What's new in PowerVC for Private Cloud

PowerVC high availability and scale architecture

Earlier versions of PowerVC followed the All-in-One (AIO) deployment model that involved installing packages and setting up services corresponding to stateless (OpenStack based services like nova, cinder, etc.) and stateful services (MariaDB, RabbitMQetc) on a single system; thus, not following the distributed approach that OpenStack supports. While All-in-one deployment model keeps PowerVC deployment simple and highly manageable, the model denies PowerVC the scale and high availability that it might achieve with a multinode model. For details, see PowerVC high availability and scale architecture.

PowerVC support for P10

PowerVC 2.2.1 supports managing a Power10 host via HMC or NovaLink.

Functional enhancements

PowerVC 2.2.1.2

PowerVC version 2.2.1.2 is now available.

Upgrade to 2.2.1.2

You can upgrade to PowerVC 2.2.1.2 from PowerVC 2.2.1 or 2.2.1.1. For details on upgrade, see Upgrading to PowerVC for Private Cloud 2.2.1, 2.2.1.1, or 2.2.1.2.

PowerVC 2.2.1.1

Listed below are the key features that are implemented in the PowerVC for Private Cloud 2.2.1.1 release.

Upgrade to 2.2.1.1

You can upgrade to PowerVC 2.2.1.1 by installing PowerVC 2.2.1. Similarly, if you have any previous version of PowerVC 2.1.1 or later installed, take a backup, copy the backup file to a custom location, and then uninstall the existing version. Reboot the system, install PowerVC 2.2.1, then perform restore. You can then upgrade to PowerVC 2.2.1.1. For details on upgrade, see Upgrading to PowerVC for Private Cloud 2.2.1, 2.2.1.1, or 2.2.1.2. For details on the backup procedure, see Backing up.

Virtual serial number (VSN)

The virtual serial number (VSN) feature is introduced to address the software licensing bottlenecks for the IBM i operating system (OS). With this feature, users can deploy the VM using VSN on HMC and NovaLink managed hosts via PowerVC. By using VSN, the hardware-tied software licensing is made more flexible in a virtualized environment because the licensing is tied to a VSN instead of a physical serial number on the host. VSNs can be moved between different physical hosts such as Power9 servers with firmware version > 950 and Power10+ servers.

For details on VSN, see Virtual serial number (VSN). For the new APIs introduced for VSN, see Virtual serial number (VSN) APIs.

Migration across host group

PowerVC now supports migrating a virtual machine (VM) to any compatible host even if the VM is in a different host group.

• A new Allow migration across host groups toggle is introduced in the PowerVC GUI to enable VM migration across host groups. For details, see Migrating a virtual machine.
• New APIs are introduced to enable the migration of VMs to a different host group. For details, see Supported OpenStack Compute (Nova) APIs.

Virtual universally unique identifier (UUID) support

Starting PowerVC 2.2.1.1, the virtual hypervisor ID, also called the virtual universally unique identifier (UUID) support is enabled for hosts that are part of the default reservation group or a reservation host group primarily for managing the hosts during or after a maintenance operation in the reservation host group. The virtual UUID attribute is automatically included to all reservation hosts that are in PowerVC 2.2.1.1.

During maintenance, if admins want to remove the customer reserved host that failed and cannot be recovered for unknown reasons, the host that was added to manage the maintenance can be made the primary host by replacing the previously reserved host. This process will automatically switch the virtual UUID between these hosts so that there is no impact on billing.

Squall service integration

By using the new cloud-relay (Squall) service, PowerVC events data can be published to one of the supported external publishers. For details, see PowerVC Squall service.

Additional validators in the environment checker tool

Two additional validators are introduced in the environment checker tool validation.

• HMC idle time. This validation alerts the user if the idle timeout value is set to 0, which indicates that the session never logs out, and recommends the user to set the user idle timeout value to 120 seconds, which is recommended by HMC to help ensure that the performance is not degraded. The user setting must be updated in the HMC UI.
• Certificate expiry. For the SSL certificate, this validation indicates the date of expiry and the remaining number of days for the expiry if it is less than 6 months or 30 days.

PowerVC certificate renewal

Existing PowerVC certificates that are nearing expiration can now be renewed for three years. For details, see Renewing PowerVC certificates.

Rename a cluster CLI

A new CLI is introduced to rename a cluster. For details, see Rename a cluster.

PowerVC 2.2.1

Listed below are the key features that are implemented in the PowerVC for Private Cloud 2.2.1 release.

Direct installation or upgrade to 2.2.1

PowerVC 2.2.1 version supports the Private Cloud Edition only. You can now directly upgrade to PowerVC for Private Cloud 2.2.1 by using any of these options.

• If you have a previous version of PowerVC 2.1.1 or later, take a backup and restore the backup on a different system that has PowerVC for Private Cloud 2.2.1 installed.
• If you have a previous version of PowerVC 2.1.1 or 2.1.1.1 installed and want to upgrade to PowerVC for Private Cloud 2.2.1 by using the rolling upgrade or offline upgrade process, first run the powervc-opsmgr private_cloud --enable OpsMgr command to move to PowerVC for Private Cloud 2.1.1 or 2.1.1.1. Then, upgrade to PowerVC for Private Cloud 2.2.1.

It is recommended to use a fresh system or a virtual machine (VM) to install PowerVC.

Support for SLES 15 SP5 and SLES 15 SP5 SAP Edition

PowerVC 2.2.1 installation is also supported on the SLES 15 SP5 and SLES 15 SP5 SAP Edition.

Support for SSH key-based inventory creation

PowerVC 2.2.1 supports SSH key-based inventory creation. For details see, Initiate installation through PowerVC operations manager.

Host standby mode feature enhancement

In PowerVC 2.2.1, additional capabilities have been added to the host standby mode feature.

• Hosts in standby mode can be associated with one of the three tags based on the requirement of the administrator by using the Standby tag drop-down. The tags are provisioning, planned maintenance, and unplanned maintenance. For details, see Host standby mode.
• A new API is introduced to update the standby tag. For details, see Host standby mode API.

Host reservation

In PowerVC 2.2.1, customers can allocate an entire host exclusively to a single tenant by reserving the host. In addition to the existing host group support, additional support is introduced for a reservation host group through which the hosts can be reserved.

• A new Reservation menu is introduced in the PowerVC GUI, which provides the capability to reserve a host. For details, see Reservation host.
• This feature makes use of OpenStack Blazar for handling host reservation. For details, see Reservation host APIs.

Optical device attachment and detachment to VM APIs

The optical device attachment or detachment to virtual machine APIs allow you to attach or detach an optical device to a virtual machine (VM) instance and perform related actions such as network configuration and VM reboot. For details, see Supported OpenStack Compute (Nova) APIs.

powervc-validate CLI enhancement

In the powervc-validate CLI, the username requirement is now removed. For example, you can run the powervc-validate --start command from the console to begin the validation.

Storage enhancements

• Support for PowerMax (VMAX) Unisphere 10.0.1

  PowerVC supports Unisphere for PowerMax 10.0.1.

• Retype feature enhancement

  The retype feature is enhanced with a two-step process to complete the retype operation.

  If the retype operation has any pending operations such as changing I/O groups of in-use volumes, PowerVC places the volumes in pending retype and displays the 'Pending retype' alert message in the PowerVC GUI. After you complete the pending operations, such as rescan or rediscover the disk for the VM, you can return to PowerVC GUI to finish the retype operation by selecting the Finish retype option. This feature is only supported for Storwize®.

  • The Data volumes and the Boot volumes pages now display additional options after you select a volume and click Retype. For details, see Retype.
  • The new Retype volume completion API is introduced to complete the volume retype. For details, see Retype validation APIs.


• Snapshot capacity usage API

  A new API is introduced to get the snapshot capacity usage for all volume snapshots for a given project or across all projects. This API is only supported for IBM FlashSystem Storwize. For details, see Snapshot capacity usage API.

• Bulk volume attach and detach APIs
  • In the bulk volume attach API, a new primaryBoot parameter is introduced. If the parameter is passed, it assigns the volume as rootvg and sets the boot_index as 0 to an empty VM. If the parameter is not passed, it assigns the first boot volume as rootvg to an empty VM. For details, see Bulk attach and detach volume APIs.
  • The new bulk detach volume API detaches bulk volumes from a virtual machine. For details, see Bulk attach and detach volume APIs.


• Initiator port group (IPG) enhancements
  • An additional --include-ipg flag is introduced in the powervc-edit-scg CLI that populates IPG information when setting the storage connectivity group for managed VMs. For details, see CLI commands.
  • The powervc-ipg-info CLI provides additional IPG information for boot and data volumes that are attached to a VM. For details, see CLI commands.


• Export image API by using backup node

  You can now select if the exported image should be compressed or not by passing the new compression parameter in the Export image API by using backup node. For details, see Export or import image.

UI enhancements

• Project name selection

  In the Projects Switcher drop-down, you can now search for the required project.

• New OS column in the VM list page

  The VM list page contains a new OS column that allows you to filter VMs based on the operating system (OS).

• Search bar in the Create/Edit Storage Connectivity Group page

  The Create/Edit Storage Connectivity Group page now contains a search bar in the IPG tab that allows you to quickly search for the required WWPN.

• Pagination

  Pagination is now enabled in the Volume Snapshot list page and the IPG tab in the Storage connectivity group details page. Additionally, in the FC Ports page and the IPG tab in the Storage connectivity group details page, the selection you make in the items per page option is retained on your next login.

• Sort option in the Owner field

  The Owner field in the VM details page is enhanced with a search drop-down and sort option.

Changes in hardware and software support

Changes in OS support

Support for RHEL 8.9 and RHEL 9.3 OS has been added. For details, see Hardware and software requirements.