Dell PowerScale

Application Version and Upgrade Details

Introduction

Dell PowerScale is a scale out network-attached storage platform offered by Dell EMC for high-volume storage, backup and archiving of unstructured data.

It provides a cluster-based storage array based on industry-standard hardware and is scalable to 50 petabytes in a single filesystem using its FreeBSD-derived OneFS file system. A PowerScale clustered storage system is composed of three or more nodes. Each node is a server integrated with proprietary operating system software called OneFS (based on FreeBSD), which unifies a cluster of nodes into a single shared resource.

Available resources under PowerScale are as follows:

• Cluster: OneFS works exclusively with dedicated platform nodes, referred to as a “cluster”
• Node: A single cluster consists of multiple nodes, which are rack-mountable enterprise appliances containing: memory, CPU, networking, Ethernet or low-latency InfiniBandinterconnects, disk controllers and storage media. As such, each node in the distributed cluster has compute as well as storage or capacity capabilities.

Prerequisites

• OpsRamp Classic Gateway 14.0.0 and above.
• OpsRamp Nextgen Gateway 14.0.0 and above.
  Note: OpsRamp recommends using the latest Gateway version for full coverage of recent bug fixes, enhancements, etc..
• Ensure that “adapter integrations” add-on is enabled in client configuration. Once enabled you can see Dell PowerScale integration under Setup > Integrations > Adapter section

Roles and Permissions

Admin with read-only permission are the required roles and permissions for the Dell PowerScale Account to perform Discovery, Monitoring and Alert polling without any issues.

Hierarchy of Dell PowerScale resources

PowerScale Cluster
      • PowerScale Node
                  • PowerScale Network Interface
                  • PowerScale Drive
      • PowerScale Job
      • PowerScale Network Pool
      • PowerScale Quota
      • PowerScale SyncIQ Policy
      • PowerScale SnapShot
      • PowerScale Nfs Export
      • PowerScale Smb Share

Application Migration

1. Check for the gateway version as a prerequisite step - classic gateway-12.0.1 and above.
   Notes:

   • You only have to follow these steps when you want to migrate from sdk 1.0 to sdk 2.0.
   • For first time installation below steps are not required.
     • Application name should be the same.
     • Disable all installed integrations configurations for that application. This is to make sure no discovery and monitoring requests are processed.
     • Install and Add the configuration to that sdk 2.0 application.
     • During the migration from SDK 1.0 to SDK 2.0, ensure that you uncheck the Bypass Resource Reconciliation checkbox.
       Note: refer to Configure and Install the Dell Powerscale Integration & View the Dell PowerScale details sections of this document.

2. Once all discoveries are completed with the sdk 2.0 application, follow any one of the approaches.

   • Direct uninstallation of the sdk 1.0 adaptor application through the uninstall API with skipDeleteResources=true in the post request
     
     End-Point: https://{{host}}/api/v2/tenants/{tenantId}/integrations/installed/{installedIntgId}
     
     Request Body:

         {
         "uninstallReason": "Test",
         "skipDeleteResources": true
         }

     
     
     (OR)
     
     
   • Delete the configuration one by one through the Delete adaptor config API with the request parameter as skipDeleteResources=true
     
     End-Point: https://{{host}}/api/v2/tenants/{tenantId}/integrations/installed/config/{configId}?skipDeleteResources=true.
     
     
   • Finally, uninstall the adaptor application through API with skipDeleteResources=true in the post request.
     
     End-Point: https://{{host}}/api/v2/tenants/{tenantId}/integrations/installed/{installedIntgId}
     
     Request Body:

         {
         "uninstallReason": "Test",
         "skipDeleteResources": true
          }

Supported Metrics

Default Monitoring Configurations

Dell PowerScale has default Global Device Management Policies, Global Templates, Global Monitors and Global Metrics in OpsRamp. You can customize these default monitoring configurations as per your business use cases by cloning respective Global Templates and Global Device Management Policies. OpsRamp recommends doing this activity before installing the application to avoid noise alerts and data.

1. Default Global Device Management Policies

   OpsRamp has a Global Device Management Policy for each Native Type of Dell PowerScale. You can find those Device Management Policies at Setup > Resources > Device Management Policies, search with suggested names in global scope. Each Device Management Policy follows below naming convention:

   {appName nativeType - version}

   Ex: dell-power-scale PowerScale Cluster - 1 (i.e, appName = dell-power-scale, nativeType = PowerScale Cluster, version = 1)

2. Default Global Templates

   OpsRamp has a Global template for each Native Type of Dell PowerScale. You can find those templates at Setup > Monitoring > Templates, search with suggested names in global scope. Each template follows below naming convention:

   {appName nativeType 'Template' - version}

   Ex: dell-power-scale PowerScale Cluster Template - 1 (i.e, appName = dell-power-scale, nativeType = PowerScale Cluster, version = 1)

3. Default Global Monitors

   OpsRamp has a Global Monitors for each Native Type which has monitoring support. You can find those monitors at Setup > Monitoring > Monitors, search with suggested names in global scope. Each Monitors follows below naming convention:

   {monitorKey appName nativeType - version}

   Ex: PowerScale Cluster Monitor dell-power-scale PowerScale Cluster 1(i.e, monitorKey = PowerScale Cluster Monitor, appName = dell-power-scale, nativeType = PowerScale Cluster, version = 1)

Configure and Install the Dell Powerscale Integration

1. From All Clients, select a client.
2. Navigate to Setup > Account.
3. Select the Integrations and Apps tab.
4. The Installed Integrations page, where all the installed applications are displayed. If there are no installed applications, it will navigate to the Available Integrations and Apps page.
5. Click + ADD on the Installed Integrations page. The Available Integrations and Apps page displays all the available applications along with the newly created application with the version.
6. Search for the application using the search option available. Alternatively, use the All Categories option to search.

7. Click ADD in the Dell PowerScale application.
8. In the Configurations page, click + ADD. The Add Configuration page appears.
9. Enter the below mentioned BASIC INFORMATION:

Notes:

• By default the Is Secure checkbox is selected.
• Ip Address/Host Name and Port should be accessible from Gateway.
• Select the following:
  • App Failure Notifications: if turned on, you will be notified in case of an application failure that is, Connectivity Exception, Authentication Exception.
  • Event/Alert Polling: enables integrating third party alerts into OpsRamp using further configurations.
  • API Timeouts: These are the maximum API Timeouts that the application can use to connect and get responses from the end device.
    • Connection Timeout in Secs: a time period in which a client should establish a connection with a server.
      Note: By default 60 is selected.
    • Connection Request Timeout in Secs: a time period required to process an HTTP call: from sending a request to receiving a response.
      Note: By default 60 is selected.
    • Socket Timeout in Secs: a maximum time of inactivity between two data packets when exchanging data with a server.
      Note: By default 60 is selected.
• By default Alert On rootResource is selected.
• Below are the default values set for:
  • Event/Alert Severity Filter: provides severity alerts and gets integrated out of all possible alerts.
    • Default Values: emergency, critical, warning, information, unknown.
    • Possible Values: emergency, critical, warning, information, unknown.
  • Event/Alert Severity Mapping: enables you to map the severities between Dell PowerScale and OpsRamp as severities are predefined values in each system.
    • Default mappings: {“emergency”:“Critical”,“critical”:“Critical”,“warning”:“Warning”,“information”:“Info”,“unknown”:“Info”}
      Note: You can change it as per your business use cases at any point in time from the Configuration page.

10. In the RESOURCE TYPE section, select:
    • ALL: All the existing and future resources will be discovered.
    • SELECT: You can select one or multiple resources to be discovered.
11. In the DISCOVERY SCHEDULE section, select Recurrence Pattern to add one of the following patterns:
    • Minutes
    • Hourly
    • Daily
    • Weekly
    • Monthly
12. Click ADD.

Now the configuration is saved and displayed on the configurations page after you save it. From the same page, you may Edit and Remove the created configuration.

13. Under the ADVANCED SETTINGS, Select the Bypass Resource Reconciliation option, if you wish to bypass resource reconciliation when encountering the same resources discovered by multiple applications.

    Note: If two different applications provide identical discovery attributes, two separate resources will be generated with those respective attributes from the individual discoveries.

14. Click NEXT.

15. (Optional) Click +ADD to create a new collector by providing a name or use the pre-populated name.

16. Select an existing registered profile.

17. Click FINISH.

The application is installed and displayed on the INSTALLED INTEGRATION page. Use the search field to find the installed integration.

Modify the Configuration

• See Modify an Installed Integration or Application article.

  Note: Select the Dell PowerScale application.

View the Dell PowerScale Details

To discover resources for Dell PowerScale

1. Navigate to Infrastructure > Search > Storage > Dell PowerScale.
2. The Dell PowerScale page is displayed, select the application name.
3. The RESOURCE DETAILS page appears from the right.
4. Click the ellipsis (…) on the top right and select View details.
5. Navigate to the Attributes tab to view the discovery details.

• Click the Metrics tab to view the metric details for Dell PowerScale.

Resource Filter Input Keys

Dell PowerScale app Resources are filtered and discovered based on below keys:

Note: You can filter the resources with the discoverable keys only.

Supported Alert Custom Macros

Customize the alert subject and description with below macros then it will generate alert based on customisation.
Supported macros keys:

Risks, Limitations & Assumptions

• Application can handle Critical/Recovery failure notifications for below two cases when user enables App Failure Notifications in configuration

  • Connectivity Exception
  • Authentication Exception

• Application uses the provided IpAddress/hostname, Credentials for both REST APIs and SSH communications. SSH communication is used for powerscale_bootDrive_LifeRemaining metric collection. Rest API communication is used for rest of the functionalities.

• Credentials used should have sudo root privileges for ssh connection used for powerscale_bootDrive_LifeRemaining metric collection.

• Application will send any duplicate/repeat failure alert notification for every 6 hours.

• Application cannot control monitoring pause/resume actions based on above alerts.

• Metrics can be used to monitor Dell PowerScale resources and can generate alerts based on the threshold values.

• Dell PowerScale’s Event/Alert polling will be started only if the user enables Event/Alert Polling in configuration.

• Possible values of Event/Alert Severity Filter configuration property are emergency, critical, warning, information, unknown.

• OpsRamp has given sample mappings to map Dell PowerScale with OpsRamp Severities as part of the Event/Alert Severity Mapping configuration file. Users can modify them as per their use-case at any point of time from the application configuration page. Possible OpsRamp Severities are Critical, Warning, Ok, Info.

• No support of showing activity logs.

• The Template Applied Time will only be displayed if the collector profile (Classic and NextGen Gateway) is version 18.1.0 or higher.

• The minimum supported version for the option to get the latest snapshot metric is Nextgen-14.0.0.

• ​​​For Network Interfaces, we are mapping the Ip Address with external IPs of network interfaces and ignoring internal ips based on available pool details like “Internal_MGMT”.

• This application supports both Classic Gateway and NextGen Gateway.

• The following read privilege is required to get the Zones API work:

  • Auth access zones (ISI_PRIV_AUTH_ZONES)

• For PowerScale Nodes, we are mapping the Ip Address with external IP of first network interface whose pool is not null and not Internal_MGMT and also Type is not internal.

• Starting from version 5.0.1, to avoid node reconciliation with the cluster, we are mapping the MAC address with dummy values if both the Cluster and Node have the same IP Address.

  Note: In the scenario where the Cluster and Node share the same IPAddress and have undergone reconciliation, during an upgrade, the cluster will retain the custom attributes of the node as well.

References

REST API Doc: https://developer.dell.com/apis/4088/versions/9.4.0.0/docs/1introduction.md

Troubleshooting

Before troubleshooting, ensure all prerequisites prerequisites are met.

If Dell PowerScale integrations fail to discover or monitor, troubleshoot using the following steps:

• Check if any alerts have been generation on PowerScale Cluster, the gateway, or in vprobe.
• If there is an error or alert related to the end device connectivity or authentication, try checking the reachability of the end device from the gateway with the following commands:
  • to ping the IP address provided in the configuration: {ping <IP Address>}
  • to try telnet: {telnet <IP Adress> <Port>}
  • To run an API:

    • Prepare the request payload by using below sample request:

      { “apiVersion”: “debug/v1”, “module”: “Debug”, “app”: “dell-power-scale”, “action”: “Reachability”, “payload”: { “ipAddressOrHostName”: “”, “protocol”: “https”, “port”: 443, “requestPath”: “”,

      “version”:“v1”,

      “requestMethod”:"<get/post>", “userName”: “”, “password”: “” } }

    • Encode the request payload to base64

    • Log in to the gateway concole and connect to the GCLI terminal using the below command: {## gcli}

    • Run the command using the previously generated base64 encoded string {## sdkappdebug <base64 encoded string>}