SevOne Data Platform Deployment on Microsoft Azure

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About

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Microsoft Azure is a cloud computing service created by Microsoft for building, testing, deploying, and managing applications and services through Microsoft-managed data centers. Introducing Microsoft Azure to SevOne Platform has its benefits such as,

  • Ability to deploy in Microsoft Azure
  • Similar to how SevOne monitors Customer Premises Equipment (CPE), routers, switches, servers, and firewalls today, it will continue to provide the same capability with Microsoft Azure.
  • Monitoring data sources with Microsoft Azure may eliminate data transport costs.

In order to properly deploy SevOne NMS / SevOne Data Insight on Microsoft Azure, it is important to understand the following concepts.

SevOne Concepts
RHEL (RedHat Enterprise Linux) The OS driving the SevOne appliance.
SevOne NMS The SevOne NMS appliance.
SevOne Data Insight The SevOne Data Insight appliance.
Azure Concepts related to SevOne
APM Portal Azure Platform Management - the Graphical User Interface for Azure.
AZ CLI The command line interface for Azure.
Region The Azure region for deployment. This is analogous to multiple data centers in a large geographic area.
VHD Virtual Hard Disk - the raw image from which an instance is created. VHDs are generated by SevOne and are made available to customers.

Azure Instance / Virtual Machine Types for SevOne Appliances

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Note: Please refer to Azure Instance Types - D-family v3 series for details on Azure Instance Types in the table below.
SevOne Instance License Count Azure Instance Type Root Disk (GIB) Data Disk (GIB)
vPAS5k Up to 5k objects Standard_D2s_v3 600 n/a
vPAS10k Up to 10k objects Standard_D4s_v3 600 n/a
vPAS20k Up to 20k objects Standard_D4s_v3 600 n/a
vPAS60k Up to 60k objects Standard_D8s_v3 600 1,250
vPAS100k Up to 100k objects Standard_D8s_v3 600 2,000
vPAS200k Up to 200k objects Standard_D32s_v3 600 4,000
vDNC100 Up to 100 interfaces Standard_D8s_v3 600 400
vDNC300 Up to 300 interfaces Standard_D16s_v3 600 800
vDNC1000 Up to 1000 interfaces Standard_D32s_v3 600 1,500
vDNC1500 Up to 1500 interfaces Standard_D32s_v3 600 3,000
Note: The average Input / Output Operations Per Second (IOPS) is 19,000KBs.
Important: It is very important that you follow the information in the table above. Any deviation will cause undesired results and lack of support.

SevOne Image

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Download the VHD image(s) from IBM Passport Advantage (https://www.ibm.com/software/passportadvantage/pao_download_software.html) via Passport Advantage Online. However, if you are on a legacy / flexible SevOne contract and do not have access to IBM Passport Advantage but have an active Support contract, please contact IBM SevOne Support.

Once you have downloaded the package, unpack the fix / upgrade packs to obtain the required files.

Azure customers will create an Azure page blob from a VHD in the SevOne Microsoft Azure storage account. This blob will be used to create the Azure image.

Note: For details, please refer to https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/storage/blobs/storage-quickstart-blobs-portal

To deploy a virtual appliance using a .vhd file on Microsoft Azure, please refer to Microsoft's documentation https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/virtual-machines/linux/redhat-create-upload-vhd for details.

Prerequisites

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  • Azure Virtual networks must have VPN connectivity.
  • SevOne NMS image must be uploaded to your Azure storage account.

Upload SevOne NMS image to Azure Storage Account

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Upload the version of SevOne NMS VHD image you received to a container in your Azure storage account, saving the URL to the uploaded VHD for a later step. Each SevOne NMS version only needs to be uploaded once.

  1. Login to the Azure portal.
  2. Navigate to Storage Accounts.
  3. Click the + Create button.
  4. Click the link under Instance Details for If you need to create a legacy storage account type, please click here.
  5. Complete the following fields.
    1. Subscription - select your subscription.
    2. Resource Group - select an existing or create a new resource group.
    3. Storage account name - for example, sevoneimages. (you must specify a name that is unique across all of Microsoft Azure)
    4. Location - specify your region.
    5. Performance - Standard
    6. Account kind - Storage (general purpose v1).
    7. Replication - Locally-redundant storage (LRS).
  6. Click Review + create.
  7. Click Create.
  8. Click Go to resource after the deployment has completed.
  9. Click + Container and complete the following fields.
    1. Name - sevone
    2. Public access level - Blob (anonymous read-access for blobs only).
  10. Upload SevOne image to the sevone container in your storage account via Microsoft Azure Storage Explorer (fastest / recommended) or Azure Portal Graphical User Interface.

Azure Virtual Machine Creation

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Create SevOne NMS OS Disk for the Virtual Machine (VM) and create the instance from the OS disk.

  1. Login to the Azure portal.
  2. Click the + Create button and complete the following fields.
    1. Subscription - select your subscription.
    2. Resource Group - select an existing or create a new resource group.
    3. Disk Name - VM1 (Replace VM1 with your intended VM hostname).
    4. Region - specify your region.
    5. Source type - storage Blob.
    6. Source blob - specify the HTTP URL to the uploaded SevOne image or click browse to select it via Graphical User Interface.
    7. OS type - Linux
    8. VM generation - Gen 1
    9. Size - click the link for Change size at the bottom.
    10. Disk SKU - premium SSD (locally-redundant storage).
    11. Custom disk size (GiB) - 600
    12. Click OK.
  3. Click Review + create.
  4. Click Create.
  5. Click Go to resource.
  6. Click + Create VM button.
    1. Subscription - select your subscription.
    2. Resource Group - select an existing or create a new resource group.
    3. VM Name - VM1 (Replace VM1 with your intended VM hostname).
    4. Region - specify your region.
    5. Size - select the correct Azure Instance Type from the table Azure Instance Types for SevOne Appliances.
    6. Public Inbound Ports - allow selected ports.
    7. Select inbound ports - check the boxes for HTTP, HTTPS, SSH.
    8. Licensing type - Other
  7. Click the Next : Disks > button.
  8. Click Create and attach a new disk.
    Important: Skip this step if the data disk size for your SevOne NMS model is specified as n/a in table Azure Instance Types for SevOne Appliances.
    • Size - click the link for Change size at the bottom
    • Custom disk size (GiB) - specify the Data Disk (GiB) size for your SevOne NMS model in table Azure Instance Types for SevOne Appliances.
    • Click OK.
    • Click OK again.
  9. Click Next : Networking > button.
    1. Virtual Network - specify the appropriate virtual network.
    2. Subnet - specify the appropriate subnet.
    3. Public IP - None
  10. Click the Review + create button and click Create.
    Note: It will take approximately 5 or more minutes to create a Virtual Machine.
    Warning: During key generation, SSH will be unavailable. Please wait for SSH to become available after all SevOne processes have started.

You are now ready to login to your SevOne Virtual Machine in Azure via the Graphical User Interface, upload a license file, configure appliance model and size, and start monitoring your network.

Note: If this is being used as a DNC, please refer to SevOne NMS Appliance Configuration Guide for details.

SevOne Appliance Configuration

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Please refer to SevOne NMS Appliance Configuration Guide for details on how to set the correct application configuration for the customer's license type and count.