Developer Network Articles and Resources
Developer Network Articles and Resources
Think of this as a quick install guide. It will not go into configuring or using the hypervisor, or how to complete the NetApp setup script. Instead it will focus on the steps that are important to building/customizing the simulator itself. For everything else, see the Simulate ONTAP 8.2.1 Installation and Setup Guide, which covers the simulator basics as well as detailed instructions for loading it into inventory on the various supported hypervisors, and how to complete the setup scripts to configure Data ONTAP.
This procedure will get one or more NetApp simulators (vSims) up and running quickly, in either 7mode or cluster mode. Both the serial number and simdisk inventory can be customized as part of this process. This guide is written specifically for 8.2.1 but should work on older releases as well. With recent versions of the simulator, simulated disk capacities approaching 220gb can be configured with minimal effort. Larger capacities are possible, but outside the scope of this guide.
Before you begin, you should have the following:
There are 3 choices to make when building a vsim. The best time to make these choices is before you boot the sim for the first time.
Here is the procedure:
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Thank you sir, I've never seen this process. I will give it a try and let you know how it works.
The only thing I'd add is that if your'e going to deply this in ESXi or Workstation you should give the Vmware vCenter Standalone converter tool as it will allow you to thin provision, add addional IP interfaces and change CPU/Mem. Handy little tool.
Epic post btw...
I like OVFTool for that as well. Needs a few --extraconfig parameters but once you have a good ovf it's easy to spin up a bunch of sims, they aren't as target platform dependent, and they deploy a lot faster.
Thanks btw.
Would you mind sharing what the --extraconfig parameters are?
Sure. Here are the ones you need:
--allowExtraConfig
--extraConfig:disk.EnableUUID=TRUE
--extraConfig:monitor_control.pseudo_perfctr=TRUE
--extraConfig:timeTracker.forceMonotonicTTAT=TRUE
--extraConfig:monitor_control.disable_tsc_offsetting=TRUE
--extraConfig:monitor_control.disable_rdtscopt_bt=TRUE
This one is optional, but makes the sim aware of the host its running on:
--extraConfig:SMBIOS.reflectHost=TRUE
I also use --SkipManifestGeneration because powercli and ovftool disagree over the particulars of the manifest format.
What is the benefit of making the simulator aware of the host it's running on?
There is a way to give ontap credentials to its host, which enables sysconfig to give you information on the physical host its running under. More useful in the VSA, but ontap is ontap so it also works in the sim.
Hey, do you know if we are able to create a duel cluster setup using the simulators and/or can we have more than 2 nodes in the cluster?
Sure. You can make another cluster using the same cluster base key, or you can add additional nodes to one cluster by using unique node serial numbers & sysids as long as you are running 8.2 or later. The 8.1 cluster mode license keys were limited to 2 nodes.
Hello,
Should have posted my question sooner.... the next search i did i found the keys i was looking for!! Thanks!
I was looking for license keys for the following serial in case anyone else needs them. The keys on the simulator site did not match the serial in the post.
4082368508 (Non-esx 8.2.1 version default)
Just as Sean posted..... http://mysupport.netapp.com/NOW/download/tools/simulator/ontap/8.2.3/7Mode_licenses_8.2.3.txt
Thank you Sean!!
-Brandon
For anyone else who goes looking, those are in the 7mode license file for 8.2.1 and later.
http://mysupport.netapp.com/NOW/download/tools/simulator/ontap/8.2.3/7Mode_licenses_8.2.3.txt
Hi,
This is a very useful and working solution to expand the SIM storage.
Thank you!
Best regards,
Zoltan
Hello @shatfield , is there an updated version of this for 9.9.1? Docs don't indicate vCenter is supported but I'm giving it a shot as I'd prefer to use our vCenter environment if possible. After deploying the OVA and booting, I get the following errors:
Illegal instruction
Unexpected mlogd termination:
=mlogd starting at <date>
=mlogd exited at <date>
ERROR: Please communicate the above information to support.
This is following by repeats of these messages:
Illegal instruction
server/db/sqlite3/00x_create.sql: Failed to create dir 'server'
cd /cfcard/kmip/server: no such file or directory
Then it repeats trying to start_managed_app for ktlsd over and over, never succeeding. I never get to the point where I can punch a key to go to the boot menu. Any ideas?
The CPU architecture requirements changed in ONTAP 9.9.1. Starting from ONTAP version 9.9.1, CPU models earlier than Sandy Bridge are not supported. I've seen a VERY similar set of errors with ONTAP Select when attempting to start a node on older CPU architectures in ESXi.
Thank you very much @JohnChampion ! I am not as well-versed in the CPU models within vCenter as I should be. I will do some digging on how to change the CPU model to one that's later than Sandy Bridge. Any suggestions or additional thoughts?
If anywhere - it'd be the VMware EVC mode - a vSphere cluster configuration setting. This is usually used when you have ESXi hosts with different CPU architectures - applying the lowest common CPU arch between them. If you have mixed ESXi hosts this might be set. You cannot however select a CPU arch newer than what the host(s) can support.
@JohnChampion thank you for the tip! I was able to right click and choose Compatibility / Upgrade VM Compatibility to get past this issue! Thank you very much. It is at least booting now. Still have some more issues to work out but at least I've gotten past a big one!
For some reason, this thread won't let me "Mark as Answered", not sure why. I was going to mark your Saturday reply as the answer.
I think that's because the original post is already marked as answered and the remaining are additional comments to the post.