Chapter 4. Functional comparison 91
Remote control tasks
Remote control establishes a full-screen session to the remote system using a remote control
application. Examples of remote control applications for different types of endpoints are:
? BladeCenter and RSA Remote Control - Web-Based Interface
? AIX endpoint system - Virtual Network Computing (VNC)
To install and configure a remote control application, go to the Remote Access Summary
page and click Set up remote control in the Common Tasks pane. For remote control tasks
through Virtual Network Computing, the server application must be installed first on the
endpoint in order to use it with remote control. The steps to install VNC are:
? Install the RealVNC viewer or another compatible VNC viewer on the web browser client.
? Ensure that the web browser client has network access to the agent.
? Install and configure the VNC Server on the agent, using a default port number of 5091.
To install and configure a remote control application, go to the Remote Access Summary
page and click Set up remote control in the Common Tasks pane.
Remote serial console
The serial console gives you the ability to open console windows to one or more
POWER-managed systems. Each window provides access to the system’s serial console,
accessed out-of-band.
When you use the serial console to open console windows to one or more POWER-managed
systems, each window provides access to the system’s serial console, accessed out-of-band.
Launching a web browser
Use the Launch Web Browser task to access the default web page for a system that hosts a
web server.
4.3.2 System firmware updates
The following section contains information about the system firmware updates.
Firmware updates with CSM
CSM performs hardware inventory scans and maintenance activities on cluster nodes from
the CSM management server. For POWER Systems it supports Hardware Management
Console (HMC)-attached System p5 and POWER 6 nodes and some limited support for the
BladeCenter JS Servers.
The maintenance commands access the controlling HMC using dsh to perform tasks like
applying service level and release level updates to Licensed Internal Code (LIC) for managed
systems or power subsystems. LIC updates are contained within microcode update
packages, which could be downloaded from IBM.
Note: In order to use dsh commands on HMC you have to run the updatehwdev -k
command to set up and generate the ssh keys on the CSM management server and
transfer the public key to the HMC.
92 IBM CSM to IBM Systems Director Transformation Guide
Maintenance commands and their roles are as follows:
? The mkflashfiles command
Validates the firmware update packages, determines the hardware type, calculates and
stores a checksum and copies the result packages in the /csminstall/csm/fw
directory. If
the -f flag is not specified, the mkflashfiles command processes all packages in the
/csminstall/csm/fw directory.
The microcode packages consist of a microcode update file, packaged with an .rpm
filename extension, and associated XML file, and are stored in subdirectories specific to
the hardware and the component being updated.
For different hardware platforms the mkflashfiles command copies the microcode update
package and associated XML file into automatically created subdirectories specific to the
hardware and the component being updated, beneath the base as follows:
/csminstall/csm/fw/8832 <- hardware type for BladeCenter HS20 servers
/csminstall/csm/fw/p5_common <- hardware type for System p5 systems
/csminstall/csm/fw/p6_hv or /csminstall/csm/fw/p6_ml <- System POWER 6
servers use different update packages, depending on the model of the server.
? The rfwflash command
Runs from the CSM management server to perform LIC updates on the specified
HMC-attached System p5 and POWER 6 nodes. It scans the /csminstall/csm/fw
directory structure for Code Update Packages applicable to the given nodes and
components. Output from the rfwflash command is sorted by node and written to the
/csminstall/csm/fw/status directory. This directory contains one file for each node that
the rfwflash command was run on.
Depending on the Licensed Internal Code (LIC) update that is installed, the affected
HMC-attached System p nodes might need to be recycled. The --activate flag
determines how the affected systems activate the new code. It can be concurrent or
disruptive:
–The concurrent update option activates code updates that do not require a system
recycle.
–The disruptive update requires a system recycle, and causes affected systems that
are powered on to be powered down before installing and activating the update.
The System p5 and POWER 6 managed system or power subsystem flash chip stores
firmware in two locations; the temporary side and the permanent side. By default, most
System p5 and POWER 6 systems boot from the temporary side of the flash. When the
rfwflash command updates code, the contents of the temporary side are written to the
permanent side, and the new code is written to the temporary side. The new code is then
activated. Therefore, the two sides of the flash contain different levels of code when the
update has completed. The two flags that deal with the location of the firmware are:
–The commit flag writes the contents of the temporary side of the flash to the permanent
side. Use this flag after updating code and verifying correct system operation.
–The recover flag writes the permanent side of the flash chip back to the temporary
side. Use this flag to recover from a corrupt flash operation, so the previously running
code can be restored.
? The rfwscan command
Scans the HMC-attached System p5 and POWER 6 nodes to determine currently installed
LIC levels. Optionally, the -w flag can be used to write selected data to the CSM database.
Chapter 4. Functional comparison 93
For HMC-attached System p5 and POWER 6 nodes, a listing of the Managed System and,
if applicable, the associated Power Subsystem Licensed Internal Code levels are provided
as shown in Example 4-5.
Example 4-5 Listing the managed systems
# rfwscan -n p6client01.ibm.com
Nodename = p6client01.ibm.com
Managed System Release Code Level = 01SF240
Active Service Code Level = 320
Installed Service Code Level = 320
Accepted Service Code Level = 320
Power Subsystem MTMS = 9458-100*992056T
Power Subsystem Release Code Level = 02BP240
Active Service Code Level = 214
Installed Service Code Level = 214
Accepted Service Code Level = 214
Managed System Current Release Code Level Primary = 01SF240
Current Service Code Level Primary = 320
Managed System Current Release Code Level Secondary = 01SF240
Current Service Code Level Secondary = 320
Power Subsystem Current Release Code Level A = 02BP240
Current Service Code Level A = 214
Power Subsystem Current Release Code Level B = 02BP240
Current Service Code Level B = 214
The rfwscan and rfwflash commands allow the hostnames or IP addresses of one or more
HMCs to be used as the target of the command. When an HMC name is used, the command
will perform the requested firmware scan or update on all the hardware controlled by the
given HMC. This method may be useful if problems are encountered updating firmware
across the cluster. The update may be run only on particular HMCs to help isolate the failure.
A firmware update on Power Systems would look like this:
? Verify that the HWType, HWModel, HWSerialNum, and PowerMethod attributes are
defined for each node using:
shwinfo -p hmc -c HMC_IP_or_hostname
? Define the target node HMCs as managed devices and set the RemoteCopyCmd,
RemoteShell and RemoteShellUser attributes as appropriate.
? Configure dsh and dcp for the HMCs defined in the previous step by running the
updatehwdev -k command.
? Download the microcode update package and associated XML file from the IBM website
and place it into /csminstall/csm/fw.
? Run the mkflashfiles command and specify the location of downloaded firmware with the
-f flag.
? Run the rfwflash command with options like the following:
The -t flag to specify the System p5 and POWER 6 components to update: system for
managed systems or power for power subsystems.
Activate the flag to specify the update mode to perform the updates: concurrent or
disruptive.
94 IBM CSM to IBM Systems Director Transformation Guide
Firmware updates with IBM Systems Director Management Console
IBM Systems Director can handle firmware updates on Power Systems with the help of IBM
Systems Director Management Console (SDMC). In order to be able to perform such
operations you must have the SDMC properly installed and configured in your environment,
as shown in Figure 4-10.
Figure 4-10 IBM Systems Director Management Console clustered environment
SDMC is the successor to the Hardware Management Console (HMC) and the Integrated
Virtualization Manager (IVM). It supports only POWER6 and POWER7 processor-based
systems (including Power Blades) with the exception of model 575 and is the next generation
of management appliances for Power Systems.
IBM Systems Director Management Console is going to replace both Hardware Management
Console and Integrated Virtualization Manager in Power Systems administration in the future.
It is designed to work as a standalone appliance or it can be integrated into the administrative
framework of IBM Systems Director having the same look and feel and providing a common
interface for systems administration across the data center.
SDMC enables administrators to work with a more simplified high-level view of systems,
which makes it possible to organize tasks in a single panel instead of using different menus
as the HMC or IVM do. The transition began in the second half of 2011, because new
virtualization features will only be supported by the SDMC.
The SDMC is available as a software appliance that will replace the Integrated Virtualization
Manager and a hardware appliance for management of midrange systems and high-end
systems. The software appliance is a virtual machine that runs Linux as the base operating
system and can run only on top of Red Hat KVM or VMware ESX/ESXi. The hardware
appliance will come preinstalled on a System X and uses RHEV-H hypervisor.
For more details about SDMC, refer to IBM Systems Director Management Console:
Introduction and Overview, SG24-7860.
HMC
HMC
Private
Network
Private
Network
IVM
IVM
Connection through IVM or HMC
Direct Connection
POWER
Servers
Standalone Server
Blade Center
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