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Chapter 1 Overview

Table of Contents

This guide is designed to assist you with the installation procedures for both Oracle VM Manager and Oracle VM Server. It discusses the different pre-installation requirements for each component in a deployment and steps through the installation process, for both Oracle VM Manager and Oracle VM Server, to illustrate typical actions that are taken. This guide also describes how to configure an environment to automate the installation of Oracle VM Server.

Important

To get the latest information about the recent fixes, security alerts, critical patch updates, and other such changes, users with the appropriate support contract can access the support article Oracle VM : What's New with Release 3.4.7.1 - Latest Information (Doc ID 2832974.1) on My Oracle Support at: https://support.oracle.com/oip/faces/secure/km/DocumentDisplay.jspx?id=2832974.1.

The following sections summarize the basic steps for installation on the different platforms supported and provide links to more detailed coverage.

1.1 Planning Your Oracle VM Deployment

To install Oracle VM, you must install at least one Oracle VM Server and one instance of Oracle VM Manager. Your Oracle VM Server can be on either x86 hardware or SPARC hardware. Oracle VM Servers in a server pool must be of the same type, either x86 or SPARC. You cannot mix x86 and SPARC servers in the same server pool; however Oracle VM Manager can manage server pools of different types.

If you are planning to install Oracle VM in a production environments, the following requirements apply:

Oracle VM Manager and Oracle VM Server versions should be the same whenever possible. You can use Oracle VM Manager to manage Oracle VM Servers on a different, earlier patch level of a release – for example: Oracle VM Manager 3.4.5 with Oracle VM Server 3.4.2. However, it is recommended that you maintain the same patch level to ensure full compatibility with the latest functionality.

To facilitate the upgrade of your environment, you can temporarily use Oracle VM Manager Release 3.4.x in combination with Oracle VM Servers at Release 3.2.10, 3.2.11 or 3.3.x. However, in such a mixed environment you can no longer change the configuration of the servers running an older software release; server management is restricted to presenting storage repositories and performing virtual machine operations. You should proceed with the upgrade of your Oracle VM Servers as soon as possible, so that the installed release matches Oracle VM Manager again, and full management functionality is restored.

Note

Beginning with Release 3.4.6, upgrades from Oracle VM Server for x86 at Release 3.2.10 or 3.2.11 and Oracle VM Agent for SPARC at Release 3.3.1 are not supported. Users on these older server releases must first upgrade to a supported version (e.g. 3.4.5) before upgrading to a later version.

Note

As of Release 3.4.5, Oracle VM Manager uses the TLSv1.2 protocol by default. To be able to temporarily manage Oracle VM Servers at Release 3.2.10, 3.2.11 or 3.3.x, and Oracle VM Agent for SPARC at Release 3.3.1, you can enable the TLSv1 protocol, which is less secure. For instructions, see Section 7.6, “Enabling the TLS Version 1 Protocol” in the Oracle VM 3.4 Installation and Upgrade guide.
A minimum cluster of three Oracle VM Server nodes in each server pool is strongly recommended for high availability (HA). If one node in the cluster experiences a hardware failure or is shut down for maintenance, failover redundancy is preserved with the other two nodes. Having a third node in the cluster also provides reserve capacity for production load requirements.

1.2 Getting Installation ISOs and Packages

All Oracle VM software can be downloaded from the Oracle Software Delivery Cloud:

https://edelivery.oracle.com/oraclevm

You must be a registered user, logged in and have accepted the terms and conditions to download software from the Oracle Software Delivery Cloud.

Software downloads are available as Media Packs, each of which represents a different release of the software. It is recommended that you select the most recent Media Pack to obtain patch updates to the software that you intend to install. Each Media Pack contains a collection of ISOs and Zip archives that are available for download. You can select the components that you require for your deployment and download each of these using your web browser.

To locate the Oracle VM software on the Oracle Software Delivery Cloud, search for Oracle VM Manager and Oracle VM Server. Note that the software for Oracle VM Server for SPARC is included in the Media Pack for Oracle VM Server.

Depending on your installation strategy, ISOs and Zip archives may need to be copied to the relevant host or hosts involved in a deployment, or should be placed in shared storage accessible to the systems involved.

1.3 Installation From Bootable Physical Media

You can create a bootable physical media, such as a DVD-ROM, to install software directly onto systems. To do this, the ISO image file must be accessible to the host that you are using to create the bootable physical media.

You should refer to the appropriate documentation for creating bootable physical media. However, if you are using Oracle Linux, the following command burns the ISO image file to a physical DVD-ROM:

# growisofs -Z /dev/dvd=/tmp/OVMSvr.iso

Substitute /dev/dvd with the device name of your optical disc drive. Substitute /tmp/OVMSvr.iso with the path to the ISO file. If you are uncertain of the device name for your drive, try running:

cat /proc/sys/dev/ovm/info

Take note of the drive name and prepend it with /dev/.

Solaris users can use the cdrw tool to do something similar:

# cdrw -i -d /dev/rdsk/cxtxdxs2 /var/tmp/OVMSvr.iso

Substitute /dev/rdsk/cxtxdxs2 with the device name of your optical disc drive. Substitute /var/tmp/OVMSvr.iso with the path to the ISO image file. If you are uncertain of the device name for your optical disc drive, try using the rmformat command to list your removable media devices and take note of the Logical Node that is reported for the device.

When you have burned your media to an optical disc, you can use it to install the software onto your target host. In the case of Oracle VM Server for x86 hardware, the ISO that you have burned is a bootable DVD-ROM that includes a full operating system installation. If you have opted to install your servers using physical media, ensure the DVD-ROM device is configured as the first boot device in the BIOS or UEFI settings for each server where you want to install the software.

For most other installations, such as for Oracle VM Manager or Oracle VM Agent for SPARC, the operating system is already present on the target host. You then need to mount the DVD-ROM device in the existing file system. Typically, this can be achieved by running the following command:

# mount -t iso9660 /dev/dvd /mnt/ovm

Substitute /dev/dvd with the device name of your optical disc drive. Substitute /mnt/ovm with a suitable path to an existing mount point. If you are uncertain of the device name for your drive, try running:

cat /proc/sys/dev/ovm/info

Take note of the drive name and prepend it with /dev/.

Note

If you are installing Oracle VM Manager from an ISO file that has been automatically mounted, ensure the permissions to the mounted directory are at least 0755.

1.4 Loopback ISO Mounts

For installations that do not replace the entire operating system of the target host, such as the installation of Oracle VM Manager, the most common method of accessing the installation media is to perform a loopback mount on the ISO provided. For this method, the ISO image file must be accessible to the target host.

1.4.1 Loopback Mounts on x86

If the target host is an x86-based system running Oracle Linux, run the following command to perform a loopback mount of the ISO image file:

# mount -o loop /tmp/OracleVM-Manager.iso /mnt

Substitute /tmp/OracleVM-Manager.iso with the full path to the ISO image file. Substitute /mnt with the path to the directory on the file system to use as a mount point. From this point onward, you can access the contents of the ISO image file at the location of your mount point.

1.4.2 Loopback Mounts on SPARC

If the target host is a SPARC-based system running Oracle Solaris, run the following command to perform a loopback mount of the ISO image file:

# mount -o ro -F hsfs /var/tmp/OracleVM-Manager.iso /mnt

Substitute /var/tmp/OracleVM-Manager.iso with the full path to the ISO image file. Substitute /mnt with the path to the directory on the file system to use as a mount point. From this point onward, you can access the contents of the ISO image file at the location of your mount point.

If you have trouble mounting the ISO image file on a SPARC system, you may need to manually configure the ISO image file as a loopback device:

# lofiadm -a /var/tmp/OracleVM-Manager.iso

This command outputs the device name you should use, for example /dev/lofi/1. Use the new loopback device to perform the mount, for example:

# mount -o ro -F hsfs /dev/lofi/1 /mnt

When you have finished installing, remember to unmount the loopback device and remove it:

# umount /mnt
# lofiadm -d /dev/lofi/1

Refer to the lofiadm man page for more details.

1.5 Installing Oracle VM Server on x86

Installing Oracle VM Server on x86 deletes any previous operating system and data on the drive selected for installation. To install Oracle VM Server on an x86 server:

Boot the computer on which you want to install Oracle VM Server with your Oracle VM Server bootable physical media.
At the boot prompt, press Enter.
Follow the prompts to install Oracle VM Server.

See Chapter 2, Installing Oracle VM Server for detailed information on installing Oracle VM Server.

If you want to use more than one Oracle VM Server, repeat the installation process. Oracle VM Servers can be added to a server pool and managed by Oracle VM Manager.

To automate the install, see Chapter 3, Performing a Network Installation of Oracle VM Server.

1.6 Installing Oracle VM Server on SPARC

Installing Oracle VM Server on a SPARC server requires you install and configure the following on the SPARC server:

Oracle Solaris OS in the control domain.
Oracle VM Server for SPARC. This is included in Oracle Solaris 11 OS.
Oracle VM Agent for SPARC.

Important

Installing Oracle Solaris within the control domain will destroy the data on the disk on which it is installed, however if Oracle Solaris 11 is already installed within the control domain then Oracle VM Server for SPARC is already available and there is no need to reinstall. Setting up Oracle VM Server for SPARC in this environment will not result in any data being destroyed.

See Section 2.2, “Installing Oracle VM Server on SPARC Hardware” for detailed information on installing Oracle VM Server on SPARC servers.

If you want to use more than one Oracle VM Server, repeat the installation process.

To automate the install, see Chapter 3, Performing a Network Installation of Oracle VM Server.

1.7 Installing Oracle VM Manager

To install Oracle VM Manager:

Start the operating system on the computer on which you want to install Oracle VM Manager.
Insert and mount the Oracle VM Manager installation media.
As the root user, start the Oracle VM Manager installation script:
```
# ./runInstaller.sh
```
Follow the prompts to install Oracle VM Manager.

See Chapter 4, Installing Oracle VM Manager for detailed information on installing Oracle VM Manager.

1.8 Upgrading Oracle VM

You can upgrade Oracle VM from Release 3.2.10 or later. You cannot upgrade Oracle VM 2.x to Oracle VM 3.x, in this case you must re-install Oracle VM. See Chapter 5, Upgrading Oracle VM for information on performing an upgrade.