Monitoring Nutanix

You can monitor the metrics and configuration data related to Nutanix by using Instana. The Nutanix sensor is automatically deployed and installed after you install the Instana host agent with the necessary configuration settings as documented.

The support for Nutanix on Instana is disabled by default. To enable this optional feature, perform one of the following procedures: SaaS, Self-Hosted Custom Edition (Kubernetes or Red Hat OpenShift Container Platform), or Self-Hosted Classic Edition (Docker).

Supported versions

Instana supports metrics and configuration data for Nutanix Prism Gateway API 2.0.

Configuration

To enable Nutanix datacenter monitoring, add the Prism Central URL and credentials to the agent configuration file, <agent_install_dir>/etc/instana/configuration.yaml.

com.instana.plugin.nutanix:
  url: https://<INSERT_PRISM_CENTRAL_URL_HERE>:<PORT>
  username: <INSERT_USERNAME_HERE>
  password: <INSERT_PASSWORD_HERE>
  enabled: true
  poll_rate: 20 # metrics poll rate in seconds

The Nutanix user that is configured on Instana must have access to the Prism Central APIs to collect the metrics.

Instana supports remote monitoring for Nutanix. You can install the agent on a different host machine, but it might increase the latency and affect performance. Install the agent on a Nutanix datacenter virtual machine to achieve minimal latency and high performance. In the Kubernetes environment, install the Instana agent separately on a dedicated machine to make sure only one agent monitors Nutanix entities. A connection must be established between the machine in which the agent runs and the Nutanix Prism Central APIs.

Nutanix datacenter metrics are polled every 20 seconds by default or as configured in the poll_rate parameter.

If the Nutanix dashboard is not visible on Instana, open a support case with IBM Support to enable this feature on Instana.

Metrics collection

To view the metrics on the Instana UI, go to the navigation menu, and then click Platforms > Nutanix. The Nutanix dashboard is displayed.

Performance metrics

The Nutanix sensor collects the following performance metrics from the Nutanix datacenter, host, and virtual machines (VMs):

Datacenter

The Nutanix datacenter dashboard on the Instana UI displays the following details:

  • Name
  • Type
  • The number of hosts, which is the count of the hosts in the datacenter
  • The number of VMs turned on, which is the count of VMs excluding those VMs created as hosts
  • Overall CPU usage, which is the average of the CPU usage of the hosts in the cluster
  • Overall memory usage, which is the average of the memory usage of the hosts in the cluster

The summary page displays the following details along with the average value of the metrics that are collected for each host in the datacenter:

  • Operation mode, which indicates the status of the datacenter
  • Hypervisor types, which is the list of hypervisor types that are used in the datacenter
  • Cluster architecture, which represents the cluster architecture
Data point Description Granularity
CPU usage This metric indicates the percentage of CPU that was used out of the total CPU that was allocated to the datacenter. 20 seconds
Memory usage This metric indicates the percentage of memory that was used out of the total memory that was allocated to the datacenter. 20 seconds
Controller IO read operations This metric indicates the IO read operations that are handled at the time of metrics collection. 20 seconds
Controller IO write operations This metric indicates the IO write operations that are handled at the time of metrics collection. 20 seconds
Average IO Latency This metric indicates the average IO latency on the datacenter. 20 seconds
Content cache lookups This metric indicates the number of cache lookups. 20 seconds
Content cache memory usage This metric indicates the amount of memory that is used for content cache. 20 seconds
Content cache hit percentage This metric indicates the percentage of cache hits. 20 seconds
Total IO size This metric indicates the IO transfer rate/second. 20 seconds

Host

The Nutanix host dashboard on the Instana UI displays the following details:

  • Name
  • Number of VMs that are turned on and are associated with the host including VM's created as host
  • Number of CPU cores
  • Disks attached
  • CPU Usage
  • Memory Usage

The summary page displays the following additional details:

  • CPU Model
  • Number of CPU Sockets
  • Number of CPU threads
  • Host type

The data points listed it the preceding table is also collected for each host and plotted in the respective charts.

The following details of each storage device attached on the host are also collected:

  • Disk status
  • Mount path
  • Storage tier name
  • Available space
  • Free space
  • Used space

VM

The Nutanix VM dashboard on the Instana UI displays the following details:

  • Name
  • Type
  • State
  • Number of CPU
  • Number of CPU cores
  • Memory (RAM) allocated

Details are collected only for the VMs that are turned on.