NetApp ONTAP 9.1: OnCommand System Manager On-Box Guided Cluster Setup

I was never a fan of ‘System Setup’ (the GUI way of setting up pre-9.1 clusters), so when I heard that ONTAP 9.1 has an On-Box Cluster Setup, I wanted to try it out, so here we go!

Note i: With the VSIM you can’t use Guided Setup to create anything other than a single node cluster, if you try for a 2 node cluster it will complain that “HA is not configured”, but it would let you part do the first node in the cluster, and then you’d need to add the second VSIM node using CLI. With real world systems you won’t encounter this.

Note ii: Another problem I found with using Guided Cluster Setup against a VSIM, is that it gets stuck at ‘Step 2: Network’. The error is fairly vague, I’m pretty sure it’s due to the absence of service-processor on the VSIM. Again, with real world systems you won’t encounter this. The moral of the story “don’t use Guided Cluster Setup to setup a VSIM.”

Here we have 1 x ONTAP 9.1 simulator. The basic setup is similar to here - Build Recipe for 8.3.2 - up to and including step 1.8 (node setup).

Image: Node management interface configuration via the console

Guided Cluster Setup

1) Point your web browser at https://NODE_MGMT_IP

And the below is what you should see. A very cool feature is that you can download/upload a template (in CSV format - see the Appendix for more).

Image: Welcome to the Guided Cluster Setup

2) Click the ‘Guided Setup’ button.

Image: Guided Setup

2.1) Cluster

- Input Cluster name
- Input Node name
- Tick the single node cluster box
- Input admin password
- Click Submit

Image: Guided Cluster Setup 1 - Cluster

Note: The Cluster Base License is now optional in 9.1’s setup (mandatory to add Feature Licenses).

2.2) Network

- Input network details as required (see image below)
- Click Submit

Image: Guided Cluster Setup 2 - Network

... and this is where we get stuck with the VSIM. Still, hopefully this post wasn’t a total fail and you can see the potential (check out the Appendix for the CSV details!)

Image: Error in the input fields. Verify the field values before proceeding.

Appendix: Cluster Setup Template

The Cluster Setup Template functionality will be very useful. The CSV/XLSX can be downloaded from ‘Guided Cluster Setup’. I’m not going to copy and paste the CSV template here, just detail the fields to give an idea of what it could be used for (up to 8 node cluster setup!)

Section: Cluster
Version
Cluster Name
Configuration Type(for SingleNodeCluster)
Configuration Type(for TwoNodeCluster)
Base License
Feature License(Optional)

Section: Network
Network Configuration Type
IP Address Range1
IP Address Range2
IP Address Range3
Cluster MgmtDetails(Manual)
Node-2 MgmtDetails(Manual)
Node-3 MgmtDetails(Manual)
Node-4 MgmtDetails(Manual)
Node-5 MgmtDetails(Manual)
Node-6 MgmtDetails(Manual)
Node-7 MgmtDetails(Manual)
Node-8 MgmtDetails(Manual)
Override Existing SP MgmtDetails
Node-1 SP MgmtDetails(Manual)
Node-2 SP MgmtDetails(Manual)
Node-3 SP MgmtDetails(Manual)
Node-4 SP MgmtDetails(Manual)
Node-5 SP MgmtDetails(Manual)
Node-6 SP MgmtDetails(Manual)
Node-7 SP MgmtDetails(Manual)
Node-8 SP MgmtDetails(Manual)
DNS Domain Names
DNS Server IP Addresses
NTP Primary
NTP Alternative(Optional)

Section: Support
AutoSupport Status
AutoSupport URL(Optional)
EMS SMTP MailHost
EMS Mail IDs
EMS SNMP TrapHost
EMS Syslog Server
SysBackup Transport Protocol
SysBackup Destination Address

THE END

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