Implementing Cisco UCS Solutions - Second Edition
By Prasenjit Sarkar, Anuj Modi and Farhan Nadeem
()
About this ebook
- Learn how to reduce equipment and operating costs, consolidate resources, and automate data center processes
- Eliminate manual, time-consuming tasks that were traditionally required to connect servers in data centers
- A practical hands-on guide that will help you to deploy servers and application stacks with ease
This book is for system, network, and storage administrators who are responsible for Cisco UCS deployments. You need to have basic knowledge of server architecture, network, and storage technologies.
Prasenjit Sarkar
Prasenjit Sarkar (@stretchcloud) is a senior member of technical staff at VMware Service Provider Cloud R&D, where he provides architectural oversight and technical guidance for designing, implementing, and testing VMware's Cloud datacenters. He is an author, R&D guy, and a blogger focusing on virtualization, Cloud computing, storage, networking, and other enterprise technologies. He has more than 10 years of expert knowledge in R&D, professional services, alliances, solution engineering, consulting, and technical sales with expertise in architecting and deploying virtualization solutions and rolling out new technologies and solution initiatives. His primary focus is on VMware vSphere Infrastructure and Public Cloud using VMware vCloud Suite. His aim is to own the entire life cycle of a VMware based IaaS (SDDC), especially vSphere, vCloud Director, vShield Manager, and vCenter Operations. He was one of the VMware vExperts of 2012 and is well known for his acclaimed virtualization blog http://stretch-cloud.info. He holds certifications from VMware, Cisco, Citrix, Red Hat, Microsoft, IBM, HP, and Exin. Prior to joining VMware, he served other fine organizations (such as Capgemini, HP, and GE) as a solution architect and infrastructure architect.
Read more from Prasenjit Sarkar
Implementing Cisco UCS Solutions Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsVMware vCloud Security Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsvSphere High Performance Cookbook - Second Edition Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsvSphere High Performance Cookbook Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratings
Related to Implementing Cisco UCS Solutions - Second Edition
Related ebooks
Cisco ACI Cookbook Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Cisco UCS Cookbook Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsVMware NSX Network Essentials Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsInstant Citrix XenApp Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Getting Started with VMware Virtual SAN Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsInstant VMware vCloud Starter Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsMicrosoft System Center Configuration Manager High availability and performance tuning Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsIntroduction to Python Network Automation: The First Journey Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsCitrix XenApp Performance Essentials Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsImplementing NetScaler VPX™ - Second Edition Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsLearning OpenDaylight Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsManaging Virtual Infrastructure with Veeam® ONE™ Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsHyper-V Security Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsVMware Virtual SAN Cookbook Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Building VMware Software-Defined Data Centers Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsVMware Performance and Capacity Management - Second Edition Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsDeploying QoS for Cisco IP and Next Generation Networks: The Definitive Guide Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Private Cloud Computing: Consolidation, Virtualization, and Service-Oriented Infrastructure Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsHow Software Defined Networking (SDN) Is Going To Change Your World Forever: The Revolution In Network Design And How It Affects You Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsPractical Deployment of Cisco Identity Services Engine (ISE): Real-World Examples of AAA Deployments Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5VMware Certified Professional Data Center Virtualization on vSphere 6.7 Study Guide: Exam 2V0-21.19 Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsCCNP Enterprise Certification Study Guide: Implementing and Operating Cisco Enterprise Network Core Technologies: Exam 350-401 Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsVMware vSphere Essentials Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsVCA-DCV VMware Certified Associate on vSphere Study Guide: VCAD-510 Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsTroubleshooting Citrix XenApp® Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratings
System Administration For You
Improve your skills with Google Sheets: Professional training Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsCybersecurity: The Beginner's Guide: A comprehensive guide to getting started in cybersecurity Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Practical Data Analysis Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Learn PowerShell in a Month of Lunches, Fourth Edition: Covers Windows, Linux, and macOS Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsCompTIA A+ Complete Review Guide: Core 1 Exam 220-1101 and Core 2 Exam 220-1102 Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Ethical Hacking Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Linux: Learn in 24 Hours Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Bash Command Line Pro Tips Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Operating Systems DeMYSTiFieD Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsConfigMgr - An Administrator's Guide to Deploying Applications using PowerShell Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Learn Windows PowerShell in a Month of Lunches Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsLinux Command-Line Tips & Tricks Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsBuilding a Plex Server with Raspberry Pi Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsPowerShell in Depth Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsLearn PowerShell Scripting in a Month of Lunches Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsLinux Commands By Example Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Learn SQL Server Administration in a Month of Lunches Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Mastering Linux Shell Scripting Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Summary of Lights Out: by Ted Koppel | Includes Analysis Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsMastering Windows PowerShell Scripting Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Mastering Active Directory Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsLinux Bible Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsGit Essentials Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Linux for Beginners: Linux Command Line, Linux Programming and Linux Operating System Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Complete Powershell Training for Beginners Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratings
Reviews for Implementing Cisco UCS Solutions - Second Edition
0 ratings0 reviews
Book preview
Implementing Cisco UCS Solutions - Second Edition - Prasenjit Sarkar
Title Page
Implementing Cisco UCS Solutions
Second Edition
A hands-on guide to deploy, manage, troubleshoot and automate Cisco UCS solutions in the data center
Anuj Modi
Farhan Nadeem
Prasenjit Sarkar
BIRMINGHAM - MUMBAI
Copyright
Implementing Cisco UCS Solutions
Second Edition
Copyright © 2017 Packt Publishing
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embedded in critical articles or reviews.
Every effort has been made in the preparation of this book to ensure the accuracy of the information presented. However, the information contained in this book is sold without warranty, either express or implied. Neither the authors, nor Packt Publishing, and its dealers and distributors will be held liable for any damages caused or alleged to be caused directly or indirectly by this book.
Packt Publishing has endeavored to provide trademark information about all of the companies and products mentioned in this book by the appropriate use of capitals. However, Packt Publishing cannot guarantee the accuracy of this information.
First published: December 2013
Second edition: April 2017
Production reference: 1240417
Published by Packt Publishing Ltd.
Livery Place
35 Livery Street
Birmingham
B3 2PB, UK.
ISBN 978-1-78646-440-8
www.packtpub.com
Credits
About the Authors
Anuj Modi (@vConsultant) is a senior consulting engineer in the Advanced Service Group at Cisco Systems and has worked in architecting and implementing Cisco's cloud and data center solutions. He has more than 14 years' experience in the IT industry, including serving various roles as IT manager at IndSwift, senior system admin at Computer Science Corporation, and virtualization consultant at Hewlett Packard.
He holds a bachelor's and master's degree in computer applications and many industry-standard certifications, such as MCSE, VCP, ITIL, and CCA. He has co-authored a book on VMware NSX and Cisco Unified Computing System. His primary focus is orchestrating and automating infrastructures for private, public, and hybrid cloud solutions with Cisco and third-party products. He has extensive experience in data center assessment, and planning, designing, implementing, and optimizing infrastructure, and helping customers build and migrate to next-generation data centers.
WordPress: https://anujmodi.wordpress.com/
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/anuj-modi-2866481
Other: https://communities.vmware.com/thread/528879?start=0&tstart=0
Thanks to my family for having the patience with me in spite of all the time it took me away from them and couldn’t spend quality time. I would like to dedicate this book to my family for all the encouragement and support while writing this book.
Farhan Nadeem has been in the IT field for over 19 years. He has a master's degree in electrical engineering and holds several industry-recognized certifications, including VCAP-DCA, VCP, CCNP DC, CISSP, CCA, and MCIP-EA. Farhan has proven experience in successfully engineering, deploying, administering, and troubleshooting heterogeneous infrastructure solutions. Starting with the MCSE-NT Microsoft certification in 1997, he's always stayed abreast of the latest technologies and server hardware through proactive learning and successful real-world deployments. He has extensive work experience in complex heterogeneous environments comprising various hardware platforms, operating systems, and applications. This exposure has given him broad knowledge in investigating, designing, implementing, and managing infrastructure solutions. He progressively started focusing on virtualization technologies and the Cisco UCS platform and has completed several successful UCS deployments with multiple virtualization platforms. When not working with computers, he enjoys spending time with his family. He has also technically reviewed the second edition of this book.
I would like to thank my family for providing their support during reviewing of this book.
Prasenjit Sarkar is a product manager at Oracle for their public cloud, with a focus on cloud strategy, Oracle Ravello, cloud-native applications, and the API platform. His primary focus is driving Oracle's cloud computing business with commercial and public sector customers, helping to shape and deliver a strategy to build broad use of Oracle's Infrastructure as a Service offerings, such as Compute, Storage, and Database as a Service. He is also responsible for developing public/private cloud integration strategies, customers' cloud computing architecture visions, future state architectures, and implementable architecture roadmaps in the context of the public, private, and hybrid cloud computing solutions that Oracle can offer.
He is the author of a virtualization blog (http://stretch-cloud.info) and has also authored six industry-leading books on virtualization, SDN, and physical compute, among others.
He has six successful patents and six more patents pending at the US PTO. He has also authored numerous research articles.
www.PacktPub.com
For support files and downloads related to your book, please visit www.PacktPub.com.
Did you know that Packt offers eBook versions of every book published, with PDF and ePub files available? You can upgrade to the eBook version at www.PacktPub.com and as a print book customer, you are entitled to a discount on the eBook copy. Get in touch with us at service@packtpub.com for more details.
At www.PacktPub.com, you can also read a collection of free technical articles, sign up for a range of free newsletters and receive exclusive discounts and offers on Packt books and eBooks.
https://www.packtpub.com/mapt
Get the most in-demand software skills with Mapt. Mapt gives you full access to all Packt books and video courses, as well as industry-leading tools to help you plan your personal development and advance your career.
Why subscribe?
Fully searchable across every book published by Packt
Copy and paste, print, and bookmark content
On demand and accessible via a web browser
Customer Feedback
Thanks for purchasing this Packt book. At Packt, quality is at the heart of our editorial process. To help us improve, please leave us an honest review on this book's Amazon page at https://www.amazon.com/dp/1786464403.
If you'd like to join our team of regular reviewers, you can e-mail us at customerreviews@packtpub.com. We award our regular reviewers with free eBooks and videos in exchange for their valuable feedback. Help us be relentless in improving our products!
Table of Contents
Preface
What this book covers
What you need for this book
Who this book is for
Conventions
Reader feedback
Customer support
Downloading the color images of this book
Errata
Piracy
Questions
What's New with Cisco UCS
UCS architecture overview
Changes in the third-generation UCS
Physical architecture of UCS
Fabric Interconnects
UCS third-generation 6332
UCS third-generation 6332-16UP
UCS second-generation 6248UP
UCS second-generation 6296UP
Fabric Extenders
UCS third-generation Cisco 2304 IOM
UCS second-generation Cisco 2208XP IOM
UCS second-generation Cisco 2204XP IOM
Cisco Nexus 2348UPQ 10GE Fabric Extender
Blade server chassis
Chassis front
Chassis back
Environmental requirements
B-Series blade servers
Blade servers
B200 M3/M4
B260 M4
B420 M3/M4
B460 M4
C-Series rack servers
C220 M3/M4
C240 M3/M4
C460 M2/M4
Mezzanine adapters
VICs for blade servers
UCS third-generation VIC 1380
UCS third-generation VIC 1340
UCS second-generation VIC 1280
UCS second-generation VIC 1240
VICs for rack-mount servers
UCS third-generation VIC 1387
UCS third-generation VIC 1385
UCS second-generation VIC 1285
UCS second-generation VIC 1225
UCS storage servers
UCS C3206
UCS C3106
UCS M-Series modular servers
M4308
M2814
M1414
M142
Cisco UCS Mini
6324
Summary
Installing Cisco UCS Hardware
Installing UCS hardware components
Installing racks for UCS components
Installing UCS chassis and components
Installing blade servers
Installing and removing CPUs
Installing and removing RAM
Installing and removing internal hard disks
Installing mezzanine cards
Installing UCS chassis and rack rails
Installing blade servers into a chassis
Installing rack servers
Installing Fabric Interconnects
Cabling - Fabric Interconnects and Fabric Extenders
Fabric Extenders - Fabric Interconnect cabling topology
IOM - Fabric Interconnect physical cabling
Power capacity and power plug types
Non-redundant
N+1 redundant
Grid-redundant
Cisco SingleConnect technology
Summary
Setting Up a Lab Using Cisco UCS Emulator
Configuring Cisco UCS Emulator
System requirements
Hypervisor prerequisites
Installing UCSPE on VMware Workstation Player using the ZIP file
Installing UCSPE on VMware Workstation Player using the OVA file
Installing UCSPE on VMware Workstation
Installing UCSPE on VMware vSphere ESXi
Using Cisco UCSPE
Configuring network settings
Configuring hardware settings
Adding a new chassis with blade servers
Adding an empty chassis
Configuring and adding blade servers to the chassis
Configuring and adding rack-mount servers
Modifying server components
Launching UCS Manager using Platform Emulator
UCSPE limitations
Summary
Configuring Cisco UCS Using UCS Manager
Introducing Cisco UCSM
What's new with UCSM
UCSM firmware version
Walking through the UCSM interface
Navigation pane
The Equipment tab
The Servers tab
The LAN tab
The SAN tab
The VM tab
The Storage tab
The Admin tab
The Fault Summary area
Starting with the initial configuration
Step-by-step initial configuration
Global configuration policies
Chassis/FEX Discovery Policy
Rack Server Discovery Policy
Rack Management Connection Policy
Power Policy
MAC Address Table Aging
Global Power Allocation Policy
Firmware Auto Sync Server Policy
Global Power Profiling Policy
Info Policy
DNS server
Time-zone management
SNMP
UCS Manager - command-line interface
Getting help with CLI commands
Accessing the history of CLI commands
Accessing component-level CLIs
Scope commands
Applying changes
An example configuration using CLI commands
Summary
Configuring LAN Connectivity
Understanding Fabric Interconnect switching modes
Ethernet end-host mode
Ethernet switching mode
Introduction to Fabric Interconnect port types
Configuring northbound connectivity to upstream switches
Configuring upstream switches
Learning how to configure Fabric Interconnect uplink ports
Configuring VLANs
Using pin groups
Dynamic pin groups
Failure response
Static pin groups
Failure response re-pinning
Configuring southbound connectivity to IOMs
Learning how to configure Fabric Interconnect server ports
Configuring IOM ports
Configuring the last piece of the puzzle - vNICs
What is MAC address abstraction?
Learning to create vNICs
Summary
Configuring SAN Connectivity
Learning about storage connectivity options
Overview of FC and iSCSI storage
Overview of SCSI
Overview of Fibre Channel
Overview of iSCSI
Overview of Fibre Channel over Ethernet (FCoE)
Storage connectivity design considerations
Learning about the FC switching mode
Configuring the FC ports
Configuring the FC uplink port
Configuring the FC port channel and trunking
Configuring VSANs and zoning
Learning about zoning
Learning about VSANs
Example configuration - connecting SAN directly to Fabric Interconnects
Configuring FCoE
Manual and automatic uplink pinning
Dynamic pin groups
Failure response
Static pin groups
Failure response re-pinning
Summary
Creating Identity Resource Pools, Policies, and Templates
Understanding identity and resource pools
Learning to create a UUID pool
Learning to create a MAC pool
Learning to create a WWNN pool
Learning to create a WWPN pool
Learning to create IP pools
Making your identity pools meaningful
Understanding server pools
Learning to create server pool membership and qualification policies
Summary
Creating and Managing Service Profiles
Overview of service profiles
Different ways of creating a service profile
Creating a basic service profile
Creating a service profile in the expert mode
Creating a service profile from a service profile template
Configuring policies
Configuring the server BIOS policy
Configuring adapter policies
Configuring scrub policies
Configuring QoS policies
Local disk configuration policies
Maintenance policies
Configuring IPMI
Configuring the Host Firmware policy
A walkthrough of the service profile creation - expert mode
Identifying the service profile
Configuring the storage provisioning
Configuring the networking settings
Configuring the SAN connectivity
Configuring zoning
vNIC/vHBA placement
vMedia policy configuration
Server boot order configuration
Configuring a SAN boot policy
Configuring the server maintenance policy
Associating service profiles
Operational policies
Creating and applying a service profile template
Service profiles cloning
Summary
Managing UCS through Routine and Advanced Management
Licensing Cisco UCS Fabric Interconnect
Starting up and shutting down of Fabric Interconnects
Controlling blade server power
Status and locator LEDs
Configuring logging
Configuring the Cisco Call Home feature
Organizational structure in UCS Manager
Organizational inheritance
RBAC
Active Directory integration
Predefined roles
About UCS locales
Permissions in multitenancy
Summary
Virtual Networking in Cisco UCS
Learning about VN-Link
Using the NX-OS
Changes in the data center
Role differentiation
Role issues
Development of Nexus 1000V
Virtual Ethernet interfaces
Learning about port profiles
Nexus 1000V components
The Virtual Ethernet Module
The Virtual Supervisor Module
VEM implementation
VSM implementation
VEM data plane
VEM functions
VSM control plane
Nexus 1000V and physical switches
The physical switch chassis
Line cards
The N1KV backplane
Nexus and vPath
Performance advantages using vPath
Deploying VSM
VSUM architecture
VSUM and VSM installation
Communication between VSM and VEM
Using layer 2 connectivity
Using layer 3 connectivity
Using the Domain ID
L2 mode
L3 mode
System VLANs and opaque data
VSM to vCenter communication
Summary
Configuring Backup, Restore, and High Availability
Backing up the Cisco UCS configuration
Creating UCS backup jobs
Creating a manually run backup job using GUI
Creating a scheduled backup job using GUI
Creating a backup job using CLI
Restoring backups using GUI
Configuring high availability clustering
Configuring the first Fabric Interconnect
Configuring the second Fabric Interconnect
Fabric Interconnect elections
Managing high availability
The split brain scenario
Partition in space
Partition in time
Summary
Cisco UCS Failure Scenarios Testing
Port channel uplink failure and recovery on Fabric Interconnects
Server link to Fabric Interconnect failure and recovery
Identifying a mezzanine adapter failure
Common mezzanine adapter error messages
FEX IO modules - failure and recovery
Common IOM error messages
Fabric Interconnect server port failure
Rectifying the global Chassis/FEX Discovery Policy configuration error
Fabric Interconnect device failure and recovery
Common error messages with Fabric Interconnects
UCS chassis failure, reporting, and recovery
Common failure messages for the UCS chassis
Single Fibre Channel failure and recovery on Fabric Interconnects
Indicating a status with Beacon LEDs
Creating a tech-support file
Summary
Third-Party Application Integration
Understanding the challenges in infrastructure
Going deep with UIM
Understanding the discovery mechanism of UIM
Learning about the UIM service life cycle
Integrating VMware vCenter Server with UCSM
Configuring vCenter with UCSM
Integration with Cisco UCS PowerTool Suite
Connecting your UCS Manager using PowerTool Suite
Summary
Automation and Orchestration of Cisco UCS
Multiple UCS domain management
UCS Central architecture
Why UCS Central?
UCS domain registration with UCS Central
Performance monitoring and capacity planning
UCS Performance Manager architecture
Powering infrastructure with a cloud solution
UCS Director overview
UCS Director solutions
UCS Director
UCS Director Baremetal Agent
Summary
Preface
Cisco Unified Computer System (UCS) is a powerful solution for modern data centers that is responsible for increasing efficiency and reducing costs. Implementing Cisco UCS Solutions is an update to the previous version and provides a similar hands-on approach. With actual examples of configuring and deploying Cisco UCS components, this book prepares readers for real-world deployments of Cisco UCS data center solutions.
This book starts with a description of Cisco UCS equipment options and introduces Cisco UCS Emulator, which is an excellent resource for practically learning Cisco UCS component deployment. Subsequent chapters introduce all areas of UCS solutions with practical configuration examples.
You will be introduced to the Cisco UCS Manager, which is the centralized management interface for Cisco UCS. Once the reader establishes elementary acquaintance with UCS Manager, we go deep into configuring LAN, SAN, identity pools, resource pools, and service profiles for the servers. We also present miscellaneous administration topics, including backup, restore, user roles, and high availability cluster configuration. The last few chapters introduce virtualized networking, third-party integration tools, testing failure scenarios, and automating your infrastructure with Cisco UCS Director.
If you want to learn and enhance your hands-on skills with Cisco UCS solutions, this book is certainly for you. You will learn everything you need for the rapidly growing Cisco UCS deployments.
What this book covers
Chapter 1, What’s New with Cisco UCS, will cover the third-generation of Cisco UCS products along with an introduction to Cisco UCS M-Series modular servers, UCS storage servers, and UCS Mini. This chapter can help you to understand various UCS products and select the best one for your data center and cloud computing solutions.
Chapter 2, Installing Cisco UCS Hardware, walks through UCS hardware component installation, such as Fabric Interconnect, chassis, blade, I/O module, and interface card, and discusses how to use Cisco Single Connect Technology to connect rack servers with Fabric Interconnect. It also covers power and cooling requirements.
Chapter 3, Setting Up a Lab using Cisco UCS Emulator, introduces the UCS Emulator, which is an excellent tool from Cisco that you can use to learn about UCS without a physical lab. Different UCS Emulator installation options are discussed, and configuring the UCS Emulator for lab usage is explained.
Chapter 4, Configuring Cisco UCS using UCS Manager, gives an overview of UCS Manager, which is the core management tool for the UCS platform. Readers will get acquainted with UCS Manager navigation and configuration options using both the graphical user interface and the command-line interface.
Chapter 5, Configuring LAN Connectivity, explains UCS network connectivity. UCS platform-unique features, including Fabric Interconnect operational modes, pin groups, port channels, virtual PortChannel, and Virtual Network Interface Card configuration, are explained along with both northbound and southbound network connectivities from Fabric Interconnects.
Chapter 6, Configuring SAN Connectivity, explains storage connectivity for different SAN protocols supported by the UCS platform. The configuration of protocols including FC, FCoE, and iSCSI is discussed, along with an introduction to unique UCS features, such as FC operational modes, VSANs, and uplink pinning.
Chapter 7, Creating Identity Resource Pools, Policies, and Templates, explains that pools are a very important topic in UCS, especially in relation to configuring service profiles. In this chapter, we’ll discuss the different pools you create during UCS deployments. We’ll start by looking at what pools are, and then we’ll discuss the different types of pool and show how to configure each of them.
Chapter 8, Creating and Managing Service Profiles, introduces identity and resource pools, which include UUID, MAC addresses, WWN, and server pools. Identity and resource pools are used for abstracting unique identities and resources for devices such as vNICs; vHBAs and server pools can assign servers in groups based on similar server characteristics.
Chapter 9, Managing UCS through Routine and Advanced Management, introduces the most common and advanced management tasks performed with UCS, from startup and shutdown to logging, upgrading firmware, licensing, and role-based access. These routine management tasks are crucial to understand in order to effectively administer Cisco UCS.
Chapter 10, Virtual Networking in Cisco UCS, explains the integration of Cisco UCS and the virtualization of hypervisors with VMware vSphere and Cisco Nexus 1000V Distributed Virtual Switch.
Chapter 11, Configuring Backup, Restore, and High Availability, covers UCS backup and restore options. This chapter also provides details of high availability configuration for UCS Fabric Interconnects.
Chapter 12, Cisco UCS Failure Scenarios Testing, discusses various failure scenarios that provide solutions for UCS troubleshooting to identify and resolve issues.
Chapter 13, Third-Party Application Integration, covers third-party applications, including VMware vCenter extension, goUCS automation toolkit, and EMC UIM.
Chapter 14, Automation and Orchestration of Cisco UCS, introduces using Cisco UCS Central for domain management, Performance Manager for health monitoring, and Cisco UCS Director for automation, and orchestrating all the infrastructure components: compute, network, storage, and virtualization.
What you need for this book
In order to create a lab without physical equipment and to practice the procedures provided in this book, you will need the following:
A UCS Emulator virtual machine that provides UCS Manager and emulated hardware.
A hypervisor that can run the UCS Emulator VM. Options include VM Player, VM Workstation, VM Fusion, vSphere, and Hyper-V.
A client machine with an Internet Explorer- or Mozilla-compatible browser for accessing the UCS Manager application.
Who this book is for
This book is intended for professionals responsible for Cisco UCS deployments, which include systems, network, and storage administrators. Readers should have basic knowledge of the server's architecture, network, and storage technologies. Although not necessary, familiarity with virtualization technologies is also recommended because a majority of real-world UCS deployments run virtualized loads. Even though UCS Fabric Interconnects running UCS Manager are based on the Nexus platform, knowledge of Nexus OS is not necessary, because the majority of the management tasks are handled in the graphical user interface, with very few exceptions using the CLI.
Conventions
In this book, you will find a number of text styles that distinguish between different kinds of information. Here are some examples of these styles and an explanation of their meaning.
Code words in text, database table names, folder names, filenames, file extensions, pathnames, dummy URLs, user input, and Twitter handles are shown as follows: "None of