Documentation
Changes in ESXi support in Abiquo 3.8.x
Abiquo 3.8:
Abiquo 3.8.1:
Abiquo 3.8.3:
Abiquo 3.8.5
Detect all HostProxySwitch as DVS without requiring a naming convention
Please see VMware documentation for installation instructions. You can perform a basic install and then configure for Abiquo as required.
To connect to vCenter, Abiquo will require a valid administration user and password (and port if not using the default).
Enter these credentials in the /opt/abiquo/config/abiquo.properties file, on the same server where the ESXi plugin is located, which is usually the Remote Services server.
abiquo.dvs.vcenter.user = Administrator abiquo.dvs.vcenter.password = Pa$$w0rd abiquo.vcenter.port.connection = <Port No.>
Notes:
For the VNC connection to VMs through the "eye icon", add a custom firewall rule to define the ports that will be available to users.
You will also need to define the same range of VNC ports for Abiquo, so that it will allocate available ports. Define these ports with Abiquo Configuration Properties#vncport properties.
You cannot add a VNC firewall rule through the VMware console. Follow the steps below to add the firewall rule with the CLI (using SSH).
The following example shows how to add a custom firewall rule under ESXi 5 for ports 5900 to 5964.
(Credit vInfrastructure Blog)
1. Log in to the CLI for the ESXi as root user
2. Create the XML file
~ # vi /etc/vmware/firewall/Abiquo-vnc.xml
3. Add these lines (copy/paste) to the VI and save the file.
<!-- Firewall Rule for Abiquo VNC Console --> <ConfigRoot> <service> <id>Abiquo-VNC</id> <rule id = '0000'> <direction>inbound</direction> <protocol>tcp</protocol> <porttype>dst</porttype> <port> <begin>5900</begin> <end>5964</end> </port> </rule> <rule id = '0001'> <direction>outbound</direction> <protocol>tcp</protocol> <porttype>dst</porttype> <port> <begin>5900</begin> <end>5964</end> </port> </rule> <enabled>true</enabled> </service> </ConfigRoot>
4. Refresh the rules and check it has been added;
~ # esxcli network firewall refresh ~ # esxcli network firewall ruleset list | grep Abiquo-VNC Abiquo-VNC true
5. Optional step - Add a specific IP address to the rule for added security;
Set the status of the allowedAll flag to false
/etc/vmware/firewall # esxcli network firewall ruleset set --ruleset-id Abiquo-VNC --allowed-all false
Add the list of allowed IP addresses
/etc/vmware/firewall # esxcli network firewall ruleset allowedip add --ruleset-id Abiquo-VNC --ip-address 10.81.2.20/24
See How to configure Abiquo to use the Distributed Virtual Switch feature.
On the ESXi host, the vNICs must be attached to a vSwitch, which may be a DVS. Abiquo will automatically create a port group for the host.
Reconfigure an Existing ESX or ESXi Installation
If your host has already been configured with another vSwitch, you may need to delete the port group before adding the host in Abiquo.
It is possible to configure NFS Datastores on ESXi hypervisors. However, to allow access to persistent virtual machines and external storage volumes, you should configure the abiquo.esxi.datastoreRdm property to use iSCSI.
Set this property to the name of a VMFS datastore configured for RDM on the ESXi hypervisor, for example on an iSCSI LUN. If you create a persistent VM or add an additional iSCSI disk, ESXi will use the configured RDM datastore to map into the iSCSI LUN. If you create an auxiliary disk, ESXi will store it on the hypervisor's NFS datastore.
Configure the property with the name of the datastore in ESXi. For example, if the hypervisor has an NFS datastore named "datastore1" and an RDM datastore named "datastore2", configure it as:
abiquo.esxi.datastoreRdm = datastore2
All the ESXi hypervisors monitored by the same Abiquo Remote Services will use the same RDM datastore, so all of them should have the same datastore configured with the same name.
Note that ESXi datastores can only be configured with the datastore name – you cannot enter a directory as part of the datastore configuration.
If you are deploying only virtual machines that only have persistent disks (volumes on external storage devices, not the hypervisor datastore) then you must set the datastoreVmFile property.
abiquo.esxi.datastoreVmFile =
See Abiquo Configuration Properties#esxi
Abiquo uses thin provisioning on ESXi. It is enabled for all VMs deployed using Abiquo, which will all be deployed with thin disks. If the disks are attached to an IDE controller, you can resize these disks outside Abiquo, using VMWare tools such as vCenter. Within Abiquo you can only resize disks attached to a SCSI controller, due to an ESXi limitation.
Abiquo avoids performing a full HBA rescan of storage on ESX or ESXi for performance reasons. Instead it checks for a raw device mapping for a given IQN and LUN. However, if a volume has been removed or replaced in the storage device, Abiquo may try to attach a volume that does not exist or is completely different to the one previously configured.
This situation may occur with: managed storage volumes, generic iSCSI volumes and persistent virtual machines. It can be resolved by manually performing a full HBA rescan of all ESX or ESXi hosts that had raw device mappings for the devices involved.
You should check that the appropriate iSCSI adapters were enabled as part of the ESXi installation process. See How to enable iSCSI Initiator on ESXi
Abiquo recommends that you install the drivers for the appropriate SCSI controllers when preparing virtual machine templates that will be uploaded to the Abiquo platform.
Users can set the SCSI disk controller type and controller for ESXi. The supported disk controllers are listed in the following table.
ResourceSubType value | diskController saved in template and created on VMware |
---|---|
contains "bus" | VirtualBusLogicController |
contains "paravirtual" | ParaVirtualSCSIController |
contains "sas" | VirtualLsiLogicSASController |
other (default value) | VirtualLsiLogicController |
If the user does not set a controller, the defaults are:
The default configuration set by the administrator in the abiquo.properties file
LSI Logic Parallel SCSI controller
# Default VirtualSCSIController implementation when diskController is not # specified. Range [lsilogic, paravirtual, bus, sas] #abiquo.esxi.scsicontroller=lsilogic
If the user does not set the controller before deployment, Abiquo attaches SCSI disks to the default controller.
Disk controller user information
Users can now set disk controller and disk controller type
You can set multiple controllers but only ONE of each type (e.g. you cannot set two LSI Logic controllers)
To resize disks of virtual machines running on ESXi using Abiquo, the disks must be:
You cannot resize the primary disk of a virtual machine that is not allocated (not deployed)
Note that
See VMware knowledge base article
Abiquo supports vMotion. See How to make VMware vMotion work with Abiquo for configuration information.
DO NOT FORGET THIS STEP
You must review and double check the properties file before you use Abiquo. NFS settings to configure the repository location and vCenter settings are critical for the correct functioning of Abiquo. See Abiquo Configuration Properties and below.
Log in to the Abiquo Remote Services machine (or if you performed a Monolithic installation log in to the Abiquo Server) and set the appropriate properties for your system to appropriate values in the /opt/abiquo/config/abiquo.properties file:
abiquo.esxi.datastoreRdm abiquo.esxi.datastoreVmFile abiquo.esxi.scsicontroller RemoteDisplay.vnc.keyMap com.abiquo.virtualfactory.esxi.timeoutConnectionMs com.abiquo.virtualfactory.esxi.timeoutReadMs abiquo.dvs.portgroup.loadsharingmechanism abiquo.dvs.portgroup.maxsize abiquo.dvs.vcenter.user abiquo.dvs.vcenter.password abiquo.vcenter.port.connection abiquo.esxi.forcehardwareversion
Log in to the Abiquo Server and add the properties that apply to your system to the abiquo.properties file:
abiquo.vncport.min abiquo.vncport.max
After the properties have been set to the appropriate values, restart the Tomcat server on each machine:
service abiquo-tomcat restart
See the full list of supported properties.