The following are the rudimentary steps for the initial configuration of UCSM:
- First ensure the presence of proper physical cabling between FIs, IOMs, and north-bound switches, as explained in Chapter 2, Installing Cisco UCS Hardware.
- Access FIs using a serial console as there is no IP assigned initially (most modern PCs and laptops do not have serial port, and a USB-to-serial converter might be required).
- UCSM 3.1 provides the option for initial configuration through GUI and CLI. FI will run an initial configuration wizard that will assign IP and other necessary configurations (detailed steps are provided in Chapter 11, Configuring Backup, Restore, and High Availability)
Please refer the link for more information: http://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/td/docs/unified_computing/ucs/ucs-manager/GUI-User-Guides/Getting-Started/3-1/b_UCSM_Getting_Started_Guide_3_1/b_UCSM_Initial_Configuration_Guide_3_0_chapter_011.html
- Make sure that the L1 port is connected to L1 and the L2 port is connected to L2 between FIs so that, when the second FI is powered up, it automatically detects the first FI and configures the cluster settings as part of the initial configuration (detailed steps are provided in Chapter 11, Configuring Backup, Restore, and High Availability).
- Assign a cluster IP to get centralized management access to the cluster, also known as Virtual IP (VIP).
- Once the IPs have been assigned, it is also possible to access FIs through Secure Shell (SSH).
- Log in to FI and use the following commands to get the status of the cluster, as shown in the following screenshot:
show cluster state
show cluster extended-state
- After confirming the status of the cluster, log in to the UCSM GUI using the cluster VIP IP or DNS name using a compatible browser, as shown in the following screenshot:
- Configure the UCS global policies, which will be explained in the next section.
In case it is necessary to reinitialize FI to default factory settings, use the following commands:
connect local-mgmt
erase-config
On a primary FI, A is automatically added to the name, and on a secondary FI, B is automatically added to the name, so pay attention to the naming convention.
In this chapter, we will only discuss the configuration of UCS policies that have global impact on chassis discovery, connectivity, and power management.
In subsequent chapters, we will be exploring different blade-server-specific policies and other configurations using the UCSM.