bigip_vcmp_guest – Manages vCMP guests on a BIG-IP

New in version 1.1.0.

Synopsis

  • Manages vCMP (Virtual Clustered Multiprocessing) guests on a BIG-IP. This functionality only exists on actual hardware and must be enabled by provisioning VCMP with the bigip_do_deploy module.

Parameters

Parameter Choices/Defaults Configuration Comments
allowed_slots
list / elements=string
Contains those slots to which the guest is allowed to be assigned.
When the host determines which slots this guest should be assigned, only slots in this list are considered.
This is a good way to force guests to be assigned only to particular slots, or, by configuring disjoint allowed_slots on two guests, that those guests are never assigned to the same slot.
By default, this list includes every available slot in the cluster. This means the guest may be assigned to any slot by default.
cores_per_slot
integer
Specifies the number of cores the system allocates to the guest.
Each core represents a portion of CPU and memory. Therefore, the amount of memory allocated per core is directly tied to the amount of CPU. This amount of memory varies per hardware platform type.
The number you can specify depends on the type of hardware you have.
In the event of a reboot, the system persists the guest to the same slot on which it ran prior to the reboot.
delete_virtual_disk
boolean
    Choices:
  • no ←
  • yes
When state is absent, the system additionally deletes the virtual disk associated with the vCMP guest. By default, this value is false.
initial_hotfix
string
Specifies the hotfix ISO image file which is applied on top of the base image.
initial_image
string
Specifies the base software release ISO image file for installing the TMOS hypervisor instance and any licensed BIG-IP modules onto the guest's virtual disk. When creating a new guest, this parameter is required. Ensure this image is present on the VCMP host and not only on the VCMP guest. Also, the file reference for this image should be the one present on the host and not on the guest.
mgmt_address
string
Specifies the IP address and subnet or subnet mask you use to access the guest when you want to manage a module running within the guest. This parameter is required if the mgmt_network parameter is bridged.
When creating a new guest, if you do not specify a network or network mask, a default of /24 (255.255.255.0) is used.
mgmt_network
string
    Choices:
  • bridged
  • isolated
  • host only
Specifies the method by which the management address is used in the vCMP guest.
When bridged, specifies the guest can communicate with the vCMP host's management network.
When isolated, specifies the guest is isolated from the vCMP host's management network. In this case, the only way a guest can communicate with the vCMP host is through the console port or through a self IP address on the guest that allows traffic through port 22.
When host only, prevents the guest from installing images and hotfixes other than those provided by the hypervisor.
If the guest setting is isolated or host only, the mgmt_address does not apply.
For mode changing, changing bridged to isolated causes the vCMP host to remove all of the guest's management interfaces from its bridged management network. This immediately disconnects the guest's VMs from the physical management network. Changing isolated to bridged causes the vCMP host to dynamically add the guest's management interfaces to the bridged management network. This immediately connects all of the guest's VMs to the physical management network. Changing this property while the guest is in the configured or provisioned state has no immediate effect.
mgmt_route
string
Specifies the gateway address for the mgmt_address.
If this value is not specified when creating a new guest, it is set to none.
The value none can be used during an update to remove this value.
min_number_of_slots
integer
Specifies the minimum number of slots the guest must be assigned to in order to deploy.
This field dictates the number of slots to which the guest must be assigned.
At the end of any allocation attempt, if the guest is not assigned to at least this many slots, the attempt fails and the change that initiated it is reverted.
A guest's min_number_of_slots value cannot be greater than its number_of_slots.
name
string / required
The name of the vCMP guest to manage.
number_of_slots
integer
Specifies the number of slots for the system to use when creating the guest.
This value dictates how many cores a guest is allocated from each slot to which it is assigned.
Possible values are dependent on the type of blades being used in this cluster.
The default value depends on the type of blades being used in this cluster.
partition
string
Default:
"Common"
Device partition to manage resources on.
state
string
    Choices:
  • configured
  • disabled
  • provisioned
  • present ←
  • absent
The state of the vCMP guest on the system. Each state implies the actions of all states before it.
When configured, guarantees the vCMP guest exists with the provided attributes. Additionally, ensures the vCMP guest is turned off.
When disabled, behaves the same way as configured, it is just a more user-friendly name.
When provisioned, ensures the guest is created and installed. This state does not start the guest; use deployed for that purpose. This state is one step beyond present, as present does not install the guest; only sets up the configuration for it to be installed.
When present, ensures the guest is properly provisioned and starts the guest so that it is in a running state.
When absent, removes the vCMP from the system.
vlans
list / elements=string
VLANs the guest uses to communicate with other guests, the host, and with the external network. The available VLANs in the list are those that are currently configured on the vCMP host.
The order of these VLANs is not important and is ignored. This module orders the VLANs automatically. Therefore, if you deliberately re-order them in subsequent tasks, this module does not register a change.

Notes

Note

  • This module can take a lot of time to deploy vCMP guests. This is an intrinsic limitation of the vCMP system, because it is booting real VMs on the BIG-IP device. This boot time is very similar in length to the time it takes to boot VMs on any other virtualization platform; public or private.
  • When BIG-IP starts, the VMs are booted sequentially; not in parallel. This means it is not unusual for a vCMP host with many guests to take a long time (60+ minutes) to reboot and bring all the guests online. The BIG-IP chassis will be available before all vCMP guests are online.

Examples

- name: Create a vCMP guest
  bigip_vcmp_guest:
    name: foo
    mgmt_network: bridge
    mgmt_address: 10.20.30.40/24

- name: Create a vCMP guest with specific VLANs
  bigip_vcmp_guest:
    name: foo
    mgmt_network: bridge
    mgmt_address: 10.20.30.40/24
    vlans:
      - vlan1
      - vlan2

- name: Remove vCMP guest and disk
  bigip_vcmp_guest:
    name: guest1
    state: absent
    delete_virtual_disk: true

Return Values

The following are the fields unique to this module:

Key Returned Description
vlans
list
changed
The VLANs assigned to the vCMP guest, in their full path format.

Sample:
['/Common/vlan1', '/Common/vlan2']


Status

Authors

  • Wojciech Wypior (@wojtek0806)