Cloud deployment environments

You can choose to deploy IBM® Software Hub in the environment that suits your business needs.

IBM Software Hub can be deployed in various private cloud and public cloud environments.

Deployment environment Managed OpenShift® Self-managed OpenShift
On-premises ✓ ✓
IBM Cloud ✓ ✓
Amazon Web Services (AWS) ✓ ✓
Microsoft Azure ✓ ✓
Google Cloud ✓ ✓
Important: If you plan to deploy a service that requires GPU, ensure that the deployment environment that you choose supports the required GPU. For more information about which services require GPU, see Hardware requirements.
The following sections include additional guidance about:
  • How to install OpenShift on the environment
  • The recommended cluster architecture
  • How to install the IBM Software Hub platform and services on the environment

On-premises infrastructure

If you want to ensure that your environment is running securely behind your firewall, or you have an existing on-premises Red Hat® OpenShift Container Platform cluster, you can deploy IBM Software Hub on your on-premises infrastructure.

You can deploy IBM Software Hub on bare-metal servers, IBM Fusion, or on IBM Fusion HCI System.

You can optionally create hosted control planes with:
  • OpenShift Virtualization on bare-metal servers
  • IBM Fusion

    For more information, see Multi-cluster IBM Fusion using Hosted Control Plane in the IBM Fusion documentation:

  • IBM Fusion HCI System

    For more information, see Multi-cluster IBM Fusion HCI System using Hosted Control Plane in the IBM Fusion HCI System documentation:

Restriction: If you want to use hosted control planes on IBM Fusion or IBM Fusion HCI System, review the following information to determine whether the services that you plan to install can be on your environment.
Virtualized hosted control planes

Virtualized hosted control planes are available on IBM Fusion and IBM Fusion HCI System Version 2.8 or later.

Services with a dependency on Multicloud Object Gateway or on GPUs cannot be installed on virtualized hosted control planes.

Services with a dependency on Multicloud Object Gateway
  • Watson Discovery
  • Watson Speech services
  • watsonx Assistant
  • watsonx™ Orchestrate
Services with a dependency on GPUs

You can install services with an optional dependency on GPUs if you don't want to use the features that require GPUs.

  • IBM Knowledge Catalog Premium
  • IBM Knowledge Catalog Standard
  • Watson Machine Learning (required to use optional GPU features)
  • Watson Studio Runtimes (required to use runtimes that require GPU)
  • watsonx.ai™
  • watsonx Assistant (required to use optional GPU features)
  • watsonx Code Assistant™
  • watsonx Code Assistant for Red Hat Ansible® Lightspeed
  • watsonx Code Assistant for Z
  • watsonx.data™ (required to use Milvus indexes that require GPU)
  • watsonx Orchestrate
Bare metal hosted control planes

Bare metal hosted control planes are available on IBM Fusion HCI System Version 2.9 or later only.

Services with a dependency on Multicloud Object Gateway cannot be installed on bare metal hosted control planes.

Services with a dependency on Multicloud Object Gateway
  • Watson Discovery
  • Watson Speech services
  • watsonx Assistant
  • watsonx Orchestrate
Installing Red Hat OpenShift Container Platform
The method for installing Red Hat OpenShift Container Platform depends on whether you want a managed or self-managed OpenShift cluster:
OpenShift type Deployment options
Managed You can deploy a managed OpenShift cluster on your on-premises infrastructure with IBM Cloud Satellite. For details, see IBM Cloud Satellite in the IBM Cloud marketplace.
Self-managed You can deploy a self-managed OpenShift cluster on your on-premises infrastructure by following the Red Hat OpenShift Container Platform documentation:

You can optionally use hosted control planes.

Additional guidance on setting up OpenShift is available in the IBM Cloud Paks documentation.
Tip: If your license includes entitlement to Red Hat OpenShift Container Platform, you can apply the entitlement to your self-managed OpenShift cluster.
Recommended cluster architecture
IBM Software Hub is deployed on a multi-node cluster. Although you can deploy IBM Software Hub on a 3-node cluster for development or proof of concept environments, it is strongly recommended that you deploy your production environment on a larger, highly available cluster with multiple dedicated control plane and worker nodes. This configuration provides better performance, better cluster stability, and increased ease of scaling the cluster to support workload growth. The specific requirements for a production-level cluster are identified in Hardware requirements.

For more information, see Architecture for IBM Software Hub.

Supported storage
Deployment environment Managed OpenShift Self-managed OpenShift
On-premises IBM Cloud Satellite supports the following storage options with managed OpenShift:
  • OpenShift Data Foundation
  • Portworx
 The following storage options are supported on bare metal and VMware infrastructure with self-managed OpenShift:
  • OpenShift Data Foundation
  • IBM Fusion Data Foundation
  • IBM Fusion Global Data Platform
  • IBM Storage Scale Container Native
  • Portworx
  • NFS
  • NetApp Trident
  • Nutanix (hyper-converged infrastructure)
Prerequisites
Ensure that you review the following information:
Topic What to look for
Hardware requirements Based on the services that you plan to install, determine whether you have sufficient hardware and whether you need AVX instructions or dedicated nodes.
Software requirements Based on the services that you plan to install, determine whether you have the necessary external software and service dependencies.
Storage requirements The storage that you use determines the services that you can run. Ensure that the services that you want to run are compatible with the storage in your environment.
Installing IBM Software Hub and services
See Installing IBM Software Hub.

IBM Cloud infrastructure

If you already use IBM Cloud to run business-critical applications, or if you don't want to set up and manage your own hardware, you can deploy IBM Software Hub on IBM Cloud.

Installing Red Hat OpenShift Container Platform

The method for installing Red Hat OpenShift Container Platform depends on whether you want a managed or self-managed OpenShift cluster:

OpenShift type Deployment options
Managed You can deploy a managed OpenShift cluster on IBM Cloud infrastructure from the IBM Cloud catalog. For details, see Red Hat OpenShift on IBM Cloud in the IBM Cloud catalog.

Ensure that you select a supported version of Red Hat OpenShift.

You can deploy IBM Software Hub on Virtual Private Cloud (VPC) infrastructure. You can use either a single zone or multi zone deployment.
Self-managed You can deploy a self-managed OpenShift cluster on Virtual Private Cloud (VPC) IBM Cloud infrastructure by following the Red Hat OpenShift Container Platform documentation:

Additional guidance on setting up OpenShift is available in the IBM Cloud Paks documentation.
Tip: If your license includes entitlement to Red Hat OpenShift Container Platform, you can apply the entitlement to your self-managed OpenShift cluster.
Recommended cluster architecture
IBM Software Hub is deployed on a multi-node cluster. Although you can deploy IBM Software Hub on a 3-node cluster for development or proof of concept environments, it is strongly recommended that you deploy your production environment on a larger, highly available cluster with multiple dedicated control plane and worker nodes. This configuration provides better performance, better cluster stability, and increased ease of scaling the cluster to support workload growth. The specific requirements for a production-level cluster are identified in Hardware requirements.

For more information, see Architecture for IBM Software Hub.

Supported storage
Deployment environment Managed OpenShift Self-managed OpenShift
IBM Cloud Red Hat OpenShift on IBM Cloud supports the following storage options on VPC infrastructure:
  • OpenShift Data Foundation
  • IBM Fusion Data Foundation
  • Portworx
 The following storage options are supported on VPC IBM Cloud infrastructure with self-managed OpenShift:
  • OpenShift Data Foundation
  • IBM Fusion Data Foundation
  • Portworx
  • NFS
Prerequisites
Ensure that you review the following information:
Topic What to look for
Hardware requirements Based on the services that you plan to install, determine whether you have sufficient hardware and whether you need AVX instructions or dedicated nodes.
Software requirements Based on the services that you plan to install, determine whether you have the necessary external software and service dependencies.
Storage requirements The storage that you use determines the services that you can run. Ensure that the services that you want to run are compatible with the storage in your environment.
Installing IBM Software Hub and services
See Installing IBM Software Hub.

Amazon Web Services (AWS) infrastructure

If you already use AWS and you don't want to set up and manage your own hardware, you can deploy IBM Software Hub on AWS.

Installing Red Hat OpenShift Container Platform

The method for installing Red Hat OpenShift Container Platform depends on whether you want a managed or self-managed OpenShift cluster:

OpenShift type Deployment options
Managed
ROSA classic
You can use the ROSA CLI to manually install ROSA. For details, see the Red Hat OpenShift Service on AWS (ROSA) documentation.
ROSA with hosted control planes
You can use the ROSA CLI to manually install ROSA with hosted control planes (ROSA with HCP). For details, see the Red Hat OpenShift Service on AWS (ROSA) documentation.
AWS GovCloud (US)
You can use the AWS CLI to manually install ROSA on AWS GovCloud (US). For details, see Red Hat OpenShift Service on AWS in the AWS GovCloud (US) documentation.
IBM Cloud Satellite
You can use IBM Cloud Satellite in the IBM Cloud marketplace to install Red Hat OpenShift Container Platform on AWS.
Self-managed
You can deploy a self-managed OpenShift cluster on AWS infrastructure by following the Red Hat OpenShift Container Platform documentation:

Additional guidance on setting up OpenShift is available in the IBM Cloud Paks documentation.
Tip: If your license includes entitlement to Red Hat OpenShift Container Platform, you can apply the entitlement to your self-managed OpenShift cluster.
Recommended cluster architecture
IBM Software Hub is deployed on a multi-node cluster. Although you can deploy IBM Software Hub on a 3-node cluster for development or proof of concept environments, it is strongly recommended that you deploy your production environment on a larger, highly available cluster with multiple dedicated control plane and worker nodes. This configuration provides better performance, better cluster stability, and increased ease of scaling the cluster to support workload growth. The specific requirements for a production-level cluster are identified in Hardware requirements.

For more information, see Architecture for IBM Software Hub.

Supported storage
Deployment environment Managed OpenShift Self-managed OpenShift
Amazon Web Services (AWS) Red Hat OpenShift Service on AWS (ROSA) supports the following storage options:
  • IBM Fusion Global Data Platform
  • Amazon Elastic Block Store (EBS)
  • Amazon Elastic File System (EFS)
  • NetApp Trident (includes Amazon FSx for NetApp ONTAP)
 The following storage options are supported on AWS infrastructure with self-managed OpenShift:
  • OpenShift Data Foundation
  • IBM Fusion Data Foundation
  • Amazon Elastic Block Store (EBS)
  • Amazon Elastic File System (EFS)
  • Portworx
  • NFS
  • NetApp Trident (includes Amazon FSx for NetApp ONTAP)
Prerequisites
Ensure that you review the following information:
Topic What to look for
Hardware requirements Based on the services that you plan to install, determine whether you have sufficient hardware and whether you need AVX instructions or dedicated nodes.
Software requirements Based on the services that you plan to install, determine whether you have the necessary external software and service dependencies.
Storage requirements The storage that you use determines the services that you can run. Ensure that the services that you want to run are compatible with the storage in your environment.
Installing IBM Software Hub and services
See Installing IBM Software Hub.

Microsoft Azure infrastructure

If you already use Microsoft Azure and you don't want to set up and manage your own hardware, you can deploy IBM Software Hub on Azure.

Installing Red Hat OpenShift Container Platform
OpenShift type Deployment options
Managed
You can use the az aro CLI to manually install Azure Red Hat OpenShift 4 (ARO). For details, see the Azure Red Hat OpenShift 4 documentation.
Multiple availability zone support
You can install IBM Software Hub on an ARO cluster that is deployed across multiple availability zones. However, this configuration is supported only for the following types of storage:
  • Red Hat OpenShift Data Foundation
  • IBM Fusion Data Foundation
Best practice: Use the scheduling service to apply cluster-level topology spread constraints to minimize downtime when zone failures occur. For more information, see
Self-managed
You can deploy a self-managed OpenShift cluster on Azure infrastructure by following the Red Hat OpenShift Container Platform documentation:

Additional guidance on setting up OpenShift is available in the IBM Cloud Paks documentation.
Tip: If your license includes entitlement to Red Hat OpenShift Container Platform, you can apply the entitlement to your self-managed OpenShift cluster.
Recommended cluster architecture
IBM Software Hub is deployed on a multi-node cluster. Although you can deploy IBM Software Hub on a 3-node cluster for development or proof of concept environments, it is strongly recommended that you deploy your production environment on a larger, highly available cluster with multiple dedicated control plane and worker nodes. This configuration provides better performance, better cluster stability, and increased ease of scaling the cluster to support workload growth. The specific requirements for a production-level cluster are identified in Hardware requirements.

For more information, see Architecture for IBM Software Hub.

Supported storage
Deployment environment Managed OpenShift Self-managed OpenShift
Microsoft Azure Azure Red Hat OpenShift (ARO) supports the following storage options:
  • OpenShift Data Foundation
  • IBM Fusion Data Foundation
  • Portworx
  • NFS
 The following storage options are supported on Microsoft Azure infrastructure with self-managed OpenShift:
  • OpenShift Data Foundation
  • IBM Fusion Data Foundation
  • Portworx
  • NFS, specifically Microsoft Azure locally redundant Premium SSD storage
Prerequisites
Ensure that you review the following information:
Topic What to look for
Hardware requirements Based on the services that you plan to install, determine whether you have sufficient hardware and whether you need AVX instructions or dedicated nodes.
Software requirements Based on the services that you plan to install, determine whether you have the necessary external software and service dependencies.
Storage requirements The storage that you use determines the services that you can run. Ensure that the services that you want to run are compatible with the storage in your environment.
Installing IBM Software Hub and services
See Installing IBM Software Hub.

Google Cloud infrastructure

If you already use Google Cloud and you don't want to set up and manage your own hardware, you can deploy IBM Software Hub on Google Cloud.

Installing Red Hat OpenShift Container Platform
OpenShift type Deployment options
Managed You can deploy Red Hat OpenShift Dedicated on Google Cloud using a variety of methods. For details, see Creating a cluster on GCP in the Red Hat OpenShift Dedicated documentation.
Self-managed
You can deploy a self-managed OpenShift cluster on Google Cloud infrastructure by following the Red Hat OpenShift Container Platform documentation:

Additional guidance on setting up OpenShift is available in the IBM Cloud Paks documentation.
Remember: If your license includes entitlement to Red Hat OpenShift Container Platform, you can apply the entitlement to your self-managed OpenShift cluster.
Recommended cluster architecture
IBM Software Hub is deployed on a multi-node cluster. Although you can deploy IBM Software Hub on a 3-node cluster for development or proof of concept environments, it is strongly recommended that you deploy your production environment on a larger, highly available cluster with multiple dedicated control plane and worker nodes. This configuration provides better performance, better cluster stability, and increased ease of scaling the cluster to support workload growth. The specific requirements for a production-level cluster are identified in Hardware requirements.

For more information, see Architecture for IBM Software Hub.

Supported storage
Deployment environment Managed OpenShift Self-managed OpenShift
Google Cloud Red Hat OpenShift Dedicated on Google Cloud supports the following storage options:
  • OpenShift Data Foundation
  • IBM Fusion Data Foundation
 The following storage options are supported on Google Cloud infrastructure with self-managed OpenShift:
  • OpenShift Data Foundation
  • IBM Fusion Data Foundation
  • Portworx
  • NFS
Prerequisites
Ensure that you review the following information:
Topic What to look for
Hardware requirements Based on the services that you plan to install, determine whether you have sufficient hardware and whether you need AVX instructions or dedicated nodes.
Software requirements Based on the services that you plan to install, determine whether you have the necessary external software and service dependencies.
Storage requirements The storage that you use determines the services that you can run. Ensure that the services that you want to run are compatible with the storage in your environment.
Installing IBM Software Hub and services
See Installing IBM Software Hub.