6.3 HP StoreAll Storage Installation Guide (TA768-96085, April 2013)

6 Configuring virtual interfaces for client access
StoreAll software uses a cluster network interface to carry Fusion Manager traffic and traffic between
file serving nodes. This network is configured as bond0 when the cluster is installed. To provide
failover support for the Fusion Manager, a virtual interface is created for the cluster network
interface.
To provide high availability for a user network, you should configure a bonded virtual interface
(VIF) for the network and then set up failover for the VIF. This method prevents interruptions to client
traffic. If necessary, the file serving node hosting the VIF can fail over to its backup server, and
clients can continue to access the file system through the backup server.
StoreAll systems also support the use of VLAN tagging on the cluster and user networks. See
“Configuring VLAN tagging” (page 76) for an example.
Network and VIF guidelines
To provide high availability, the user interfaces used for client access should be configured as
bonded virtual interfaces (VIFs). Note the following:
• Nodes needing to communicate for file system coverage or for failover must be on the same
network interface. Also, nodes set up as a failover pair must be connected to the same network
interface.
• Use a Gigabit Ethernet port (or faster) for user networks.
• NFS, SMB, FTP, and HTTP clients can use the same user VIF. The servers providing the VIF
should be configured in backup pairs, and the NICs on those servers should also be configured
for failover. See “Configuring High Availability on the cluster” in the administrator guide for
information about performing this configuration from the GUI.
• For Linux and Windows StoreAll clients, the servers hosting the VIF should be configured in
backup pairs. However, StoreAll clients do not support backup NICs. Instead, StoreAll clients
should connect to the parent bond (for example, bond0 versus the vif bond0:1) of the user
VIF or to a different VIF.
Creating a bonded VIF
NOTE: The examples in this chapter use the unified network and create a bonded VIF on bond0.
If your cluster uses a different network layout, create the bonded VIF on a user network bond such
as bond1.
Use the following procedure to create a bonded VIF (bond0:1 in this example):
1. If high availability (automated failover) is configured on the servers, disable it. Run the following
command on the Fusion Manager:
# ibrix_server –m -U
2. Identify the bond0:1 VIF:
# ibrix_nic –a -n bond0:1 –h node1,node2,node3,node4
3. Assign an IP address to the bond1:1 VIFs on each node. In the command, -I specifies the
IP address, -M specifies the netmask, and -B specifies the broadcast address:
# ibrix_nic –c –n bond0:1 –h node1 –I 16.123.200.201 –M 255.255.255.0 -B 16.123.200.255
# ibrix_nic –c –n bond0:1 –h node2 –I 16.123.200.202 –M 255.255.255.0 -B 16.123.200.255
# ibrix_nic –c –n bond0:1 –h node3 –I 16.123.200.203 –M 255.255.255.0 -B 16.123.200.255
# ibrix_nic –c –n bond0:1 –h node4 –I 16.123.200.204 –M 255.255.255.0 -B 16.123.200.255
74 Configuring virtual interfaces for client access