Simplify with VMware Cloud Foundation 4.x and automated code-based deployment on HPE Storage

[ComputeExperts]

Simplify deployment and infrastructure management with HPE Synergy: If you’re considering VMware Cloud Foundation and looking for a validated configuration, HPE presents a solution automating provisioning of HPE Synergy with HPE Primera, HPE Nimble, and HPE 3PAR StoreServ as both principal and ancillary storage.

Enterprises need an ideal IT model which supports traditional and cloud native applications. As a result enterprises are embracing a journey to digital transformation and software-defined data center (SDDC). Business want to turn ideas into services faster, respond to new customer demands and innovate better by leverage latest technology.

Black swan events like COVID-19 have reinforced the need for agile infrastructure to cater to changing needs. Enterprises are increasingly adopting new cloud technologies based on software-defined model and capable of running VMs as well Containers in public cloud while keeping workloads on-prem. VMware Cloud Foundation (VCF) 4.x provides organizations with reliable platform for deploying Virtual machines and Containers based workloads. VCF 4.x is based on VMware vSphere 7.x and NSX-T 3.x releases.

Challenges

Consider these challenges when deploying infrastructure and applications in a mission critical environment involving VMware VCF platform:

• Complexity in managing infrastructure—Management of infrastructure components frequently requires multiple tools which adds to complexity. In addition, firmware updates and upgrades in Day 2 scenarios need to be managed.
• Provisioning time and overprovisioned infrastructure—It starts with time taken to provision infrastructure. In addition to meet long-term needs, the current infrastructure is often overprovisioned, adding to both CapEx and OpEx costs.
• High availability—Enterprise IT shops must provision for modern high-availability practices.
• Security—Enterprise IT shops must provide protection against threats and ensure compliance.

HPE Reference Architecture for VMware Cloud Foundation 4.x on HPE Synergy provides solution around manageability, infrastructure provisioning, scalability, security, and high availability. It encompasses Day 0, Day 1, and Day 2 requirements.

HPE Synergy composable infrastructure enables optimized infrastructure deployment and simplifies manageability using HPE OneView. VMware SDDC manager makes seamless manageability possible when used with HPE Synergy and HPE OneView. In addition, you can leverage HPE Primera, HPE Nimble Storage, or HPE 3PAR StoreServ as principal and ancillary storage platforms for your business-driven goals.

Solution highlights

• Reduced deployment time from days down to hours using faster time-to-value with fluid resource pools and software-defined intelligence of HPE Synergy. This allows administrators to rapidly compose any configuration required.
• Grow-as-you-go and support both traditional virtual machines and cloud-native applications. This delivers the ability to efficiently scale storage and compute independently, to deploy SDDC environments.
• Agility to expand and contract physical and virtual infrastructure on-demand to meet changing Business requirements with HPE OneView connector (developed and maintained by HPE and powered by DMTF Redfish APIs). Unique Integration between VMware SDDC manager and HPE Synergy Composer provides a single console to dynamically compose software- defined and physical infrastructure for SHPE ynergy solutions using D3940 for vSAN storage.
• Remediate drivers and firmware upgrade in a single maintenance window along with ESXi update for a vLCM based workload domain through the Hardware Support Manager (HSM) service provided by the HPE OneView for VMware vCenter (OV4vC) integration.
• Integrated monitoring and reporting for VCF environment using HPE OneView for VMware vRealize Operation’s custom dashboards. HPE OneView for VMware vRealize Operations provides integrated and highly automated performance, capacity, configuration compliance, and cost management tools to the vRealize Operations custom GUI. The plugin seamlessly integrates the manageability features of HPE Synergy with VMware analytics engine that analyzes what is normal and then applies that baseline to a dynamic server environment.
• Automation of complex IT tasks in extensible and repeatable manner. Predefined collection of HPE tasks and workflows that can be used in vRealize Orchestrator (VRO) with easy-to-use, drag and drop access to automation of HPE OneView managed hardware deployment, firmware updates, and other life-cycle tasks. These help you to customize any workflow in the collection to meet the needs of datacenter operations. HPE OneView for VMware vRealize Orchestrator allows the advanced management features of HPE OneView to be incorporated into larger IT workflows. HPE OneView workflows and actions can also be integrated in VMware vRealize Automation via vRealize Orchestrator.
• Single pane of glass to monitor and manage multiple cloud foundation instances using multi-instance management feature. This can be used for capacity planning and meeting security compliance regulations. This can also be configured for high availability.
• An easy-to-operate VI (Virtual Infrastructure) traditional data center in a VCF workload domain.
• Guidance to attach and configure HPE Storage, including HPE Primera, HPE Nimble and HPE 3PAR StoreServ Storage, to use as principal as well as ancillary storage to use for VCF VI workload.
• Guidance to configure Aruba CX 8325 Switches as ToR (Top of Rack) switch which supports up to 100Gb per port, high-performance server connectivity, and the capabilities to handle virtual environments.
• Guidance for VMware Kubernetes as a cloud-native platform on VCF NSX-T workload domain on HPE Synergy.
• Guidance for Offline VMware Cloud Foundation update for HPE Synergy.
• Guidance for deployment of Consolidated Architecture of VCF

The solution demonstrates the concept by deploying two (2) HPE Synergy 12000 frames each equipped with eight (8) HPE Synergy 480 Gen10 servers, and an HPE Synergy D3940 Module. Each HPE Synergy 12000 frame uses HPE VC SE 100Gb F32 Module as a fabric module to provide uplink to the data center network. Sixteen (16) HPE Synergy 480 Gen10 servers are used to configure one VCF management domain and three (3) VCF workload domains. The HPE Synergy Storage Module D3940 hosts software-defined VMware vSAN storage. HPE Primera, HPE Nimble Storage, and HPE 3PAR StoreServ provide primary storage as well as ancillary storage for the VI workload domains

Best practices presented in Reference Architecture

HPE Reference Architecture for VMware Cloud Foundation on HPE Synergy shows how to deploy VCF at scale using HPE’s solution processes and automation. The Reference Architecture also demonstrates best practices for customers building a cloud solution in an enterprise data center and deploying business-critical applications in an automated manner. It helps address key requirements of infrastructure manageability, provisioning, scalability, security. and high availability.

You can find this and other Reference Architectures and Reference Configurations here: www.hpe.com/info/ra.

In addition, you can engage HPE Pointnext Services for access to Day 0, Day 1, and Day 2 code-based automation related services.

Please contact your HPE representative for further details.

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Meet Compute Experts blogger Mandar Chitale, HPE Solution Engineering Team. Mandar has two decades of experience in the IT industry. Currently, he is a Program Manager with the HPE Solution Engineering Team which is focused on creating Solution Reference Architectures for enterprise use cases based on the traditional and emerging digital technology scape.

Compute Experts
Hewlett Packard Enterprise

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