Deployment Success

When you on-ramp new team members they’re going to need access to all their tools. If those new teammates will be managing Nutanix systems they most likely need a login to the support portal for access to documentation, downloads, the knowledge base, and the ability to open a support case.   So how do we set up access for new users? There are a few simple steps covered in the article How to Gain User Access to Nutanix Support Portal .   You’ll need a block or software-only serial number and the user’s email address. The email address should be in the authorized domain for your customer account.   To find the block serial number log into Prism and navigate to Hardware > Diagram. The block serial number is displayed above each block in the diagram. If there are multiple blocks, pick one and note the serial number for later. For software-only licenses, The software asset serial number is mentioned in the acknowledgement email sent upon the fulfilment of your order.   Once you have the

Hello guys, Is it possible to add Dell PowerEdge R640 or R730 hardware to a cluster with NX hardware?

You have the option of adding a Witness to a Metro Availability configuration (see Data Protection Guidelines (Metro Availability)). A "Witness" is a special VM that monitors the Metro Availability configuration health. The Witness resides in a separate failure domain to provide an outside view that can distinguish a site failure from a network interruption between the Metro Availability sites. The goal of the Witness is to automate failovers in case of site failures or inter-site network failures. The main functions of a Witness include: Making a failover decision in the event of a site or inter-site network failure. Avoiding a split brain condition where the same storage container is active on both sites due to (for example) a WAN failure. Handling situations where a single storage or network domain fails. Metro Availability Failure Process (no Witness)In the event of either a primary site failure (the site where the Metro storage container is currently active) or the link betwee

Below are new knowledge base articles published on the week of September 13-19, 2020.KB 9982 - LCM: Operation failed. Reason: Multiple LAGs as uplinks in a VSwitch is not supported. KB 9987 - HPDX Platforms Cabling Guides KB 10004 - LCM inventory does not show available firmware updates for HPE nodes with iLO version 2019.03.01 KB 10008 - AHV | Uploading vhdx image may fail if the image is corrupted KB 10012 - Cloning an image and Updating disk size via Prism Element API V2 call KB 10014 - Unable to see option to edit existing disk settings for any VM in PC when logged in as Cluster/Prism Central Admin user KB 10026 - Move - Migration failed with Bad/incorrect request, AOS 5.18Note: You may need to log in to the Support Portal to view some of these articles.

With the new release of Objects (Objects) 2.2, now you can assign a quota policy to a user which enables Objects to set soft thresholds on the number of buckets created by the user within an object store.Release notes - https://portal.nutanix.com/page/documents/details/?targetId=Release-Notes-Objects-v2_2%3Av22-whats-new-r.htmlDocumented steps -https://portal.nutanix.com/page/documents/details?targetId=Objects-v2_2:v22-assign-quota-policy-t.htmlIf you want to know more about Objectshttps://portal.nutanix.com/page/documents/details?targetId=Objects-v2_0:Objects-v2_0ENABLING OBJECTS https://portal.nutanix.com/page/documents/details?targetId=Objects-v2_0:v20-enable-objects-t.html#ntask_t1y_mzc_4hb 

Compression is one of the key features of the Nutanix Capacity Optimization Engine (COE) to perform data optimization. Data Storage Fabric provides both inline and offline flavors of compression to best suit the cluster’s needs and type of data. As of 5.1, offline compression is enabled by default.Inline compression will compress sequential streams of data or large I/O sizes (>64K) when written to the Extent Store (SSD + HDD). This includes data draining from OpLog as well as sequential data skipping it. There is no impact to random I/O, helps increase storage tier utilization and benefits large or sequential I/O performance by reducing data to replicate and read from disk.Offline compression will initially write the data as normal (in an un-compressed state) and then leverage the Curator framework to compress the data cluster wide. When inline compression is enabled but the I/Os are random in nature, the data will be written un-compressed in the OpLog, coalesced, and then compresse

Representational state transfer ( REST ) Application Programming Interface (API) 3.0 is based on an intentful API philosophy. According to the intentful API philosophy the machine should handle the programming instead of the user enabling the datacenter administrator able to focus on the other task There are three publicly available Nutanix APIs. Note that while you may see API v0.8 listed in the REST API Explorer in Nutanix Prism, it is strongly recommended to use v3 APIs wherever possible.   v1 (Prism Element only) v2.0 (Prism Element only) v3 (Prism Central only) cURL Command AnalysisAs an extra step, let’s take the v3 API request above and look at what each part of the command is doing. If you are familiar with using cURL to make API requests, this will look very familiar. curl -X POST – Run cURL and specify that we will be making an HTTP POST request (as opposed to HTTP GET) https://[prism_central_virtual_ip]:9440/api/nutanix/v3/vms/list – Specify the complete request URL

Citrix Diagnostic Facility (CDF)CDF collects and traces the messages generated by various Citrix services running on the Delivery Controller. CDF helps discover and debug the root cause and related issues. Configure and Use CDFDownload the tool in a ZIP file from: http://support.citrix.com/article/CTX111961 Extract the ZIP file and run the extracted CDFControl.exe file. Go to Tools > Options and ensure that Enable real-time viewing while capturing trace is selected. This allows you to view the real time logs while the scripts run. Go to Tools → Options → Trace File Path and set the path for log collection. Check the following modules to enable plugin specific log collection. BrokerHostingManagementBrokerHostingPluginHostServiceHCLHostServiceLogHostServiceLoggingHostSnapInMachineCreationLogMachineCreationLoggingMachineCreationServiceHCLMachineCreationSnapIn Before running the script, click Start Tracing. It will start capturing the traces while PoSH script executes.Once you encounter

Nutanix Cluster Check (NCC) is cluster-resident software that can help diagnose cluster health and identify configurations qualified and recommended by Nutanix. Depending on the issue discovered, NCC raises an alert or automatically creates Nutanix Support cases. NCC can be run provided that the individual nodes are up, regardless of cluster state.NCC actions are grouped into plugins and modules:A Plugin is a purpose-specific or component-specific code block inside a module, commonly referred to as a check. A plugin can be a single check or one or more individual related checks. A Module is a logical group of common-purpose plugins. It can also be a logical group of common-purpose modulesNCC Output: Each NCC plugin is a test that completes independently of other plugins. Each test completes with one of these status types:PASS FAIL WARN INFO ERRNCC can be executed via:a) GUIb) CLINutanix Cluster Check (NCC) 3.10 Guide Reference LinkLogbay Tags Reference Guide for Nutanix Cluster Check (

Nutanix recommends that you use the Prism Life Cycle Manager to perform firmware updates. However, firmware must be updated manually if:The component is located in a single-node cluster, OR The component is located in a multi-node cluster, but the hypervisor the cluster is running does not support LCM firmware updates.Manual Upgrades:Manually Updating SATA DOM Firmware Manually Updating M.2 RAID Hypervisor Boot Drive Firmware Manually Updating the BMC and BIOS Manually Updating HBA Controller Firmware Manually Updating Data Drive Firmware Manually Updating NIC FirmwareFor more details: https://portal.nutanix.com/page/documents/details?targetId=Hardware-Admin-Ref-AOS-v5_18:bre-manual-firmware-update-c.html

When attempting to hit LCM via ‘Software Upgrade’ screen via a Cluster in Central, it links you to LCM on central, not on the cluster. Is this intended behavior or a bug? 

As the title stated, I have tried to get around this by searching some docs on Portal but couldn’t find any related to. Could someone provide me any way to identify exactly the info of the M2 drives in a G7-model standalone node? 

Does anyone have issues when trying to install NGT on a system that previously had it installed? I have tried to uninstall and reinstall to no avail. And trying to install/Upgrade via prism fails.  

The Prism interface allows the investigation of the disk I/O latency. As a result, following questions are raised. Note: Nutanix recommends that maximum latency readings should not be used as a measure of cluster performance and health. Average latency is a useful measure of cluster performance and health. What should be the average latency on a production cluster? What should be the maximum latency? What point is the latency too high? How to investigate the high latency? Consider the following for latency investigations. The end-user impact for any performance investigation. If the impact is not measurable by the end-user, then any investigation of performance statistics is going to reveal normal and healthy cluster operations. VM combinations, traffic type at the time, write or read size, sequential versus non-sequential, read versus write factors on which investigations are dependent. Latency Variables in a Nutanix ClusterThe following points provide you with the information

We may have a requirement to have a RPO as less as 1 minute.  The NearSync feature provides you with the ability to protect your data with an RPO of as low as 1 minute.To implement the NearSync feature, Nutanix has introduced a technology called Lightweight Snapshots (LWS) to take snapshots that continuously replicates incoming data generated by workloads running on the active cluster. The LWS snapshots are created at the metadata level only. These snapshots are stored in the LWS store, which is allocated on the SSD tier. LWS store is automatically allocated when you configure NearSync for a Protection Domain.Some of the advantages of NearSync are as follows. Protection for the mission-critical applications. Securing your data with minimal data loss in case of a disaster, and providing you with more granular control during the restore process. No latency or distance requirements that are associated with fully synchronous replication feature. Allows resolution to a disaster event in

NTP i.e. Network Time Protocol is a critical component of the Nutanix cluster and is crucial in keeping up hardware, processes, services and applications running with time synchronization across one another.  Inconsistencies in time synchronization could lead to undesirable consequences, not to mention the potential disastrous impact it could have on databases and real time applications through operational failures.  The downside of a poor NTP scenario could be data loss, hard to detect security breaches, even leading to legal liabilities, and loss of credibility.  NTP alerts are generated when you run the NCC Health checks, and are typically shown as below:Detailed information for check_ntp:Node 172.24.0.143:FAIL: The hypervisor is not synchronizing with any NTP server. This might occur if none of the configured NTP servers are available or you are currently experiencing network instability determined by the high offset/high jitter.Node 172.24.0.144:FAIL: NTP leader is not synchronizi

Witness VM in Metro Availability Configuration:A "Witness" is a special VM that monitors the Metro Availability configuration health. The Witness resides in a separate failure domain to provide an outside view that can distinguish a site failure from a network interruption between the Metro Availability sites. It can only be configured on AHV and ESXi hypervisors.The main functions of a Witness include:· Making a failover decision in the event of a site or inter-site network failure.· Avoiding a split-brain condition where the same storage container is active on both sites due to (for example) a WAN failure.· Handling situations where a single storage or network domain fails.To learn about the different scenarios you might encounter and the requirements of a witness VM, click here. Did you know?Witness VM can also be deployed if you are using a 2-node cluster! To learn more about how it works in that environment, click here.

Getting this error when I try to use putty/plink for any ACLI-related command:bash: ACLI: command not foundDoesn't seem to matter what acli “command” i run, even just running “acli” by its self gives the same error. I am able to run commands like “hostname” etc using plink/putty on the CVM. Feel like im missing something very simple here.Example command:putty $cvmIP -l $username -pw $password “acli vm.disk_get $vmname disk_addr=scsi.0”

If you want to increase data storage on your Nutanix cluster, but do not want any AHV VMs to run on that node, you can add a Never-Schedulable Node to your cluster. AOS will not run any VMs on a never-schedulable node, whether at the time of deployment of new VMs, during the migration of VMs from one host to another (in the event of a host failure), or during any other VM operations. Therefore, a never-schedulable node configuration ensures that no additional compute resources such as CPUs are consumed from the Nutanix cluster.With the release of Foundation 4.1 and higher, any G6 or G7 node can now be used as a storage-only node. You can add any number of never-schedulable nodes to your cluster!To learn more about the requirements and the procedure to add this node, click here. Also, check out KB-6819 for further instructions.

We are transferring vdisks from one Nutanix environment to another.  We are going from Euphrates 5.5.8 to Euphrates  5.9. The copy seems to work but then after a while (maybe 15 minutes) the files in the new environment disappear. We’ve tried this several times with the same results. One vDisk is around 26 GB and the other is 2 TB. Has anyone seen this and what is the problem and the solution?

I have a lot of virtual machines running with latest Debian 10 distribution (version 10.2 and next 10.5).When will be available Nutanix Guest Tools for this distribution? It’s a mess to receive warnings everyday with the message of NGT not installed in these machines.

Below are new knowledge base articles published on the week of September 6-12, 2020.KB 9960 - AD user cannot manage PC and NCC upgrades after upgrading to PC 2020.8 version KB 9980 - Cluster outage may occur during an LCM upgrade when restoring block fault-tolerance KB 9981 - SSP | VM nic update task performed by SSP user may fail on Prism Central 5.17 and above versions KB 9985 - Intermittent Network Disconnects Due to MAC Learning Disabled When Using AHV Bond Mode Balance-SLB KB 9989 - LCM : Could not find any upgrading entities forgroup Group-Cluster Service-Foundation KB 9995 - Move - Guest preparation may fail when SSL is enabled on Windows VMNote: You may need to log in to the Support Portal to view some of these articles.

Do you know Support Cases can be Scheduled on Support Portal?Support Portal users that are working with Nutanix Support can elect to schedule a follow-up for a case. The instructions within the case page are designed to be self-explanatory on how to schedule. However, you may want to understand how a case is handled when scheduled prior to using the feature. Portal Scheduling Overview The scheduling feature is only presented under the following conditions: Support contract allows for 24x7 coverage Case priority is low - P3 or lower Additionally, when scheduling, the following limits apply: Can only schedule for the next business day - not today Cannot schedule on weekends or public holidays Can only schedule up to 1 week out Your Systems Reliability Engineer (SRE) is able to work with you to assist with scheduling in other circumstances. Scheduling is available both at case creation and during the life of a case by using th

While doing LifeCycle Manager (LCM) upgrades, Nutanix infrastructure customers could encounter failures on the SATADOM upgrade on a ESXi Host, with the message:"Operation failed. Reason: Lcm prechecks detected 2 issues that would cause upgrade failures.Check 'test_hypervisor_config' failed with 'Failure reason: APD/VMCP feature is enabled on cluster, Please disable, Please refer KB 6470'Check 'test_min_phoenix_version' failed with 'Failure reason: APD/VMCP feature is enabled on cluster, Please disable, Please refer KB 6470' You can try disabling the APD using the following command on the Host:# esxcfg-advcfg -s 0 /Misc/APDHandlingEnable From experience I can tell you that this does not always resolve the issue.  It may be necessary, on certain occasions, to access the VMware vCenter, through possibly the vSphere Web Client, and do the following:Access the Hosts pageClick on the Host in questionClick on ManageGo to Advanced System SettingsSearch for “APD”Modify Misc.APDHandlingEnable an

There could be many reasons why an administrator would want to perform a factory reset of the IPMI/BMC module. Whatever the reason maybe, knowing the different options and its differences is important.Using ipmitool, we can perform 3 types of resets each with its own implication. Reset BMC  Partial factory reset (IPMI and BMC reset but will preserve Network settings) Full factory Default reset (Potential to lose IPMI network settings)Before you execute any of these commands, note the IP_Addr, Net mask and GW IP_Addr for the IPMI. ipmitool lan printUsage note: On VMware ESXi hypervisor, place a leading "/" in front of "ipmitool", for example, "/ipmitool". The executable is located at the top-level root directory.Check out the KB-8123 for detailed instructions.