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2018-04-11, Issue 03
VMware VVol Deployment Guide Based on Huawei OceanStor V3 Storage System
Contents
1 Overview.........................................................................................................................................3
1.1 Summary............................................................................................................................................................3
1.2 Purpose...............................................................................................................................................................3
1.3 Audience............................................................................................................................................................3
5 Configuration Recommendations............................................................................................50
5.1 Multipathing.....................................................................................................................................................50
5.2 PE-LUN...........................................................................................................................................................50
5.3 VASA Storage Provider HA.............................................................................................................................50
5.4 Cascading Snapshots........................................................................................................................................50
6 Appendix.......................................................................................................................................51
6.1 Reference Documents......................................................................................................................................51
6.2 Terms and Abbreviations.................................................................................................................................51
1 Overview
1.1 Summary
This deployment guide provides the detailed instructions for deploying and configuring
VMware Virtual Volume (VVol for short) on Huawei OceanStor 5500/5600/5800/18000 V3
hyper-converged storage systems and Huawei OceanStor VASA storage provider.
1.2 Purpose
This deployment guide is intended as references for establishing virtualized data centers by
using VMware Virtual Volume and Huawei OceanStor V3 hyper-converged storage systems.
1.3 Audience
This document is intended for IT administrators or administration of VMware vSphere
infrastructures. Before using this guide, the intended audience is supposed to be familiar with:
Huawei OceanStor V3 hyper-converged storage system
Huawei OceanStor UltraPath, OceanStor DeviceManager, OceanStor eSDK VASA
Storage Provider
VMware vSphere infrastructures
VVol
2.2.1 Architecture
The following figure shows the architecture of VMware vSphere Virtual Volume based on
external SAN/NAS storage.
Virtual Datastore
A Virtual Datastore represents a storage container in a vCenter Server instance and the
vSphere Web Client. A vSphere Virtual Datastore represents a one-to-one mapping to the
storage system's storage container.
The storage container (or Virtual Datastore) represents a logical pool where individual Virtual
Volumes created VMDKs are created.
The OceanStor V3 storage systems are ideal for applications such as large-database Online
Transaction Processing (OLTP)/Online Analytical Processing (OLAP), file sharing, and cloud
computing. Further, these systems offer a wide range of efficient backup and disaster recovery
solutions.
With a versatile set of capabilities, the V3 series storage systems can be widely applied in
industries ranging from government, finance, telecommunications, energy, to Media and
Entertainment (M&E).
Convergence
Convergence of SAN and NAS
SAN-NAS convergence allows for elastic storage, simplifies service deployment,
improves storage resource utilization, and reduces Total Cost of Ownership (TCO).
Underlying storage resource pools provide both block and file services and shorten
storage resource access paths to ensure equivalent I/O efficiency for both block and file
services.
Convergence of heterogeneous storage systems
The OceanStor V3 built-in virtualization function can efficiently manage storage systems
from multiple vendors and unify resource pools for flexible, centralized resource
allocation, and protect different storage systems' data. In addition, it allows other-vendor
storage systems' data to be migrated to OceanStor V3, thereby further accelerating
service efficiency. OceanStor V3 mid-range storage supports gateway mode.
Convergence of mission-critical, mid-range, and entry-level storage systems
OceanStor V3 series can interwork seamlessly with any other mission-critical, mid-
range, or entry-level systems, allowing data to freely flow among these different storage
products, with no need for additional hardware or software support.
Convergence of SSDs and HDDs
Combining the advantages of both rotating media drive and solid-state drive, OceanStor
V3 series offer an optimal balance between performance and cost. With all-flash storage
configuration, they can provide highest performance and a lowest latency of 1 ms.
Convergence of primary and backup storage
The OceanStor V3 series built-in backup functionality provides backup capabilities with
no need for additional backup software and meanwhile simplifies backup management.
Intelligence
Multi-tenant and Service Level Agreement (SLA)
OceanStor V3 series storage systems enable intelligent allocation of storage resources in
cloud computing environments. The systems apply data isolation functions and data
security policies (such as data encryption and reliable destruction of obsolete data). With
four SLAs, the systems allocate storage resources based on service priorities, to ensure
that higher-priority services always have preference for occupying system resources and
thereby enjoy faster response.
Smart efficiency improvement
OceanStor V3 series storage systems leverage dynamic storage tiering (SmartTier),
intelligent data migration (SmartMotion), and innovative heterogeneous-system
virtualization (SmartVirtualization) to achieve cross-tier, cross-Huawei storage, and
cross-storages from different vendors, significantly improving storage resource
utilization.
Hyper data protection
Functions such as remote replication, snapshot, and LUN copy provide local, remote,
and multi-branch data protection to ensure business continuity and data availability.
Advanced active-active solution
HyperMetro implements active-active mirroring with load balancing and cross-site
takeover without service interruption, preventing data loss and system breakdown from
occurring in critical application systems. Additionally, OceanStor V3 series' gateway-
free design can effectively reduce the purchase cost, simplify system deployment, and
enable the active-active solution to be smoothly upgraded to the Disaster Recovery Data
Center Solution (Geo-Redundant Mode).
Easy to Manage
Unified management
Powerful storage management software provides global topology views, capacity
analysis, performance analysis, fault diagnosis, and end-to-end GUI-based service
management, thereby simplifying management of various devices.
For detailed information about Huawei OceanStor V3 Hyper-Converged Storage systems, please refer
to:
Huawei OceanStor 5300, 5500, 5600, and 5800 V3 Storage Systems Data Sheet
Huawei OceanStor 5300,5500, 5600, and 5800 V3 Storage Systems Technical White Paper
Huawei OceanStor 6800 V3 Mission Critical Storage System Data Sheet
Huawei OceanStor 6800 V3 Mission Critical Storage System Technical White Paper
Huawei OceanStor 18000 V3 Data Sheet
Huawei OceanStor 18000 V3 Technical White Paper
Figure 4-1 Architecture for deploying VMware VVol on OceanStor V3 storage systems
The combination of VMware VVol and Huawei OceanStor V3 series hyper-converged storage
systems allow the following features to be delivered:
SnapShot
With VMware VVol, the snapshot operation for VMs is offloaded to the native array.
Since the storage array is aware of each VM, data services are performed at the
individual virtual machine level, which results in faster snapshot and clone operations.
Quality of Service (QoS)
With VMware VVol, the QoS policy is delivered per virtual machine disk (VMDK)
instead of per LUN, which results in better performance management. The QoS policy
makes it easy to implement SLAs for different business VMs.
Auto-Tiering
Huawei OceanStor V3 storage systems provide customers with an Auto-Tiering feature
when using VMware VVol over SmartTier. Auto-Tiering provides a higher business
performance while minimizing SSD investments.
Integrated Management via a Huawei OceanStor vCenter Plugin
Huawei OceanStor VASA storage provider can be integrated with an OceanStor eSDK
vCenter Plugin to simplify storage management. It means that the storage management
operations can be implemented via the Huawei eSDK vCenter plugin.
1. Auto-Tiering can be enabled only if you have purchased the SmartTier license and the storage
pools include multiple tiers.
2. The integrated management via a vCenter plugin is still under test, and is planned to be released in
the next product version. This deployment guide still uses an independent web management
interface for VASA storage provider.
Figure 4-1 Flowchart for deploying vSphere VVol on OceanStor V3 storage systems
Table 4-1 Prerequisites to be checked before deploying VVol on Huawei OceanStor V3 storage
system
Vendor Software Component Remarks
Figure 4-1 Workflow for configuring OceanStor V3 storage systems via OceanStor
DeviceManager
For detailed instructions on creating a disk domain, storage pool, PE LUN, LUN group, host,
host group, and mapping view, please refer to:
Section "Configuring Basic Storage Services (for VMware VVol Scenarios Only)" in the
OceanStor 5300 V3&5500 V3&5600 V3&5800 V3&6800 V3 Storage System V300R003 Basic
Storage Service Guide for Block.
1. The only difference in the configuration process between traditional SAN-LUN and SAN-VVol is
the LUN type. For VVol, traditional LUNs are no longer needed; instead, the PE-LUNs would be
used for interconnection between ESXi hosts and storage system to which multipath software
connects.
2. To achieve high availability, it is advisable to create at least two PE-LUNs for each storage pool.
Step 1 Log in to the Huawei OceanStor DeviceManager via a web browser, and in its Navigation
Bar, click .
Limitations
Huawei OceanStor VASA storage provider has the following limitations:
Each VASA storage provider can manage a maximum of 4 storage arrays.
Each VASA storage provider can register with a maximum of 5 vCenter servers.
Each VASA storage provider supports a maximum of 4096 VMs.
For fast clone of VMs while ensuring system performance, it is advisable to configure at
most 2 levels of cascading snapshots.
For each OceanStor V3 storage device, it is advisable to ensure that the result of Number
of PE-LUNs x Number of connected ESXi hosts is equal to or smaller than 30. For
example, if 2 PE LUNs are configured, at most15 ESXi hosts could be connected.
Obtain
You can download the Huawei OceanStor VASA storage provider software package as a .zip
file from Huawei official support website http://support.huawei.com/enterprise/softdownload
(by choosing Vertical Industries Solutions > eSDK Solution > eSDK Storage). After
obtaining the .zip file, follow the steps to deploy and configure the Huawei VASA storage
provider.
The Huawei OceanStor VASA storage provider is provided in .zip format and named as
eSDK_Storage_VASA_2.0_Vx.x.xx.zip, in which x.x.xx stands for the VASA storage provider version
number.
Prerequisites Check
Before deploying the Huawei OceanStor VASA storage provider, you need to verify some
prerequisites.
The VASA storage provider can be deployed on a VM only, and cannot be deployed on the same VM as
vCenter Server.
Operating System and Software Package Requirements
Huawei OceanStor VASA storage provider has the following requirements for VASA
VM OS, vCPU, vMemory and other pre-installed software packages.
Table 4-1 Requirements for VASA storage provider VM OS, vCPU, vMemory and other pre-
installed software packages
Item Requirements
Operating system
The SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 11 SP3 x86_64
operating system is required.
No service systems of customers are installed on the
operating system. Otherwise, the installation may fail.
CPU cores At least 8 virtual CPU cores must be configured for VASA
storage provider.
Memory At least 8 GB virtual memory capacity is required for
VASA storage provider.
Disk space If the operating system has only the root partition, the
minimum free space of the root partition is 20 GB. If the
operating system has multiple partitions:
The minimum free space of the partition where the root
directory locates is 10 GB.
The minimum free space of the partition where the
/var/log directory locates is 20 GB.
The minimum free space of the partition where the /opt
directory locates is 20 GB.
Software packages The VM for housing VASA storage provider must have no
Apache2 package preinstalled. If any Apache2 package is
preinstalled, uninstall it first.
1. During the VASA storage provider installation process, the host name for the VASA VM can be
changed.
2. After the VASA storage provider is installed, the host name of the VASA storage provider VM
cannot be changed. Otherwise, some programs will malfunction.
Time Zone and NTP Server Settings
Before deploying the VASA storage provider, you need to configure the time zone and
time settings, thereby ensuring the time zones and time of the vCenter Server, ESXi
hosts, VASA storage provider VM, and storage array are consistent. The NTP server
configuration is optional.
1. If they are inconsistent, there would be some problems and you have to uninstall and reinstall the
VASA storage provider software package.
2. The time zone and NTP server for the VASA VM can be changed during the VASA Storage
Provider installation process.
The following table shows the requirements for time zone settings, including NTP server and
time zone.
Table 4-3 Requirements for time zone settings, including NTP server and time zone
Item Description Example
addresses separated by
commas (,).
Time zone Time zone in which a site Europe/Prague
resides (customer-supplied)
The method for querying the To query the time zone
time zone of a site: of a site at the Czech
Log in to the node as user Republic, access the
root, execute the cd Europe directory, and
/usr/share/zoneinfo find the Prague
command, and then query directory. The time
the time zone directory based zone information of the
on the physical location of site is Europe/Prague.
the site.
Deploy
This section describes the steps to deploy Huawei OceanStor VASA storage provider.
Before deploying, ensure that a VM meeting the requirements for housing the VASA storage provider
has been prepared.
Step 1 Upload the OceanStor VASA storage provider software package to the /root directory of the
VM via a file transfer tool such as WinSCP or Xmanager.
Step 2 Connect to the VM as user root via PuTTY or Xshell using the management IP address, and
then change directory to /root.
Step 3 Execute the following command to decompress the software package:
OceanStorDJ # unzip eSDK_Storage_VASA_2.0_Vx.x.xx.zip
1 To install and enable VASA Enter y and change the default password
Provider, the OS encryption encryption algorithm of the OS to sha256.
algorithm needs to be set to sha256.
Press 'Y/y' to confirm the operation, To enhance the OS security, you are advised to
or 'N/n' to exit the installation. change the encryption algorithm of the OS running
(y/n): on a physical server or VM to sha256. Otherwise,
the password of the djmanager maintenance
account created during the software installation
may be encrypted using the default encryption
algorithm MD5. MD5 is insecure.
Step 5 When the configuration process is completed, the VASA storage provider is automatically
installed successfully only if the following message is displayed.
2016-12-19 15:22:52 [INFO] Config auto start
succeeded. ............. ............................ 100%
################ Installing OceanStor VASA Provider succeeded ##################
Step 6 After the deployment of VASA provider is finished, start a web browser and enter the
following address to access the VASA provider:
https://xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx:19543/esdkom/pages/login.html,
xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx stands for the management IP address of the VASA storage provider VM.
Step 7 Select Language, enter User Name, Password and Captcha, and click Login button.
For the first time login, the default User Name is admin, the default password is Change_Me, and the
password changing operation is mandatory.
Step 8 On the Change password page, enter Old Password, New Password, and Confirm
Password, and click the Change button.
----End
The default password of user djmanager is DJ@123$%. To ensure system security, you are advised to
change the password regularly.
If you want to import the certificate to a standard system path, execute the following command:
djmanager@OceanStorDJ2:~> ./import_ca.sh -d /home/djmanager/ca/ -t ssl.
----End
Step 3 In the right pane of the eSDK Unified Management Portal, select the storage Model, enter the
storage management IP Address, access Port, management User Name, and Password, click
the OK button to start adding a storage array.
Back to the right pane, the Operation Succeeded information would be shown as follows.
----End
Step 3 Enter the Name and Desc of Storage Container, and click the OK button.
Step 4 In the Create Storage Container dialog box, click the OK button to continue.
Step 5 Back to the right pane, the new-added storage container would be shown in the list. Select the
destination storage container, and then click the Manage Storage Container button.
Step 6 Click the Add Storage Pool button in the right pane to configure a storage pool for the
selected storage container.
Step 7 In the right pane, select Array from the Arrays drop-down menu. Select the TierStrategy
Support checkbox only if you have configured at least one storage pool with multiple disk
layers, choose the storage pool in the Available StoragePools list, click to add the
selected Storage Pool to the Selected StoragePools list, and then click the OK button.
----End
Step 3 In the right pane, enter the storage profile parameters, and click the OK button.
Step 4 In the Create Storage Profile dialog box, click the OK to continue.
The Operation Succeeded information will be shown as follows.
----End
1. The following steps are suitable only for VMware vSphere clients. The steps for vSphere Web
Clients would be slightly different.
2. At least one host has been added to the vCenter server before registering the VASA provider.
Step 1 Connect to the vSphere Center via a vSphere client. Within the vSphere client, navigate to
Home > Storage Providers. Then, click Add….
Step 2 In the Add Vendor Provider dialog box, enter the provider Name, service URL provided by
the VASA provider and the registered user information, and then click OK.
Step 3 In the Security Alert dialog box, click the Yes to continue.
Step 4 When the Add Vendor VASA provider process is finished, the newly-added Huawei VASA
provider will be shown in the Vendor Providers list.
After selecting the Huawei VASA Storage provider, its detailed information would be shown
as follows, including Provider Name, API Version, Provider Status, Default Namespace,
and Provider Version.
----End
Table 4-1 Recommendation for Huawei OceanStor V3 storage systems based on VMware native
multipathing
Storage Recommended SATP Policy Recommended PSP
Configuration Policy
When using VMW_SATP_ALUA as the default SATP policy, ensure that the ALUA feature is
enabled on the storage devices; otherwise, the storage devices may fail to be found in ESXi
hosts.
Perform the following steps to configure VMware native multipathing on each ESXi host.
Step 1 Connect to the vSphere Center server via a vSphere client. Within the vSphere client, select
each ESXi host needed to connect to Huawei OceanStor V3 storage device in the inventory.
In the left Software pane, click Security Profile; in the right pane, click the Configuration
tab. On the Configuration tab page, click the Properties button in the upper right corner.
Step 2 In the Service Properties dialog box, select the SSH item and click the Options button.
Step 3 In the SSH (TSM-SSH) Options dialog box, select the Start and stop with host option in
the Startup Policy area, click the Start button, and then click the OK button.
Step 4 Back to the Service Properties dialog box, click OK to finish the SSH setting.
Step 5 Connect to ESXi hosts via PuTTY or Xshell, and execute the following commands to add
Huawei vendor information to ESXi hosts and configure the default SATP policy.
Set VMW_SATP_DEFAULT_AA as the default SATP policy:
~# esxcli storage nmp satp rule add --satp=VMW_SATP_DEFAULT_AA --
vendor="HUAWEI" --description "OceanStor"
Or
Set VMW_SATP_ALUA as the default SATP policy:
~# esxcli storage nmp satp rule add --satp=VMW_SATP_ALUA --vendor="HUAWEI" --
description "OceanStor"
Step 6 Configure the default PSP policy for SATP. For example:
Set VMW_PSP_FIXED as the default PSP policy for VMW_SATP_ DEFAULT_AA:
# esxcli storage nmp satp set --default-psp=VMW_PSP_FIXED --satp VMW_SATP_
DEFAULT_AA
Or
Set VMW_PSP_RR as the default PSP policy for VMW_SATP_ ALUA:
# esxcli storage nmp satp set --default-psp=VMW_PSP_RR --satp VMW_SATP_ ALUA
Step 7 Reboot ESXi hosts to complete the VMware Native multipathing configuration for Huawei
OceanStor V3 storage systems.
~# reboot
----End
If VMW_SATP_ALUA has been set as the default SATP policy, you must enable the
ALUA feature on the storage devices.
Perform the following steps to enable ALUA feature on Huawei OceanStor V3 storage
systems:
Step 1 Log in to the Huawei OceanStor DeviceManager via a web browser, and in the Navigation
Bar, click .
Step 4 In the displayed Modify Initiator dialog box, select the User third-party multipath
software option, select early-version ALUA as the Switchover Mode, keep Path Type
default, and then click the OK button.
Step 5 Repeat Steps 3 and 4, and make sure that all the ESXi hosts to be connected to the storage
devices have the ALUA feature enabled.
Huawei VASA storage provider management is integrated with the Huawei OceanStor eSDK vCenter
plugin, and so would be multipathing management (including both VMware native multipathing and
Huawei OceanStor UltraPath).
----End
Step 2 In the Rescan Storage dialog box, make sure that the Scan for new Storage Devices option
is selected, and then click the OK button.
Step 3 Select each ESXi host in the cluster, and choose Manage > Storage > Storage Devices in the
right pane.
The mapped PE-LUNs will be displayed in the Storage Devices list, where the PE-LUN
capacity would be shown as 0.00 B and the detailed information would be shown in the
Device Detailed area.
----End
1. A VVol datastore can only be created via the vSphere CWeb Client, vSphere Client is not
supported.
2. A VVol datastore can be created only if PE-LUNs have been found online in ESXi hosts.
Step 1 Connect to vSphere Center via vSphere Web Client. Within the vSphere Web Client, navigate
to Home > Hosts and Clusters. Select the ESXi cluster to add a VVol datastore, and navigate
to Related Objects > Datastores in the right pane.
Step 2 Click in the right pane to start the New Datastore wizard. In the New Datastore wizard,
click the Next button to continue.
Step 3 Select VVOL in the Type page, and click the Next button.
Step 4 Enter Datastore Name, select the destination Storage Container, confirm the detailed
information for Backing Storage Container Details, and click the Next button.
Step 5 Select the ESXi hosts that access the datastore, and click the Next button.
Step 6 On the Ready to complete page, click the Finish button to complete the VVol datastore
creation.
Then, the newly-added VVol datastore would be shown in the datastore list.
----End
The VM storage policies can only be created via vSphere Web Client, vSphere Client is not supported.
Step 1 Connect to vSphere Center via vSphere Web Client. Within the vSphere Web Client, navigate
to Home, and click VM Storage Policies in the right pane.
Step 2 Click in the middle pane to start the Create New VM Storage Policy wizard.
Step 3 On the Name and Description page of the Create New VM Storage Policy wizard, enter the
Name and Description, and click the Next button.
Click <Add rule>, select a target rule from the drop-down list, and set the related values.
1. Multiple rules can be set in the same VM storage policy, and these rules take effect together.
2. The VM storage policy must be compatible with at least one VVol datastore. Otherwise, the
storage policy is invalid.
After the rule adding process is completed, click the Next button to continue.
1 com.huawei.vasaprovider. Flow control type, to which the flow control policy will
FlowControlType.label be applied and should be the same as that specified
during the storage profile creation process
Supported control types:
Read I/O
Write I/O
Read/Write I/O
2 com.huawei.vasaprovider. Flow control policy, which should be the same as that
FlowControlPolicy.label specified during the storage profile creation process.
Supported policy types:
Control upper bound
Control lower bound
3 com.huawei.vasaprovider. IOPS, to which a flow control policy will be applied
IOPS.label and should be the same as that specified during the
storage profile creation process
4 com.huawei.vasaprovider. Bandwidth, to which a flow control policy will be
Bandwidth.label applied and should be the same as that specified during
the storage profile creation process
5 com.huawei.vasaprovider. Latency, to which a flow control policy will be applied
Latency.label and should be the same as that specified during the
storage profile creation process
Step 6 On the Storage Compatibility page, select the compatible datastore and click the Next
button.
Step 7 On the Ready to complete page, confirm the parameter settings and click the Finish button.
Then, the newly-added VM storage policy would be shown in the list as follows.
----End
Step 2 Select the Create a new virtual machine option on the Select a creation type page of New
Virtual Machine wizard, and click the Next button.
Step 3 Enter the name for the VM, select the destination datacenter on the Select a name and folder
page, and click the Next button.
Step 4 Select the destination cluster on the Select a compute resource page, and click the Next
button.
Step 5 Select the VM Storage Policy and VVol-based datastore on the Select Storage page, and
click the Next button.
Step 6 Select a compatible ESXi version from the Compatible with option box on the Select
compatibility page, and click the Next button.
Step 7 Select Guest OS Family and Guest OS Version on the Select a guest OS page, and click the
Next button.
Step 9 On the Ready to complete page, confirm the parameter settings and then click the Finish
button.
----End
5 Configuration Recommendations
5.1 Multipathing
With VMware VVol and Huawei OceanStor V3 storage systems deployed, it is advisable to
use the Huawei OceanStor UltraPath as the default multipathing software.
5.2 PE-LUN
For each storage pool, it is advisable to create at least two PE-LUNs to keep high availability,
and set these PE-LUNs to be owned by different storage controllers.
6 Appendix
Trademark Notice
, HUAWEI, and are trademarks or registered trademarks of Huawei Technologies Co., Ltd.
Other trademarks, product, service and company names mentioned are the property of their respective owners.