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This documentation relates to the latest released version of BMC Atrium Discovery (other versions).

Installing the Virtual Appliance

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Table of Contents

Pre-requisites

  • You have identified a server onto which you will deploy your BMC Atrium Discovery virtual appliance
  • The server has sufficient spare resources to support the intended configuration of the virtual appliance.
  • You have identified the VMware Administrator who will be installing the virtual appliance.
No additional software is supported on the appliance
BMC Atrium Discovery is built as an appliance that is not intended to have any additional software installed on it. The only exception to this is BMC PATROL. BMC Customer Support cannot provide support for any appliances on which additional software is installed.
No OS customizations are supported on the appliance
The BMC Atrium Discovery software is delivered as an appliance model (either virtual or physical), and includes the entire software stack from a Linux operating system to the BMC application software. The operating system must not be treated for general purpose use, but rather as a tightly integrated part of the BMC Atrium Discovery solution. As such, customizations to the operating system should only be made at the command line level if explicitly described in this online documentation, or explicitly instructed by BMC Customer Support. Any other changes will render the appliance unsupported. If you are unclear as to the impact of a potential customization, please contact BMC Customer Support for guidance.

Supported virtualization platforms

A BMC Atrium Discovery virtual appliance is only supported on the VMware platforms described in this section.

VMware Virtual Infrastructure (ESX/ESXi)

To install the BMC Atrium Discovery Virtual Appliance onto VMware Virtual Infrastrucuture (ESX/ESXi) you must convert the BMC Atrium Discovery Virtual Appliance to a suitable format.

VMware Converter
It has been found that version 5.0.0 of VMware's tool produces an error "Unable to obtain hardware information for the selected machine" when trying to convert the ADDM image. Version 4.3.0 does not have this problem and is recommended.

The major steps in this procedure are outlined below. For full information, see the VMware documentation (pdf).

  • Copy and extract the BMC Atrium Discovery Virtual Appliance zip file to the local file system.
  • Start the VMware Converter Standalone Client.
  • Launch the "Convert Machine" Wizard
  • Select "VMware Workstation or other VMware virtual machine" as the source type.
  • Enter the path and filename for the BMC Atrium Discovery Virtual Appliance vmx file.
  • Select "VMware Infrastructure virtual machine" as the destination type and enter the relevant connection details.
  • Specify the Virtual machine name and datastore location for the target system.
  • Review the configuration and proceed.

Once the conversion process is complete you can manage the Virtual Appliance with the appropriate VMware Infrastructure client.

VMware Server v2

To install the BMC Atrium Discovery Virtual Appliance on VMware Server version 2, perform the following steps on the VMware server host:

  1. Copy and extract the BMC Atrium Discovery Virtual Appliance zip file to the local file system that is defined as the VMware Server Datastore.
  2. Start the VMware Server web interface.
  3. From the Virtual Machine menu, select Add Virtual Machine to Inventory.
  4. Expand the datastore icon that includes the directory containing the unzipped BMC Atrium Discovery Virtual Appliance.
  5. Select the *.vmx file in that directory.
  6. Click OK to load the file.
  7. Select the newly added VM from the inventory.
  8. The main panel shows the settings for the BMC Atrium Discovery Virtual Appliance. It is recommended that you do not change any of these settings.
  9. Click the green start button to start the BMC Atrium Discovery Virtual Appliance.
    • When starting for the first time, you may be prompted about your identifier. It is recommended that you choose the relevant option to create a new identifier. This ensures that the MAC address of the Network Interface Card is unique and avoids any conflicts.
  10. The IP address of the virtual appliance is displayed at the console login. Make a note of this to use when accessing the BMC Atrium Discovery UI through your browser.

Post Installation

Important Post Installation Steps
It is important to consider the following steps after installing.

VMware Tools

VMware Tools is required but is not installed on the shipped BMC Atrium Discovery Virtual Appliance, as the correct version of the tools is dependent on the version of the VMware host. When you have installed the BMC Atrium Discovery Virtual Appliance, you must always install VMware Tools.

Installing VMware Tools

The following procedure describes how to install VMware Tools. For full information, see the documentation available on the VMware Support site:

  1. From VMware Infrastructure Client, right click on the virtual machine in the left pane.
  2. Select Install/Upgrade VMware Tools. This makes a virtual CD device available to the VM.
  3. Log onto the virtual machine CLI, and become root.
  4. Issue the following commands (change the RPM or tar file name below to the version presented by your ESX server):
    1. mkdir /mnt/cdrom
    2. mount /dev/cdrom /mnt/cdrom
      Enter one of the following commands depending on whether VMware Tools is supplied on the virtual CD as an RPM, or a tar file.
      1. If you have an rpm enter the following command:
        rpm -i /mnt/cdrom/VMwareTools-7.7.5-156745.i386.rpm
        umount /mnt/cdrom
      2. If there is a tar file, enter the following commands:
        cd /tmp
        tar zxvf /mnt/cdrom/VMwareTools-7.7.5-156745.tar.gz
        umount /mnt/cdrom
        cd vmware-tools-distrib
        ./vmware-install.pl
  5. Respond to the configuration questions on the screen. Press Enter to accept the default value.

If at any later point, you need to re-run the VMware tools script, the default location will be:
/usr/bin/vmware-install.pl

Setting up NTP

It is essential to configure ntp on your BMC Atrium Discovery Virtual Appliance. If significant clock skews occur then it can impact the functioning of the system or even prevent the BMC Atrium Discovery product from starting. VMware have documented their recommended timekeeping best practices for Linux based VMs. The KnowledgeBase article can be found here.

Configure the appropriate time zone

It is sensible to configure the Virtual Appliance to be in the time zone appropriate to its location. See Localizing the appliance for more information on this.

Next Steps

Once the Virtual Appliance is installed it is a good time to configure it to have sufficient resources for its intended use. Doing so now will be easier than extending the resources once the Virtual Appliance has been in use for some time.

See Configuring the Virtual Appliance for details.
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