Dell Lifecycle Controller Integration Version 1.
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Contents 1 About Dell Lifecycle Controller Integration for Microsoft System Center 2012 Virtual Machine Manager................................................................ 7 What’s new in this release..................................................................................................................... 7 Existing features.....................................................................................................................................
Deleting servers from DLCI Console..................................................................................................22 Viewing device inventory.................................................................................................................... 23 Synchronization with SC2012 VMM................................................................................................... 23 Synchronizing appliance with SCVMM.................................................................
Importing server profile...................................................................................................................... 38 Importing server profile................................................................................................................ 39 Manage jobs........................................................................................................................................ 39 Canceling firmware update jobs.............................................
Failure of creation of update source.................................................................................................. 51 Failure of firmware update on cluster update group......................................................................... 51 Failure of a scheduled job on an update group................................................................................. 51 Failure of firmware update because of job queue being full...........................................................
About Dell Lifecycle Controller Integration for Microsoft System Center 2012 Virtual Machine Manager 1 Dell Lifecycle Controller Integration (DLCI) for Microsoft System Center 2012 Virtual Machine Manager (SC2012 VMM) enables hardware configuration, provides a solution to simplify and improve the process of firmware updates, and hypervisor deployment on Dell servers.
Existing features With DLCI for SC2012 VMM, you can continue to do the following: • Auto discover unassigned Dell servers — connect the factory delivered Dell servers to the network, power on the servers, and enter the provisioning server details of the DLCI appliance to automatically discover the servers. Servers discovered by the appliance are known as unassigned servers, and these servers are available for hypervisor deployment.
• Server management — manage Dell servers in SCVMM environment and keep the servers up-to-date as per Dell recommendations based on latest firmware and other updates. Server management of 11th generation to 13th generation of Dell PowerEdge servers is supported. – Key features in server management are as follows: * Viewing comparison report — view comparison reports with criticality from an update source, and then create a baseline version. Criticality is how important the update is.
Installing and setting up DLCI Console Add-in 2 Installing and setting up DLCI Console Add-in for SC2012 VMM includes the following: • Review and complete system requirements and then install DLCI Console Add-in for SC2012 VMM. For more information, see Installing DLCI Console Add-in. • Import DLCI Console into the VMM Console. For more information, see Importing DLCI Console into VMM Console. • View DLCI Console in the VMM Console. For more information, see Viewing DLCI Console.
Removing or repairing DLCI Console add-in To remove or repair the DLCI Console add-in, perform the following steps: 1. Run the DLCI Console Add-in for SC2012 VMM installer. 2. In Program Maintenance, select Remove or Repair and then click Next. 3. In Ready to Repair or Remove the program, click Install. 4. When the remove or repair task is complete, click Finish. Importing DLCI Console Add-in into VMM To work with the DLCI appliance, import DLCI Console into the VMM Console.
Getting Started 3 Management systems are the systems on which DLCI for SC2012 VMM, also known as the appliance and its components, are installed. The components of appliance are: • Dell Lifecycle Controller Integration (DLCI) Integration Gateway for Microsoft System Center 2012 Virtual Machine Manager (SC2012 VMM), also known as DLCI Integration Gateway for SC2012 VMM.
Figure 1. DLCI admin portal — SC2012 VMM 1. The heading banner includes the product name and the following options: • 2. Admin — displays information about the user who has logged in to DLCI for SC2012 VMM — Admin Portal. • Logout — enables you to log out of the DLCI for SC2012 VMM Admin Portal. • About — provides information about the DLCI for SC2012 VMM version. • Help — launches the context sensitive online help. The navigation pane contains the following options.
Logging in to DLCI Console Add-in for SC2012 VMM To log in to DLCI Console Add-in for SC2012 VMM: 1. In SC2012 VMM, select Fabric, and then select All Hosts. 2. In the Home ribbon, select DLCI Console.
Figure 2. DLCI Console add-in for SC2012 VMM 1. The heading banner contains the product name and the following options: • 2. \adminstrator — displays information about the user who is logged in to DLCI for SC2012 VMM. • About — provides information about the DLCI for SC2012 VMM version. • Help — launches the context-sensitive online help. The navigation pane contains the following options: • Home — displays the DLCI for SC2012 VMM dashboard.
Workflows 4 This section contains the following workflows: • Creating golden configurations • Creating and managing credential profiles • Creating and managing update sources • Creating and managing custom update groups • Applying updates on servers or server groups • Hypervisor deployment • Creating, managing and deleting protection vaults • Exporting server profile • Importing server profile • Deleting servers About golden configurations A server configuration with the preferred Boot
To delete a credential profile, see Deleting a credential profile. Creating, managing, and deleting update sources To create an update source, see Creating an update source. To manage an update source, see Modifying an update source. To delete an update source, see Deleting an update source. Creating, managing, and deleting custom update groups To create a custom update group, see Creating a custom update group. To manage a custom update group, see Modifying a custom update group.
Exporting server profile To export server configuration: 1. Create a protection vault. For more information, see Creating protection vault. 2. Export server profile immediately, or schedule it for a later date. For more information, see Creating export jobs. Importing server profile To import a server profile: 1. Create a protection vault. For more information, see Creating protection vault. 2. Export a server profile. For more information, see Creating export jobs. 3.
5 Setting up the environment for deploying hypervisors To set up an environment for hypervisor deployment: 1. Prepare Golden configurations. 2. Create a physical computer profile in SC2012 VMM. For more information, see SC2012 VMM documentation. 3. Create a target host group in SC2012 VMM. For more information, see SC2012 VMM documentation. 4. Download the latest Dell Deployment ToolKit (DTK) and create a Windows Preinstallation Environment (WinPE) boot ISO image.
Server discovery 6 You can do out-of-band discovery of unassigned Dell servers and import information about Dell servers into the appliance. For discovering servers, connect the Dell servers to the network, power on the servers, log in to iDRAC, update the provisioning server IP with the IP of the DLCI appliance and disable the administrator account for DLCI appliance to automatically discover the servers.
you can also disable blocking of IP addresses. And you can also check if the iDRAC.IPBlocking.BlockEnable feature is enabled in iDRAC. – After a server is discovered using the default credential profile and added in the appliance, if the default iDRAC credential profile is changed, then you cannot perform any activity on the server. To work with the server, rediscover the server with the new credential profile.
To perform auto discovery on Dell servers: 1. In the appliance, create a device type credential profile (by specifying the iDRAC credentials and marking it as default) for Dell servers. For more information, see Creating a credential profile. 2. In Dell servers that you want to auto discover, do the following: a. Disable the existing Admin accounts in iDRAC. b. In the iDRAC settings, in remote enablement, enable Auto-Discovery. c.
• To delete host servers — in Host Servers, select the server and click Delete and in the confirmation message, click Yes. Viewing device inventory The Device Inventory page lists unassigned servers and host servers. Using the host name or IP address of the server, you can view the server details such as compliance status, firmware versions and son on.
c. If a server is listed as an unassigned server and manually added to SCVMM, then after synchronization the server is added in to the hosts tab in the appliance. d. If a host server belongs to a Hyper-V cluster, then the cluster details are available in the device inventory. The host server is added or moved to the cluster update group. e. If a host is a modular server, then the service tag of the chassis containing the modular server is added to the device inventory page.
License for the appliance 7 Agent-free configuration, deployment, and firmware update features in DLCI for SC2012 VMM are licensed. Five licenses are available for evaluation purposes at no additional charge. To download the five licenses, see marketing.dell.com/software-download-DLCISCVMM. For more information on licensing, go to Dell TechCenter website and then OpenManage Integration Suite for Microsoft System Center wiki page.
Server management 8 Using Maintenance Center, you can perform all the tasks related to managing Dell updates in the SCVMM environment. You can maintain up-to-date firmware versions of Dell server components as per Dell recommendations. You can view, create, and maintain protection vaults, update sources, custom groups, and view the predefined update groups. You can create, and schedule jobs for firmware updates, and schedule notifications to receive alerts when new catalogs are available at update source.
• Update using DRM repository — export the inventory information of the discovered servers from appliance to prepare a repository in DRM. – After exporting the xml file, to create a repository in DRM, in My Repositories click New, and then click Dell Modular Chassis inventory. In Modular Chassis Inventory select the exported xml file from the appliance. For more information on creating a repository in DRM, see Dell Repository Manager documents.
NOTE: You cannot export and import server profiles if the filters are applied. To apply filters: In DLCI Console Add-in, click Maintenance Center, click the filters drop-down menu, and then select the filters. To remove filters: In DLCI Console Add-in, click Maintenance Center, then click Clear Filters or clear the selected check boxes. Update source overview Update source enables you to select and apply updates from Dell’s update sources. You can create, view, and manage the update sources.
Test connection Use Test Connection to verify if the location of the update source is reachable by using the credentials mentioned while creating the update source. You can create an update source, only after confirming that the catalog location is accessible through the provided credentials. Setting up local FTP To set up your local FTP: 1. Create a folder structure in your local FTP that is an exact replica of the online FTP, ftp.dell.com. 2. Download the catalog.xml.
To create an update source: 1. In DLCI Console Add-in for SC2012 VMM, click Maintenance Center and then click Maintenance Settings. 2. In Update Source click Create New and provide the required information. • If you are creating an FTP source, provide your FTP credentials along with proxy credentials if the FTP site is reachable by using proxy credentials. • If you are creating a DRM source, provide your Windows credentials and ensure that the Windows shared location is accessible.
NOTE: After upgrading from DLCI for SC2012 VMM version 1.1 to version 1.2, all the servers discovered earlier are added to Generic update groups or Host update groups. To add the servers into the respective predefined update groups, rediscover the servers.
Custom update groups You can create, modify and delete the custom update groups. However, you can add a server into a custom update group only from Default unassigned update groups and Default host update groups. After you add a server into a custom update group, the server is removed from the predefined update group and this server is available only in the custom update group. To add the servers in custom update group, search for the servers using their service tag.
Creating custom update groups To create custom update groups: 1. In DLCI for SC2012 VMM, click Maintenance Center, and then click Maintenance Settings. 2. In Maintenance Settings, click Update Groups, and then click Create. The Firmware Update Group page is displayed. 3. Provide the details, and select the type of update group that you want to create. Custom update groups can have servers only form the following update group types: • 4.
NOTE: • You can apply firmware updates on a single component of a server, or to the entire environment. • If there are no applicable upgrades or downgrades for a server or a group of servers, performing a firmware update on that server or a group of servers cause no action on the server or group of servers. • When you are updating component level information, if the existing firmware version is same as the firmware version at the update source, then there is no action on that component.
NOTE: After submitting a firmware update job to iDRAC, the appliance interacts with iDRAC for status of the job and provides status updates in Jobs and Activity Log in the Admin Console. Sometimes iDRAC does not provide any status updates on the jobs tracked by the appliance. Appliance waits for maximum 6 hours, and if there is no response from iDRAC then the firmware update job status is considered as failed.
Modifying protection vault Consider the following when you are modifying a protection vault: • You cannot modify the name, description, type of protection vault, and passphrase. To modify a protection vault: 1. In DLCI for SC2012 VMM, click Maintenance Center, and then click Maintenance Settings. 2. In Maintenance Center, click Protection Vault, and then click Edit to modify the vault.
You can refresh the firmware inventory for a server, a group of servers, or chassis to view the latest information. When you refresh the component information of a server, the complete inventory information of the server is refreshed. NOTE: • DLCI for SC2012 VMM version 1.2 is packaged with a catalog that displays an earlier version of the comparison report for the predefined FTP and HTTP update source. Hence, download the latest catalog to display the latest comparison report.
Creating export jobs To export the server configurations: Prerequisites: Disable the F1/F2 Prompt on Error option in BIOS Settings. 1. 2. In DLCI Console Add-in for SC2012 VMM, click Maintenance Center, and then click Export Server Profile. In Export Profile, provide the job details, and then select a protection vault. In Export Server Profile select: • Run Now — to export the server configuration immediately of the selected servers, or group of servers.
for those particular servers that do that have server profile and a log message is added in the Activity logs with the details of the failure. • After exporting a server profile, if any component is removed from the server, and then an import profile job is started, all the components information are restored except the missing component information is skipped. This information is not available in the activity log of DLCI for SC2012 VMM. To know more about the missing components, see iDRAC’s LifeCycle Log.
Profiles and templates 9 About credential profile Credential profiles simplify the use and management of user credentials by authenticating the role-based capabilities of the user. Each credential profile contains a user name and password for a single user account. A credential profile authenticates a user’s role-based capabilities. The appliance uses credential profiles to connect to the managed systems’ iDRAC.
– (Recommended) Do not edit or delete the RunAsAccount. • When no credential profiles are created and no default credential profile for iDRAC is available; During auto discovery, the default iDRAC factory setting credential profile is used. The default username as root and password as calvin is used. To create a credential profile: 1. In DLCI Console Add-in for SC2012 VMM, do any of the following: • 2. In the dashboard, click Create Credential Profile.
Creating hardware profile You can create a hardware profile by using a server with golden configuration and then using that profile to apply hardware configurations to managed systems.
• For 11th and 12th generation of PowerEdge servers, you can modify DHS for RAID as One or None and for 13th generation of PowerEdge servers you can retain only the existing RAID settings of the server. To modify a hardware configuration profile: 1. In DLCI Console Add-in for SC2012 VMM, click Hardware Profile. 2. Select the profile that you want to modify and click Edit. 3. Make the required changes and click Finish.
• You can modify host profile, host group, and drivers from Lifecycle Controller. • You can modify the WinpE ISO name; however, you cannot modify the ISO. To modify a hypervisor profile: 1. In DLCI Console Add-in for SC2012 VMM, in Hypervisor Profile, select the profile that you want to modify and click Edit. 2. Provide the details and click Finish.
To update a WinPE image: 1. In DLCI Console, select WinPE Update, under Image Source, for Custom WinPE Image Path, provide the WinPE image path. For example, \\DLCI IG Share\WIM\boot.wim. 2. Under DTK Path, for DTK Drivers Path, provide the location for the Dell Deployment Toolkit drivers. 3. Provide ISO name. 4. To view the job list, select Go to the Job List. For example, \\DLCI IG Share\DTK\DTK501. A unique job name is assigned to each Windows Preinstallation Environment (WinPE) update. 5.
To modify a deployment template: 1. In DLCI Console Add-in for SC2012 VMM, click Deployment Templates. 2. Select the deployment template that you want to modify and click Edit. 3. Make the required changes and click Finish. Deleting deployment template NOTE: Deleting a deployment template does not impact the associated hardware, hypervisor profiles and update source. To delete a deployment template: 1. In DLCI Console Add-in for SC2012 VMM, click Deployment Templates. 2.
Deploying hypervisors 10 Operating systems are deployed only on servers that are compliant. Before hypervisor deployment, consider the following: upgrade the firmware versions to the latest versions available at ftp.dell.com or downloads.dell.com, and then continue with hypervisor deployment. To deploy to servers: 1. In the appliance do the following: • 2. In the appliance dashboard, click Deploy Unassigned Servers. • In the appliance navigation pane, click Deployment Wizard. In Welcome, click Next.
Viewing information in appliance 11 Viewing job status To quickly search and view logs for a particular update job from among the logged messages, see the timestamp of the update job log messages. You can view the jobs from the DLCI Admin Portal — SC2012 VMM and DLCI Console Add-in for SC2012 VMM. 1. In the left navigation pane, click Jobs. 2. From Filter, based on the jobs you want to view, select Deployments, Firmware Update, Discovery Jobs, WinPE Creation Jobs, Sync Jobs or Export and Import Jobs.
Troubleshooting 12 Account deletion in SC2012 VMM SC2012 VMM creates an account for the appliance with the name DLCI-VMM Addin Registration Profile. If this profile is deleted, then you cannot work with the appliance. Recommend you to not delete the account. However, reinstall the appliance if the account is deleted.
As a workaround, close the current discovery screen and relaunch the discovery screen from the Inventory page. Submit the new discovery job after entering the required inputs. Duplicate VRTX chassis group gets created When modular servers that were previously in another chassis are added to a VRTX chassis and discovered, the modular servers carry previous chassis service tag information and create a duplicate VRTX chassis group in the appliance. To resolve, do the following: 1.
3. Uninstall and then reimport the Console Add-in as mentioned in Dell Lifecycle Controller Integration for Microsoft System Center 2012 Virtual Machine Manager Installation Guide. Failure to connect to server After installing the DLCI for SC2012 VMM console addin in SCVMM environment, on clicking the DLCI console icon the following error is displayed: Connection to server failed. As a workaround, do the following: • Add the appliance IP and FQDN as a trusted site.
Failure to connect to FTP using system default update source After setting up and configuring, or upgrading the appliance, trying to access the FTP site using system created update source Dell Online Catalog might fail if proxy credentials are required. To access the FTP site using Dell Online Catalog as an update source edit, and add the proxy credentials.
IG installation issue while running multiple instances of the installer on the same server After you start installing the IG, if you try running another instance of the IG, then an error message is displayed. After you click OK, you are prompted to save another IG MSI file. As a workaround, do not save this file and continue with the first installation.
These errors may occur due to exception output by the VMM command-let GET-SCJOB status and driver files are retained in the library share. Before you retry or do another hypervisor deployment you must remove these files from the library share. To remove files from library share: 1. From SC2012 VMM Console, select Library → Library Servers and then select the Integration Gateway server that was added as the library server. 2. In the library server, select and delete the library share. 3.
Connection lost between appliance and Integration Gateway When you restart the server in which Integration Gateway is installed, connectivity is lost between the appliance and Integration Gateway. This is because the execution policy of the Integration Gateway for the user is not active. Log in to the Integration Gateway server using the Integration Gateway user account to make the execution policy active. However, after login the connection is not restored until the following steps are completed.
13 Accessing documents from Dell support site You can access the required documents in one of the following ways: • Using the following links: – For all Enterprise Systems Management documents — Dell.com/SoftwareSecurityManuals – For OpenManage documents — Dell.com/OpenManageManuals – For Remote Enterprise Systems Management documents — Dell.com/esmmanuals – For OpenManage Connections Enterprise Systems Management documents — Dell.
