VSC Archives - The Practical Administrator

NetApp Virtual Storage Console Default Provisioning and Cloning Settings

2018-07-202014-02-07 by Andrew Sullivan

As a VMware administrator, if you aren’t using Virtual Storage Console (it’s free!) to assist with administering your NetApp storage, you’re missing out on a great tool. It simplifies a lot of tasks through abstraction and a GUI. That being said, I know not everyone has that advantage, especially if you work for an organization where silos are still alive and well.

In order to facilitate best practices when it comes to creating datastores, whether FC/iSCSI LUNs or NFS, I want to publish the settings that VSC uses to create the volumes. As a VMware administrator, you can approach the storage team and ensure the volumes/LUNs/etc. are configured in this manner, or as the storage administrator this is the baseline for VSC configures them.

Remember that these are best practices / recommendations only. They ALWAYS come with the “it depends” caveat…every setup is different, so not all of these may be appropriate for you and your environment.

All of these settings are documented in the VSC Installation and Administration Guide. Additionally, justification and rationale can be found in TR-3749 and TR-4068, the two best practices guides for using vSphere and NetApp together.

NetApp: Change Virtual Storage Console (VSC) SSL Certificates

2018-07-202010-11-23 by Andrew Sullivan

Glenn posited an interesting question this morning…how to change the SSL certificate that VSC uses to one that is signed by your CA so that the warning(s) would no longer appear. Turns out it’s significantly more difficult that it probably should be, but it is possible.

First, let me say that NetApp probably hates me doing this and will not support your VSC install in anyway should you modify the key. Also, keep in mind that any updates to VSC may over write the key, thus undoing any of this work. So, proceed at your own risk…

PowerCLI: Force NetApp Virtual Storage Console (VSC) to use a FQDN

2015-12-212010-11-22 by Glenn

First let me say, I love VCS, it took all of the complexity out of using NetApp storage in a vSphere environment. I have been tolerating one annoyance for quite some time now, and this morning said annoyance broke VCS at a customer site. What’s wrong with VCS? Well, for some reason it forces you to register the plugin with vCenter using an IP address. Due to an over-restrictive proxy configuration, which caused only fully qualified domain names(FQDN) worked. Any IP address was redirected to an web page that explained said over-restricted policy, because VCS is mainly a web page the use of an IP address broke everything. I searched around a little, and found Williams Lams post on removing plug-ins with the MOB. Once I found the pivot point for Plug-ins, I searched the API Reference, and found the ExtensionManager object. Now that I had the Object in hand, I fired up PowerCLI and in less than 10 min figured out how to manually adjust the URL VSC used. It was so easy that I think I’m going to try and slap together a quick module to manage plug-ins via PowerCLI, but in the meantime if you, like me, have been frustrated by VSCs use of an IP address… try this.

<span style="color: #ff4500;">$URL</span> <span style="color: #a9a9a9;">=</span> <span style="color: #8b0000;">'https://VCS.getadmin.local:8143/vSphereExtensionDescriptor.xml'</span>
<span style="color: #006400;"># Get the Service Instance..</span>
<span style="color: #ff4500;">$SI</span> <span style="color: #a9a9a9;">=</span> <span style="color: #0000ff;">Get-View</span> <span style="color: #8a2be2;">serviceinstance</span>
<span style="color: #006400;"># Get the extension manager</span>
<span style="color: #ff4500;">$ExtensionManager</span> <span style="color: #a9a9a9;">=</span> <span style="color: #0000ff;">get-view</span> <span style="color: #ff4500;">$SI</span><span style="color: #8a2be2;">.Content.ExtensionManager</span>
<span style="color: #006400;"># filter for the NetApp VSC extention</span>
<span style="color: #ff4500;">$extention</span> <span style="color: #a9a9a9;">=</span> <span style="color: #ff4500;">$ExtensionManager</span><span style="color: #a9a9a9;">.</span><span style="color: #000000;">ExtensionList</span> <span style="color: #a9a9a9;">|</span>
    <span style="color: #0000ff;">Where-Object</span> <span style="color: #000000;">{</span><span style="color: #ff4500;">$_</span><span style="color: #a9a9a9;">.</span><span style="color: #000000;">key</span> <span style="color: #a9a9a9;">-eq</span> <span style="color: #8b0000;">'com.netapp.nvpf'</span><span style="color: #000000;">}</span>
<span style="color: #006400;"># Change the URL to use a FQDN vice an IP address</span>
<span style="color: #ff4500;">$extention</span><span style="color: #a9a9a9;">.</span><span style="color: #000000;">Client</span><span style="color: #a9a9a9;">[</span><span style="color: #800080;">0</span><span style="color: #a9a9a9;">]</span><span style="color: #a9a9a9;">.</span><span style="color: #000000;">url</span> <span style="color: #a9a9a9;">=</span> <span style="color: #ff4500;">$URL</span>
<span style="color: #006400;"># Save our updated extention!</span>
<span style="color: #ff4500;">$ExtensionManager</span><span style="color: #a9a9a9;">.</span><span style="color: #000000;">UpdateExtension</span><span style="color: #000000;">(</span><span style="color: #ff4500;">$extention</span><span style="color: #000000;">)

~Glenn
</span>

$URL = 'https://VCS.getadmin.local:8143/vSphereExtensionDescriptor.xml'

# Get the Service Instance..

$SI = Get-View serviceinstance

# Get the extension manager

$ExtensionManager = get-view $SI.Content.ExtensionManager

# filter for the NetApp VSC extention

$extention = $ExtensionManager.ExtensionList |

Where-Object {$_.key -eq 'com.netapp.nvpf'}

# Change the URL to use a FQDN vice an IP address

$extention.Client[0].url = $URL

# Save our updated extention!

$ExtensionManager.UpdateExtension($extention)

~Glenn

Monitoring for orphaned snapshots left by SMVI

2018-07-202010-06-17 by Andrew Sullivan

NetApp’s SnapManager for Virtual Infrastructure (SMVI) is a great product, but it’s messy. If it encounters the any error, it seemingly forgets to delete the virtual machine snapshots from the Virtual Infrastructure before dying.

To prevent many orphans (I’ve seen as many as 20 on a single virtual machine) from happening, I created a quick Nagios check that simply alerts when it sees them.

This script is very elementary. It very simply uses a regex to check for any snapshots that match the default SMVI naming convention. For each one it finds, a counter is incremented. If any are found, the script returns an error to Nagios, which causes an alert to be sent.

#!/usr/bin/perl -w
#
# check_vi_smvi_snapshots.pl - written by Andrew Sullivan, 2010-06-16
#
# Please report bugs and request improvements at http://get-admin.com/blog/?p=1059
#
# A simple script to look for snapshots that match the name pattern that smvi uses.
# We are merely pulling a list of all snapshots, searching for the string "smvi" in 
# the name, if it's found, we return a warning condition.  This could lead to a 
# "false" positive if it runs while a snapshot series is still ongoing, but since
# the smvi snaps should be very short lived the condidition will not last unless
# the snap is left.
#
# Example:
#   ./check_vi_smvi_snapshots.pl --server your.esx.host --username you --password secret
#

use strict;
use warnings;

use FindBin;
use lib "$FindBin::Bin/../";

use VMware::VIRuntime;

# substitute the location of your nagios perl library
use lib "/usr/lib64/nagios/plugins";
use utils qw(%ERRORS);

Opts::parse();
Opts::validate();

Util::connect();

main();

Util::disconnect();

sub main {

	# the number of smvi snapshots
	my $smviSnaps = 0;
	
	# for setting the type of exit we want
	my $exitCondition = "";

	# we need MORs for each of the VMs on the host
	my $VMs = Vim::find_entity_views( view_type =&gt; 'VirtualMachine' );

	foreach my $vm (@$VMs) {
		if ($vm-&gt;snapshot) {			
			foreach my $childSnapshot (@{$vm-&gt;snapshot-&gt;snapshotInfo-&gt;rootSnapshotList}) {
				$smviSnaps += getSnaps($childSnapshot);
			}

		} else {
			#print $vm-&gt;name . " has no snapshotsn";
		}
	}
	
	if ($smviSnaps &gt; 0) {
		print "WARNING - " . $smviSnaps . " SMVI snapshots exist.n";
		$exitCondition = "WARNING";
		
	} else {
		print "OK - No SMVI snapshots exist.n";
		$exitCondition = "OK";
		
	}
	
	Util::disconnect();
	exit $ERRORS{ $exitCondition };
}

sub getSnaps {
	my ($snapshotTree) = @_;
	my $snapcount = 0;
	
	# uncomment for debugging
	#print "Found snap: " . $snapshotTree-&gt;{name} . "n";
	
	if ( $snapshotTree-&gt;{name} =~ /smvi/ ) {
		$snapcount++;
	}
	
	if ($snapshotTree-&gt;childSnapshotList) {
		foreach my $childSnapshot (@{$snapshotTree-&gt;childSnapshotList}) {
			$snapcount += getSnaps($childSnapshot);
		}
	}
	
	return $snapcount;
}

#!/usr/bin/perl -w

# check_vi_smvi_snapshots.pl - written by Andrew Sullivan, 2010-06-16

# Please report bugs and request improvements at http://get-admin.com/blog/?p=1059

# A simple script to look for snapshots that match the name pattern that smvi uses.

# We are merely pulling a list of all snapshots, searching for the string "smvi" in

# the name, if it's found, we return a warning condition. This could lead to a

# "false" positive if it runs while a snapshot series is still ongoing, but since

# the smvi snaps should be very short lived the condidition will not last unless

# the snap is left.

# Example:

# ./check_vi_smvi_snapshots.pl --server your.esx.host --username you --password secret

use strict;

use warnings;

use FindBin;

use lib "$FindBin::Bin/../";

use VMware::VIRuntime;

# substitute the location of your nagios perl library

use lib "/usr/lib64/nagios/plugins";

use utils qw(%ERRORS);

Opts::parse();

Opts::validate();

Util::connect();

main();

Util::disconnect();

sub main {

# the number of smvi snapshots

my $smviSnaps = 0;

# for setting the type of exit we want

my $exitCondition = "";

# we need MORs for each of the VMs on the host

my $VMs = Vim::find_entity_views( view_type => 'VirtualMachine' );

foreach my $vm (@$VMs) {

if ($vm->snapshot) {

foreach my $childSnapshot (@{$vm->snapshot->snapshotInfo->rootSnapshotList}) {

$smviSnaps += getSnaps($childSnapshot);

}

} else {

#print $vm->name . " has no snapshotsn";

}

if ($smviSnaps > 0) {

print "WARNING - " . $smviSnaps . " SMVI snapshots exist.n";

$exitCondition = "WARNING";

} else {

print "OK - No SMVI snapshots exist.n";

$exitCondition = "OK";

}

Util::disconnect();

exit $ERRORS{ $exitCondition };

}

sub getSnaps {

my ($snapshotTree) = @_;

my $snapcount = 0;

# uncomment for debugging

#print "Found snap: " . $snapshotTree->{name} . "n";

if ( $snapshotTree->{name} =~ /smvi/ ) {

$snapcount++;

}

if ($snapshotTree->childSnapshotList) {

foreach my $childSnapshot (@{$snapshotTree->childSnapshotList}) {

$snapcount += getSnaps($childSnapshot);

}

return $snapcount;

}

I’ve set the check to execute once an hour in my environment, as I don’t feel that granularity finer than that is needed…an hour’s worth of change is ok for an SMVI snapshot for me.