Obsolete:Nova-zVM

Overview

System z and z/VM

System z is a family name used by IBM for all of its mainframe computers. IBM System z now includes the IBM System z9, the IBM System z10 and the newer IBM zEnterprise.

z/VM is an IBM VM hypervisor based on 64-bit z/Architecture, and now with multi-system virtualization and virtual server mobility. z/VM is designed to allow the capability for clients to run hundreds to thousands of Linux servers on a single mainframe running with other System z operating systems, such as z/OS, or as a large-scale linux-only enterprise server solution.

xCAT is a management tool developed by IBM. It is used for the deployment and administration of Linux or AIX based clusters.

Architecture

Nova z/VM driver will communicate with xCAT REST api to control/configure z/VM. This picture show the architure of xCAT and zVM

xCAT can be used to manage virtual servers spanning across multiple z/VM partitions. The xCAT management node (MN) runs on any Linux virtual server. It manages each z/VM partition using a System z hardware control point (zHCP) running on a privileged Linux virtual server. The zHCP interfaces with z/VM systems management API (SMAPI), directory manager (DirMaint), and control program layer (CP) to manage the z/VM partition. It utilizes a C socket interface to communicate with the SMAPI layer and VMCP Linux module to communicate with the CP layer.

Prerequisites

1. One OpenStack nova-compute service node will manage one and only one xCAT MN node.
2. Each of the zVM systems (reside in different LPARs or CECs ) has one nova-compute service node
3. zHCP must be managed by xCAT MN.

Configuration

By default /etc/nova/nova.conf, should contain following items

libvirt_type=zvm
compute_driver = zvm.ZVMDriver
libvirt_vif_driver = nova.virt.libvirt.vif.LibvirtHybridOVSBridgeDriver
network_api_class = nova.network.quantumv2.api.API
zvm_xcat_master = xcatmaster
zvm_snapshots_directory=/opt/stack/data/nova/images
instance_name_template = ibm%04x
zvm_diskpool = pool1
zvm_scsi_pool = smpool
zvm_xcat_server = 192.168.1.100
zvm_xcat_username = root
zvm_xcat_password = xxxxxxx
zvm_host = zvmssio1
zvm_user_profile = lnxdflt
config_drive_format=tgz
zvm_reachable_timeout=600

References

1. z/VM
2. xCAT on z/VM