HP nPartition Servers support three
management paradigms. These paradigms enable administrators to manage
nPartitions in the mode which best suits their environments. The three
management paradigms are as follows:
Local Management
has been the most commonly used paradigm for managing nPartitions
because it was the only supported paradigm on the first-generation
nPartition servers. Local management entails logging into an nPartition
on the complex and executing the management tools directly on the
nPartition. Using local management, an administrator has the ability to
either make changes to the entire complex or limit management
capabilities to those that affect only the local nPartition.
Remote Management via an nPartition
allows administrators to manage the complex from a central management
station. This enables more efficient management because the
administrator need not log into each nPartition to be managed and start
the respective management tools. Instead, the management tools can be
executed from a single location and directed toward each nPartition to
be managed. In addition, only a subset of the management components
needs to be running on the nPartitions.
Remote Management via the MP
enables administrators to fully configure an nPartition server without
running any of the management software components on the nPartitions.
In addition, this management paradigm affords similar benefits
regarding remote management via an nPartition and the ability to manage
many complexes from a central management station. Finally, this
management paradigm provides a means to perform system administration
even if no nPartition is active in the complex.
Local nPartition Management Paradigm
Figure 1
shows the paradigm of local nPartition management. This paradigm
applies to all HP nPartition servers. Local nPartition management
involves logging into an nPartition on the complex and performing
management tasks on the local nPartition. This architecture is the
simplest to use out of the box because it requires only a single
system, the nPartition, to be operating in order to perform nPartition
management. However, this management paradigm doesn't take full
advantage of the remote management capabilities available on HP
nPartition servers; this topic will be discussed in the following
sections.
nPartition
management applications for the original HP 9000 nPartition servers use
a proprietary interface to communicate with the MP for configuration
tasks. This interface enables nPartition management tools to configure
the entire complex from any nPartition within the complex. nPartition
management tools provide some limitations on configuration changes from
one nPartition to another, such as disallowing the removal of an active
nPartition from another nPartition. However, most operations are
allowed from any nPartition in the complex. This provides a simplified
and flexible management model, as an administrator may log into a
single nPartition and perform several tasks that affect other
nPartitions. The ramifications of this simplicity and flexibility
should be considered when managing a shared HP nPartition server.
The
second-generation HP nPartition servers, which contain the sx1000
chipset, use the Intelligent Platform Management Interface (IPMI)
protocol as the interface between the MP and the management
applications. IPMI is an industry-standard protocol designed to
facilitate low-level system management. The IPMI interface is supported
on HP-UX, Microsoft Windows, and Linux operating systems for the HP
nPartition servers containing the sx1000 chipset and later chipsets. As
implemented on HP nPartition servers, IPMI supports two transport
mechanisms for communicating with the MP. The first is block transfer
(BT) and the second is LAN. These are commonly referred to as IPMI over
BT (IPMI/BT) and IPMI over LAN (IPMI/LAN). The IPMI/BT transport goes
though a kernel driver on an nPartition to communicate with the MP. The
IPMI/LAN transport uses the MP's LAN interface for communication.
While
nPartition management has remained very similar between the generations
of HP nPartition servers, several enhancements have been added. The
most notable enhancement relating to Figure 1
and the use of the IPMI/BT interface is a feature called the nPartition
configuration privilege. This feature can be enabled on the MP by using
the PARPERM command from the MP's command menu as shown in Listing 1.
note
The
nPartition configuration privilege is supported only on HP nPartition
servers based on the sx1000 chipset and later chipsets. This feature is
not available on the first-generation HP 9000 nPartition servers.
Listing 1. Enabling the nPartition Configuration Privilege
Welcome to the
rx8620 Management Processor
(c) Copyright 1995-2003 Hewlett-Packard Co., All Rights Reserved.
Version A.5.011
MP MAIN MENU:
CO: Consoles
VFP: Virtual Front Panel (partition status)
CM: Command Menu
CL: Console Logs
SL: Show Event Logs
HE: Help
X: Exit Connection
MP> cm
Enter HE to get a list of available commands
MP:CM> parperm
This command configures the nPartition Configuration Privilege.
WARNING: When nPartition Configuration Privilege is unrestricted,
configuration commands issued by one partition can
affect the configuration of another partition. When
this privilege is restricted, configuration commands
issued by a partition cannot affect power or partition
assignment of hardware not already assigned to the
partition. Restricting nPartition configuration
privilege does not restrict deallocation of processors
across partition boundaries.
nPartition Configuration Privilege is currently unrestricted.
Do you wish to restrict partition configuration
(preventing partitions from changing the configuration
of the platform)? (Y/[N]) y
-> Partition reconfiguration is disabled
MP:CM>
|
When the nPartition
configuration privilege is enabled (restricted), only configuration
changes to the PCD data structure for the nPartition from which the
request originated are allowed. Therefore, an administrator on one
nPartition may not make changes to the SCCD or any other nPartition's
PCD. In order to change the SCCD and the PCD data structures other than
the PCD for the local nPartition, the administrator must use the IPMI
over LAN interface; this is described in the next section.
In Figure 1,
immediately above the IPMI or HP proprietary kernel interface component
is the nPartition provider. The nPartition provider is a software
component that implements the Web-Based Enterprise Management (WBEM)
standard provider interface. Since an industry-standard WBEM interface
for nPartition configuration is available for HP nPartition servers,
third-party management tools are able to integrate with HP's nPartition
servers.
Next
to the nPartition provider component is the instant capacity provider.
Similar to the nPartition provider, the instant capacity provider
exposes an industry-standard interface for managing unlicensed
components on HP nPartition servers. The nPartition management
infrastructure verifies all changes to the SCCD and PCD data structures
with the instant capacity provider to ensure that the complex remains
in compliance with the number of unlicensed resources. All nPartition
configuration changes on complexes containing unlicensed components
must be made through an nPartition running HP-UX. The interface between
the nPartition provider and the instant capacity provider is built to
deny all configuration changes on complexes with unlicensed resources
if the operating system is not HP-UX. For complexes that weren't
purchased with unlicensed instant capacity components, the instant
capacity provider will automatically approve all configuration changes.
Above the nPartition provider and instant capacity provider components in Figure 1
is the WBEM or Windows Management Instrumentation (WMI) server. When
the nPartition provider is running on the HP-UX and Linux operating
systems, it runs under the Pegasus open-source implementation of the
WBEM server. When running on the Microsoft Windows operating system,
the nPartition provider takes advantage of the (WMI) server. This
allows the nPartition provider to operate as part of an existing
framework on the Microsoft Windows operating system.
The
next component above the WBEM or WMI Server is the nPartition commands.
The nPartition commands component is the command-line interface (CLI)
used for managing nPartitions. Commands such as parcreate, parmodify, and parstatus
are represented by this component. The nPartition commands use the WBEM
or WMI interface to read status information and configure HP nPartition
servers. The nPartition commands are available on HP-UX, Linux, and
Microsoft Windows.
Finally, the uppermost box in Figure 1 is the Partition Manager (parmgr)
graphical user interface (GUI). The Partition Manager GUI provides a
web-based interface for viewing the status and making configuration
changes to HP nPartition servers. Partition Manager provides graphical
hardware and logical views of the entire complex to facilitate system
administration. Partition Manager uses the WBEM or WMI interface to
read the configuration data for the complex. It makes all changes to
the complex configuration using the nPartition commands. This allows
administrators to preview the commands that will be executed and even
cut and paste the commands into a script or use the GUI as a learning
tool. Partition Manager is available on HP-UX, Linux, and Microsoft
Windows operating systems.
