ESX Host Utilities

With every FC or iSCSI connected host install, we supply a Host Utilities kit (used to be called Host Attach Kit). The idea behind the host utilities is to automate installation, configuration tasks as well as provide the ability to collect end-to-end configuration information from the host, the fabric and the array controllers.

The following scripts are part of the ESX Server Host utilities kit that get installed at the ESX Console:

config_hba - This utilitity will set the necessary timeout values for each Fibre Channel HBA (Qlogic or Emulex) required by the NetApp array

sanlun - This utility will query the array controllers and will display all the LUNs that have been mapped to the ESX server, the size of each LUN, the Linux device file as well as the vmhba number, Target, and Lun ID as it ESX see it. There is also a more verbose switch that will depict the LUN serial number, IP address of the controller owning the LUN, as well as the WWNN/WWPN and physical Port number the LUN is exposed thru on the array side.  Over the years I've found the output of sanlun very helpful in that I was able to quickly correlate specific host device files to array LUNs without having to go to a LUN ID hunt on the array side.

config_mpath - This utility will discover all paths to NetApp LUN and will set the appropriate multipathing policy, set path persistency across reboots and select the prefer path for each LUN.

esx_info - This utility will collect esx server configuration information as well as vm and console configuration information and is primarily used by the NetApp support center for case resolution purposes

filer_info - This utility will collect controller configuration information

brocade_info - This utility will collect switch configuration information such zoning, and support-show output

cisco_info - Same collection information as for brocade

mcdata_info - Same as above

The output of collection scripts is tar'd and gzipped into a directory you specify.

Comments

[Andrew]

If I understand correctly, this is primary useful (as far as actual settings changes/tweaks) for FC environments -- would that be correct?

[Nick Triantos]

Andrew,

There are 2 flavors of the Host Utilities. The one displayed on this post is for Fibre Channel environments. There's also one for iSCSI with the use of an iSCSI HW initiator (i.e QLA4050/52)

[Jedd Go]

Hello all
has somebody figured out a way to put this in a script and automate during startup of ESX

[Jedd Go]

Hello all
has somebody figured out a way to put this in a script and automate during startup of ESX

[Jedd Go]

Hello all
has somebody figured out a way to put this in a script and automate during startup of ESX

[Jedd Go]

Hello all
has somebody figured out a way to put this in a script and automate during startup of ESX

[Nick Triantos]

Jedd,

Under normal circumstances, the only utility you'd use would be the config_mpath. You only need run config_mpath when you add a new LUN and it needs to be done on every node in the cluster. Furthermore, the path settings are persistent across reboots because it uses the VML to set the active/preferred paths.

The other useful utility is the config_hba one, which sets the HBA driver timeouts. The setting are persistent across reboots as well. The timeouts you only set them once.

The remaining utilties are there for troubleshooting purposes.