Download - vSphere Client Hardware Health Monitoring - Official · PDF filevSphere Client Hardware Health Monitoring Sensors Displayed in the vSphere Client The set of sensors displayed for an

Technical Note
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vSphere Client Hardware Health MonitoringVMware vSphere 4.1
Purpose of This DocumentVMwarevSphereprovideshealthmonitoringdataforESXhardwaretosupportdatacentervirtualization.HealthmonitoringdataisavailablefromtheVMwarevSphereClientaswellasfromseveralprogrammaticinterfaces.
Thisdocumentdescribes:
ThebasicarchitecturethatsupportshardwarehealthmonitoringinESX
Thehealthinformationthatisavailablebydefault
Howpartnersandindependenthardwarevendorscanextendthearchitecturetoprovidehealthinformationabouttheirownsystems
Howsystemsmanagementvendorscanextracthardwarehealthinformation
Hardware Health Monitoring OptionsVMwaresupportshealthmonitoringthroughseveralinterfaces,includingAPIs,CLIs,andGUIs.UserscancreatetheirownhealthmonitoringsoftwareusingtheAPIs,ortheycantakeadvantageofexistingGUIorCLIclientstoaccesshardwarehealthinformation.
HealthmonitoringclientscanconnectdirectlytoanESXserver,ortothevCenterServerthatmanagesanESXserver.ClientsthatconnecttovCenterServercanviewhardwarehealthinformationforanymanagedESXserverthroughasingleconnection.
Programmatic Interfaces for Health MonitoringForthosewhowantthepowerandflexibilitytodesigntheirownhealthmonitoringsolutions,VMwaresupportsthefollowingprotocols.Twoofthemareindustrystandardprotocols,andoneisaproprietaryAPIdesignedspecificallyformanagingvSpheredatacenters:
CIM(CommonInformationModel)
SNMP(SimpleNetworkManagementProtocol)
vSphereWebServicesAPI(WSAPI)

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vSphere Client Hardware Health Monitoring
Figure 1. Health Monitoring APIs
Thisdocumentusesthetermnotificationinagenericsense,includingbothSNMPtrapsandCIMindications.
ThearrowsinFigure 1andFigure 2representinitialmessages,whetherrequestsornotifications.Noarrowsareshownforreplies.
Polling and Notification
Allthreeoftheseinterfacesofferbothpollingandasynchronousnotificationcapabilities.
NotificationsforSNMPandCIMconformtoasubscribepushmodel,whereasWSAPIeventsuseadelayedreplymodeltoapproximateasynchronousnotifications.TheWaitForUpdatesfunctionkeepsarequestopenuntiltheserverhaschangestoreport.
VMware API Language Bindings
TheWSAPIislanguageagnostic.TheAPIisdefinedinaWebServicesDescriptionLanguage(WSDL)file.YoucanbindtheWSDLtoyourchoiceofclientsidestubs.
VMwareprovidesclientbindingsforPerlintheVMwarevSphereSDKforPerl.TheSDKincludesanadditionalAPIlayerthatyoucanusetosimplifycommonoperations.
ThevSphereSDKforPerlalsocontainsanAPIforCIMoperations.APerlclientcanaccesseithertheCIMOM(CIMObjectManager)ortheHostAgenttogatherhardwareinformation.
WS-Management
VMwaresupportstheWSManagementprotocol,inadditiontotheCIMXMLprotocol,forcommunicationswiththeCIMOM.Clientscanuseeitherprotocol,buttheVMwarevSphereSDKforPerlcontainsclientlibrariestosupportWSManagementfunctions.
Table 1. Polling and Notification Capabilities
Polling Notification
SNMP get,getnext SNMPtraps
CIM getinstance,enumerateinstances CIMindications
WS API RetrieveProperties Events(WaitForUpdates)
SNMPclient
SNMP trapreceiver
SNMP agent CIMOM
CIMclient
Indicationconsumer
Host Agent
data notification data notification
GetInstanceetc.
Trap Indication
RetrievePropertiesWaitForUpdates
GetRequestetc.
ESX
vCenterServer
WS API client
data notification

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Figure 2. VMware Perl APIs in Health Monitoring Clients
Command-Line Interfaces for Health MonitoringCLIsareavailableforallthreeprotocolssupportedbyVMware.
ThevSpherePowerCLIinterfacesupportsmanystandardPowerShelloptions.Thecapabilitytopipe.NETobjectsfromonecommandtoanothergivesyouconsiderablepowerinmanagingvSphereobjectsfromthecommandline.
Graphical Interfaces for Health MonitoringAnumberofcommercialGUIclientsthatuseSNMPareavailableforhealthmonitoring,suchasHP Openview,IBMTivoliNetcool,andDellOpenManage.
VMwareprovidesthevSphereClientformanagingESXdatacenters.ThevSphere ClienttakesadvantageofboththeCIMAPIandtheWebServicesAPItogatherinformationaboutthehardware.ItusestheWSAPIformostmanagementtasks,andtheCIMAPIforhardwarehealthmonitoring.
vSphere Client Health Status DisplayWhenyouconnectthevSphereClienttoasingleESXhost,itdisplaysdatarelatedonlytothathost.HealthmonitoringdataisavailableontheConfigurationtabintheHealthStatuspaneoftheHardwaredisplay.Figure 3,PowerSupplySensor,onpage 4showsanexampleofthevSphereClientdisplaywhenconnectedtoasinglehost.
WhenyouconnectthevSphereClienttovCenterServer,itdisplaysdataforallESXhostsmanagedbyvCenter Server.Afteryouselectahostintheinventorypane,thehealthstatusdisplayforthathostisavailableontheHardwareStatustab.YoumighthavetoscrollthroughthetabsiftheHardwareStatustabisnotvisible.Figure 4,TemperatureSensor,onpage 5showsanexampleofthevSphereClientdisplaywhenconnectedtovCenterServer.
ThevSphereClientdisplayshealthinformationashealthstatussensors.Asensorcanrepresenteitherhardwareorsoftwaredata.
SNMPclient
SNMP trapreceiver
SNMP agent CIMOM
CIM clientIndicationconsumer WS API client
Host Agent
GetInstanceetc.
Trap Indication
RetrievePropertiesWaitForUpdates
GetRequestetc.
ESX
vCenterServer
Perl Perl
Table 2. CLIs for Monitoring Hardware Health
SNMP snmpget,snmpgetnext,snmpwalk
CIM wbemcli,owexecwql,wbemop,cimcli
WS API VMwarevSpherePowerCLI

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Hardware HealthAhardwaresensorrepresentsalogicalinterpretationofoneormorephysicalmeasurementsinthehostmachine,suchasavoltagemonitoronapowersupplyoutput.
AhardwaresensordisplayedbythevSphereClientmightnotcorrespondtoasinglephysicalmeasurement.Forexample,whenyouconnecttovCenterServer,youmightseeonesensorthatisanaggregaterepresentationofthehealthofanentirehost.Theaggregatesystemhealthsensorisawaytorollupsimilarsensordataacrossalldevicesinthesystem.
Figure 3showsanexampleofahardwaresensorthatreportsapowersupplyvoltagewithinnormallimitsforpowersupply#1.ThesensorvalueisNormal.
Inthesamefigure,powersupply#2isnotreportedwithinnormallimits.ItsstatusisUnknown.Thismightbetheresultofthepowersupplybeingturnedoff.
Figure 3. Power Supply Sensor
Figure 4onpage 5showsatemperaturesensorwithanabsolutereadingthatiswithinitsnormalrange.Thetemperaturesensorisconfiguredwithnoncriticalandcriticaltemperaturelimits.Ifthetemperatureeverexceedsitsconfiguredlimits,thegreeniconintheStatuscolumnwillchangetoaredoryellowcolor,indicatingeitheracriticalproblemoradegradedstatus.

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Figure 4. Temperature Sensor
Software HealthThevSphereClientdisplayssoftwareinformationasasensor.Asoftwaresensorreportsadescriptionofaninstalledsoftwareorfirmwaremodule.SoftwaresensorsaredisplayedforsystemBIOS,devicedrivers,andvirtualmachinehypervisors.Figure 5showssomesoftwaresensors,includingthenameandversionoftheESXhypervisor.
Figure 5. Software Sensor

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Sensors Displayed in the vSphere ClientThesetofsensorsdisplayedforanESXhostdependsonthespecifichardware.Thisdocumentcannotgiveacompletelistofallthesensorsyousee.
SensorsdisplayedinthevSphereClientaregroupedbytype.Forinstance,allsensorsrelatedtopowersuppliesareshowntogether,andallsensorsrelatedtofansareshowntogether.ThesensorgroupsyouseeinthevSphereClientmightincludesomeorallofthesegroups:
Processors
Memory
Power
Voltage
Temperature
Fan
Network
SoftwareComponents
Yourhardwaremightshowfewergroupsormoregroupsthanthislist,dependingonwhatsensorsareactuallypresent.TheversionoftheESXhypervisoralsoaffectswhichsensorgroupsareshown.
How the vSphere Client Collects Sensor DataThevSphereClientcollectssensordataindifferentways,dependingonthesensortypeandtheservertowhichyouconnect.Regardlessofthedatasource,itishandledbytheCIMObjectManager(CIMOM)andconformstotheCIMstandard.
Figure 6onpage 7showsthebasicCIMarchitectureonanESXhost.
Hardware SensorsManyofthesensorsdisplayedforanESXhostarederivedfrominformationreportedbytheIntelligentPlatformManagementInterface(IPMI)builtintothehardware.TheIPMIstandarddefinesacrossplatformarchitectureforcollectingandcommunicatinginformationaboutthehardware.
AdditionalinformationaboutthehostisgatheredfromtheSMBIOSsubsystemonthehost.
Software SensorsSoftwaresensorsinthevSphereClientderivefromdatareportedbyadifferentprovider.Thisdatareportstheinstalledsoftwareandcurrentversioninformation.AnysoftwarethatispackagedandinstalledasavSphereInstallationBundle(VIB)isrepresentedasasoftwaresensor,includingESXdriversandthehypervisoritself.
Collecting and Reporting Health DataIfyouconnectthevSphereClienttoanESXhostratherthantovCenterServer,thesensordatayouseeinthevSphereClientiscollecteddirectlyfromthathost.IfyouconnectthevSphereClienttovCenterServer,youhaveaccesstosensorsforalltheESXhoststhatvCenterServermanages.
Collecting Health Data on an ESX Host
TheCIMsubsystemthatrunsonanESXhostincludesaCIMOMandanumberofCIMdataproviders.TheCIMOMgathersdatafromtheprovidersandreturnsthedatatoarequestingsoftwaremoduleusingastandardCIMcommunicationprotocol.
NOTETheSoftwareComponentsgroupisintroducedinvSphere4.1.EarlierversionsofVMwaresoftwaredonotreportinstalledsoftware.

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Figure 6representsatypicalsetofprovidersthatsupplydataforhardwarehealthstatusreporting,includingaprovidersuppliedbyathirdpartystoragehardwarevendor.Thirdpartyprovidersmightnotbepresentonyourhardware.
Figure 6. Hardware Health Status Providers on an ESX