtual machines, and other objects (through predefined reports)

SCOM allows authorized users to view the health state of virtual machines that are deployed in the business, indicating whether the virtual machine state is healthy, has warnings, or is critical, as shown in Figure 14.

Move the virtual machine from SCVMM to Windows Azure

Virtual machine health



Figure 14. Virtual machine health

The Health Explorer view provides information about the possible causes of errors that are displayed on the virtual machine. It also provides steps that the authorized user should take to resolve the issue.

Figure 15 shows the Health Explorer for a specific virtual machine. The current state of the virtual machine is healthy with no errors.

Figure 15. SCOM Management Pack Health Explorer

Note: The SCOM Management Pack also provides views into the health of other managed resources.



Through the ESI SCOM management pack, the monitoring page of the VNX provides health information about the VNX arrays, as shown in Figure 16.

Figure 16. Storage system health

In the event of an error or warning, the Health Explorer provides information on the cause of the specific health state and steps that the authorized user should perform on the VNX to fix the problem.

Figure 17 shows the Health Explorer for a VNX Block system. It displays an error, as the subscribed capacity of the Prod-2 storage pool has exceeded 70 percent. The Health Explorer view provides possible resolutions for the problem and any additional information to help rectify the issue.

Figure 17. Health Explorer for VNX Block system

VNX health



An SCVMM diagram view provides a topological view of resources managed within SCVMM. The topological view provides administrators a better understanding of how logical components and resources are mapped to physical resources. Health alerts for any object are percolated up to the high-level resources that are built on it. This allows administrators to easily identify which resources are being affected by a particular fault.

Figure 18 shows the topological view of the Manufacturing Production cloud along with the virtual machines and services deployed on it.

Figure 18. Topological view of Manufacturing Production cloud

SCVMM topology



Figure 19 provides a deeper view of the Manufacturing folder, which shows the cluster from which the cloud has been provisioned and the servers that belong to the cluster. You can view the virtual machines running on the physical server by expanding the physical server node.

Figure 19. Topological view of Manufacturing host group



Figure 20 provides a topological view of the VNX storage array. You can explore the logical resources like LUNs and file shares more deeply to understand the storage pools, file systems, and disks from which they are provisioned.

Figure 20. Topological view of VNX storage array

The management pack for SCVMM provides a performance folder under the monitoring tab of SCOM through which performance information of physical and logical resources managed by SCVMM can be obtained. The performance information is delivered through graphs, as shown in Figure 21, which can be modified to display necessary counters. For example, a cloud administrator might want to view the performance of clouds that are under the administrator’s scope.

VNX topology

SCVMM performance



Figure 21. SCVMM private cloud performance

The system administrator can view the performance of system center component servers, as shown in Figure 22.

Figure 22. Performance of System Center components



The Reporting tab in the SCVMM management pack provides predefined reports that can be run to display informational reports on objects selected by the user. Users can schedule reports to run periodically and author new reports based on business needs.

Figure 23 shows the Host Utilization report for the physical hosts that are being managed by the SCVMM server.

Figure 23. Host Utilization report

SCVMM reports



Similarly, users can generate reports on utilization of virtual machine objects, as shown in Figure 24.

Figure 24. Virtual Machine Utilization report



The EMC SCOM Management Pack enables authorized users to run reports on EMC storage objects.

Figure 25 shows the report for the top ten storage pools within SCOM in terms of available capacity.

Figure 25. VNX Storage Pool Available Capacity report

VNX reports



Clicking a histogram for a specific pool in the storage pool report displays additional details, as shown in Figure 26.

Figure 26. VNX Storage Pool Available Capacity detail



You also can generate reports on the availability of physical components of the EMC storage arrays. Figure 27 shows a report generated on the physical component availability of the VNX used in this solution.

Figure 27. VNX physical resources availability

Customizing SCOM information delivery

SCOM allows users to customize the delivery of information by giving them the ability to configure the following:

• Alerts

• Monitors and rules

• Management groups

• Views

Alerts in SCOM can be generated from either monitors or rules. The Microsoft TechNet article Alerts provides detailed information:


Alerts




Monitors and rules are the primary elements for measuring health and detecting errors in SCOM. They provide similar yet distinct functionality. Monitors set the state of an object, while rules create alerts and collect data for analysis and reporting.

When a particular condition is met, the monitor of the affected object changes the health state of the object to either warning or critical and, optionally, generates an alert. For example, a user may want to change the health state of a file system or storage pool to warn when the capacity exceeds 90 percent, or a cloud administrator may want to generate an alert when the capacity of the available CPUs falls below a certain value.

Rules are of three types: Alerting rules, collection rules, and command rules. Rules do not change the health of an object.

The Microsoft TechNet article Monitors and Rules provides detailed information on creating and configuring rules and monitors:


In SCOM, you can create groups that contain specific objects, dynamic objects, and subgroups. You can apply alerts, views, monitors, and rules to each group so that you can monitor the objects and subgroups collectively.

For example, you can create a group for the Manufacturing organization or Manufacturing Production cloud where all the logical and physical objects used by the organization or cloud are part of the group, as shown in Figure 28. The Manufacturing cloud can be added as a subgroup to the Manufacturing organization because it is provisioned from the Manufacturing organization.

Monitors and rules

Management groups




Figure 28. Management group explicit members

Objects can be added dynamically to the group based on inclusion rules. If the Manufacturing Production cloud virtual machines are created with the prefix of Manufacturing_Prod_VM then a rule can be added to the group to include objects that are virtual machines containing the string Manufacturing_Prod_VM.

Similarly, objects can be dynamically excluded from the group by using rules. Groups also provide the ability to insert product knowledge for the group to help users resolve errors and warnings.

The Microsoft TechNet article Creating and Managing Groups provides more information on creating and managing groups:


SCOM views display information that meets specific criteria. When you select a view, a query is sent to the SCOM database and the results of the query are displayed in the results pane.

Views




After creating a group, you can create specific views and store them together under a single folder. You can create views on groups or objects that relate to alerts, state, performance, and so on.

Figure 29 shows the dashboard view for the Manufacturing_Prod_Cloud group.

Figure 29. View for Manufacturing_Prod_Cloud group in SCOM

The Microsoft TechNet article Using Views in Operations Manager provides detailed information on using views in SCOM:





Using SCO

This section provides information on how to use SCO as managed and orchestrated through System Center.

Administrators can create runbooks that can be provided via permissions to specific users and groups for execution. You can use SCO in several ways to simplify tasks such as the following:

• Start or stop all virtual machines in a cloud

• Create virtual machines from templates and provision EMC storage

• Reconfigure virtual machine properties

Cloud administrators might want to power on or shut down all the virtual machines that are hosted in an SCVMM private cloud. The Virtual Machine Manager Integration Pack provides objects that automate this operation with ease.

As depicted in Figure 30, a runbook receives as input from the user a cloud name that is used to get all the virtual machines within that specific cloud. The virtual machines in the cloud are then started, and a 60-second delay is introduced on the link between start virtual machines and virtual machine status before a platform notification on the status of the virtual machines is sent.

Figure 30. Runbook request for virtual machine status

Start or stop virtual machines in a cloud



Authorized users can deploy virtual machines from templates and provision external storage to the virtual machine using ESI PowerShell scripts. SCO allows authorized users to simplify these tasks by automating them in a single runbook.

Figure 31 shows how to create a template and provision storage to it from a VNX array.

Figure 31. Runbook diagram: Create template and provision storage

The first activity creates a virtual machine from a template in the SCVMM library, as shown in Figure 32.

Figure 32. Runbook activity: Create VM From Template Properties

Create virtual machine from template and provision storage



The second activity executes an ESI PowerShell script that creates a disk in the storage pool and assigns it to the host, as shown in Figure 33.

Figure 33. Runbook activity: Create Disk with ESI Properties



The third activity in the runbook, shown in Figure 34, executes another ESI PowerShell script that adds the disk to the virtual machine that was just created.

Figure 34. Runbook activity: Add Disk to VM using ESI PowerShell Properties

Note: SCVMM integration in SCO is not limited to SCVMM objects shown in the integration pack. PowerShell scripts for the SCVMM server can be executed through SCO as well.



To give users a web-based portal to reconfigure virtual machines, you can create runbooks that update the virtual machine configuration, as shown in Figure 35. The runbook can then be made available to self-service users so that they can use the SCO web portal along with SCAC to manage, deploy, and reconfigure virtual machines without having to use the SCVMM console.

Figure 35. Runbook request to update virtual machines

The self-service users can view the runbooks for which they have been given permissions and can start the runbook to reconfigure the virtual machine, as shown in Figure 36.

Figure 36. Reconfigure VM details in SCO web portal

Reconfigure virtual machine



The runbook takes input data from the user about the virtual machine name, new memory size, new CPU allocation, name of the virtual hard drive, and the size by which the virtual disk should be extended. Fields that do not need to be changed can remain empty. Figure 37 shows the runbook parameters.

Figure 37. Runbook parameters: Reconfigure VM

Verifying SCSM operations

System Center components help to manage the following processes:

• Quotas

• Leases

• Approvals

• Chargeback or showback

This solution uses SCSM to provide billing and chargeback functionality within the business.

Chargeback is one of the tools in System Center that helps to communicate with business units about how they consume capacity. This helps to utilize existing investments proportionate to customers’ requests. Through Chargeback, IT can bill individual organizations for the resources they use.

Chargeback



Installing and configuring Chargeback

To install Chargeback in System Center, you must install Chargeback management packs in SCOM and SCSM.

The Microsoft TechNet article How to Install Chargeback Reports provides information on how to install the Chargeback report files on SCSM and SCOM packs:


Creating a view for cloud objects in configuration items

To create a view for cloud objects in configuration items, follow these steps:

1. Verify that the SCOM CI connector created earlier in this section is working.

2. Create a folder under Configuration Items.

3. Right-click the folder and select Create View.

4. Provide a name for the view and then select Private Cloud in Search for objects of a specific class.




5. On the Display tab, select the columns to be displayed.

The clouds from SCVMM are displayed in the newly created view.

Creating a price sheet

To create a price sheet to be applied to the clouds, follow these steps:

1. From the Administration page, navigate to Chargeback > Infrastructure > Price Sheet, right-click Price Sheet, and click Create Price Sheet.

2. Provide a name for the price sheet and enter the prices determined by the IT organization in the Price tab.



3. Click Publish.

4. On the Assigned Clouds tab, select the clouds to which this price sheet should be applied.

5. Click OK to create the price sheet.

Analyzing data for Chargeback

1. From the SVSM console, click Data Warehouse and select Cubes.

2. Select the Chargeback cube and click Process cube.

3. After processing is complete, select Analyze Cube in Excel in the panel on the right for the chargeback cube.

Creating Chargeback reports

From the Excel power pivot chart, select the objects to generate Chargeback reports.

Chapter 6: Resource Sizing Guide


Chapter 6 Resource Sizing Guide


Overview .................................................................................................................. 93

Cloud management environment sizing ................................................................... 93

Summary .................................................................................................................. 94



Overview

Understanding the performance requirements of a VSPEX private cloud environment can be a challenge. The VSPEX private cloud document for Hyper-V, along with these sizing guidelines, helps with the sizing of the environment components that form the private cloud and with the sizing of the supporting infrastructure components on which the virtualized workloads will run.

Cloud management environment sizing

This section provides guidelines with respect to reference virtual machines discussed in EMC VSPEX Private Cloud: Microsoft Windows Server 2012 with Hyper-V for up to 1,000 Virtual Machines—Enabled by EMC Next-Generation VNX and EMC Backup. Table 5 provides examples of how the solution is sized according to those guidelines.

As mentioned in the VSPEX private cloud document, a reference VM is 1 vCPU, 2 GB RAM, and 100 GB storage space.

Proven Infrastructure: EMC VSPEX Private Cloud—Microsoft Windows Server 2012 with Hyper-V for up to 1,000 Virtual Machines—Enabled by EMC Next-Generation VNX and EMC Backup provides more details.

Table 5. System Center component sizing

Server role Number of servers

Recommended hardware specifications

Number of VSPEX reference virtual machines

SQL Server 2 • CPU: 2.4 GHz 8-core or equivalent RAM: 16 GB

• VHD: 60 GB

• Additional LUNs for different System Center components

• Network: 1 GB/s

16

SCVMM server 2 • 4 vCPU and 4 GB RAM

• VHD: 60 GB

• Network: 1 GB/s

8

SCAC server 1 • 4 vCPU and 4 GB RAM

• VHD: 60 GB

• Network: 1 GB/s

4

SCOM management server

2 • 8 vCPU and 16 GB RAM: 10 GB

• VHD: 60 GB

• Network: 1 GB/s

16



Server role Number of servers

Recommended hardware specifications

Number of VSPEX reference virtual machines

SCOM reporting server 1 • 4 vCPU and 8 GB RAM

• VHD: 60 GB

• Network: 1 GB/s

4

SCO server 1 • 2 vCPU (2.1 GHz) and 2 GB RAM

• VHD: 60 GB

• Network: 1 GB/s

2

SCSM server 2 • 4 vCPU (2.66 GHZ) and 8 GB RAM

• VHD: 60 GB

• Network: 1 GB/s

8

SCSM data warehouse server

1 • 8 vCPU (2.66 GHz) and 16 GB RAM

• VHD: 60 GB

• Network: 1 GB/s

8

ESI Service for SCOM 1 • 1vCPU and 2 GB RAM

• VHD: 60 GB

• Network: 1 GB/s

1

SMI-S Provider server 1 • 1 vCPU and 2 GB RAM

• VHD: 60 GB

• Network: 1 GB/s

1

The components listed in Table 5 have a total resource requirement of 68 VSPEX reference virtual machines.

Summary

The EMC VSPEX solution for IaaS creates a robust, scalable platform infrastructure that takes the best features of the underlying EMC and Microsoft technologies and layers them into the complete solution. Sizing the appropriate solution built upon the VSPEX private cloud platform becomes significantly easier because EMC has provided solutions with known sizing metrics.

This solution provides several recommendations and examples for enabling IaaS within the business. VSPEX partners can use these recommendations to create different types of resource pools or SCVMM private clouds to meet specific application and performance requirements of departments within a customer environment.



This solution uses the same design, hardware, and configuration described in the VSPEX Proven Infrastructure as a base architecture to provide IaaS within a business. It discusses two additional types of storage service levels in Appendix A on page 96 to give customers the flexibility of deploying virtual machines based on performance and capacity requirements. These additional storage levels should have their own set of disks separate from the disks required in the VSPEX Proven Infrastructure. However, EMC recommends that you use only the VSPEX storage layout to calculate and support the exact number of VSPEX reference virtual machines desired. Deploying virtual machines on different storage service levels may reduce the total number of supported reference virtual machines.

When building the cloud infrastructure, you should note certain recommendations, including verifying the interconnect points of IP connected devices. Where workloads and infrastructure management exist, connections with a minimum of 10 Gb with appropriately sized switching backplanes are and should be used. Failure to observe these recommendations can result in underperforming situations, such as resource scheduling problems or failure scenarios, which require the movement of workloads as quickly as possible.

The VSPEX sizing tool can assist you in quickly, easily, and properly sizing your VSPEX private cloud environment, including the required management and orchestration applications. You will then be able to determine the proper VSPEX private cloud reference architecture for your given workloads that has been tested, sized, and proven by EMC.

Appendix A: Resource Sizing Guide


Appendix A Storage Design with Multiple Service Levels

Overview

The VSPEX IaaS solution using Microsoft System Center is designed on top of an existing VSPEX private cloud Proven Infrastructure for Hyper-V. The Proven Infrastructure uses a specific configuration for storage pools on the VNX array to support a required number of virtual machines. Accordingly, this solution uses a single storage service level.

This appendix provides information on using additional storage service levels in the VSPEX private cloud management solution. However, note that the VSPEX architecture is built for a specific number of virtual servers and using different storage levels may reduce the number of virtual servers that are supported.

Storage service levels

The VNX storage array provides many features that allow provisioning of IaaS. Creating storage pools with specific type of drives enables the creation of different storage service levels based on pool composition and drive performance.

Multiple storage service levels can be created within a VNX array to achieve different levels of performance and most effectively align resources with performance requirements.

Storage service levels can be created across a VNX with varying availability, capacity, and performance capabilities. You can individually weigh each service level respective to the application and operational requirements of each line of business, with some weighted in favor of capacity and others weighted for performance. The service levels provide the highest performance where workloads demand it. The performance capabilities decrease as the service levels move toward serving less performance-intensive workloads where cost is more important. Figure 40 shows the performance-versus-capacity requirements for the different segments of an organization used as a reference within this solution.

Storage levels consumable by tenants



Figure 40. Storage service-level positioning for VSPEX management and orchestration

The Prod-2 storage service level built according to the VSPEX private cloud solution storage design is the only VSPEX recommended storage service level. This section provides two additional storage layout examples for virtual machines with different performance requirements within an organization. All three storage service levels are depicted in Figure 41 and described in Table 6.

Figure 41. Storage service levels on VNX systems

Note: Additional drives must exist on the VNX to support the two storage service levels. Deploying virtual machines on these storage service levels might lower the number of reference virtual machines specified in the VSPEX configuration.

Note: FAST VP must be enabled for all service levels so that they can take advantage of storage tiering and load balancing when different drive types are added to the storage pool.

Storage service-level offerings



Table 6. Storage service levels example

Service level

FAST VP Flash disks SAS/FC disks NL-SAS/SATA disks

Prod-2

Yes 2 x 200 GB 45 x 600 GB SAS N/A

TestDev No N/A 27 x 600 GB SAS N/A

Archive No N/A N/A 16 x 2 TB NL-SAS

The storage service levels are allocated as follows:

• Prod-2 is configured for production systems within organizations where performance is a criterion (similar to the VSPEX private cloud storage layout).

• TestDev is configured for testing and development systems.

• Archive is configured for archived systems or for systems where cost, but not performance, is important.

SCVMM makes these storage service levels available to the appropriate departments within the business. Initially it makes the storage devices available to the Hyper-V cluster, and then it creates appropriate SCVMM private clouds for different organizations within the business.

Note: If the exact number of reference virtual machines as stated in the VSPEX Proven Infrastructure document is to be deployed, then only the Prod-2 storage service level should be used. Each Prod-2 storage service level supports up to 125 virtual machines. The following Proven Infrastructure document provides exact sizing details: EMC VSPEX Private Cloud: Microsoft Windows Server 2012 with Hyper-V for up to 1,000 Virtual Machines—Enabled by EMC Next-Generation VNX and EMC Backup.

Figure 42 shows an example of how storage resources can be mapped for a particular organization.



Figure 42. Storage service-level mapping from applications to storage array

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