Lab 1.3: Deploy your Service Scaling Group

Before setting up our SSG and deploy it, do the following:

Note

it is recommended to launch your SSH sessions from the lab environment.

• Open 2 SSH sessions on your BIG-IQ.

• On the first SSH session, run the following command:

  tail -f /var/log/restjavad.0.log | grep vmware

• On the second SSH session, run the following command:

  tail -f /var/log/orchestrator.log

Note

Keep those sessions open until the end of the class.

• Connect via SSH or Web Shell to the system Ubuntu Lamp Server. (if you use the Web Shell, login as f5student first: su - f5student) and run the command:

  sudo service isc-dhcp-server status

  if you see something like this:

  f5student@ip-10-1-1-5:~$ sudo service isc-dhcp-server status
  isc-dhcp-server stop/waiting
  

  then run the command:

  sudo service isc-dhcp-server start

  otherwise (to be safe), run the command:

  sudo service isc-dhcp-server force-reload

From the lab environment, launch a remote desktop session to have access to the Ubuntu Desktop.

Note

You may have a QWERTY keyboard for the password, keep this in mind

Launch Chrome and click on the vSphere Web Client bookmark.

Use the following credentials:

• login: administrator@vsphere.local
• password: Purpl3$lab

Note

the login/authentication takes a bit of time.

Once logged in, click on the VMs and Templates button to see the list of VMs and folder.

In the previous lab, in our Cloud environment, we specified a VM template called BIGIP-13.1.1-0.0.4.ALL_1SLOT_template. You can see that it is listed here.

This template will give us the required information to deploy the VEs related to our SSG:

• Nb of vCPUs
• Amount of memory allocated
• Disk size and datastore used by this SSG

Service Scaling Group Setup

To deploy your Service Scaling Group (SSG), go to Applications > Environments > Service Scaling Groups and click the Create button

Service Scaling Group Properties:

• Name : SSGClass2
• Cloud Environment: select SSGClass2VMWAreEnvironment
• Minimum Device(s) Required: 2
• Desired Number of Device(s): 2
• Maximum Device(s) Required : 3
• Maximum Application(s) Allowed: 3

Note

SSG can be used along with an Access Group. APM module will need to be provisioned in the device template and proper license pool will need to be configure. The access group to use need to be specified in the SSG configuration.

Warning

in lab environment, the provisioning of a SSG VE may take up to 10 min. So it may takes up to 20 min to build those 2 devices. If you are short on time, it may be better to specify 1 minimum device and 1 desired device instead of 2.

Let’s review those parameters.

• Minimum Device(s) Required : specify how many BIG-IP VE(s) should always be available at any time
• Desired Number of Device(s): specify the ideal number of BIG-IP VE(s) should be available when no scale-out scenario is triggered
• Maximum Device(s) Required: specify the maximum number of BIG-IP VE(s) that can be created in this SSG. The purpose is to make sure that under some scenarios (like being DDOS), we won’t add constantly new devices
• Maximum Application(s) Allowed: specify how many applications we will be able to deploy on top of this SSG. The idea is to ensure that if we use a Cloud edition VE, we won’t try to go over the license limit

Load-Balancer:

• Devices: Select the already discovered BIG-IPs BOS-vBIGIP01.termmarc.com and BOS-vBIGIP02.termmarc.com

The device(s) we select here will behave as our Service Scaler devices. They will load balance the traffic aimed at this SSG.

Scaling Rules:

• Scale-Out: Select Throughput(In) Greater than 20 Mbps
• Scale-In: Select Troughput(In) Less than 5 Mbps

Here we define our threshold to scale-in/scale-out.The cooldown period mentions an interval where we don’t do any scaling. The idea is to see how the situation evolves after a scale-in scale-out event.

Click on Save & Close and your SSG will start being provisioned.

In order to allow Paula to use the SSG previously created, go to : System > Role Management > Roles and select CUSTOM ROLES > Application Roles > Application Creator VMware role (already assigned to Paula). Select the Service Scaling Groups SSGClass2, drag it to the right.

Click on Save & Close

Go to the next lab to see how to troubleshoot/monitor your SSG Deployment.