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Installing Nutanix AHV
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FML.md

How to Install Nutanix AHV in a nested VM under VMWare Workstation 15

VM Creation & Hypervisor Installation

You'll need to get two...no, three, wait, no, four, yes as in 4, static IPs to set for this single-node cluster...a hypervisor, Control VM (CVM), Data Services, and cluster VIP...

  1. Sign up for a Nutanix NEXT Account - https://next.nutanix.com/
  2. Download the installer ISOs and all the other dumb files from this STICKIED FORUM POST: https://next.nutanix.com/discussion-forum-14/download-community-edition-38417
  3. Create a new VM in VMWare Workstation with:
  • A buncha cores
  • A buncha "DIMMs" - CVM takes 20GB MINIMUM.
  • 3 HDDs, 120gb, 200gb, and 500gb or whatever. One for the Hypervisor, CVM Store (lol), and "data" or where VMs go to live out their days and die
  • AHV Installer ISO mounted to the CD/DVD device and connected
  • VT-x extensions and CPU Counters enabled under "Processors" in Settings
  • "BIOS" Mode in Settings > Options tab > Advanced > Firmware type
  • Get rid of the Sound Card and Printer lolwtf

Note: If installing on a physical server or via USB stick or DVD, make sure not to change the name of the volume from the assumed name of "PHOENIX" because the installer halts if it's not named that - ya know, like it's fucking 2002.

  1. Assign the HDDs right in the TUI because it always guesses wrong.
  2. Don't check the box for "Create Single Node Cluster" !!! Evidently this is notorious for not working so we'll do it the manual way in a second
  3. Make sure to scroll down the whole EULA cause evidently that's something we're still doing
  4. Install this stupid piece of shit hypervisor stack
  5. Reboot when prompted to, immediately go and get a drink, and hopefully you'll miss the GRUB menu where it shows a RHEL 7 BASED KERNEL

Cluster Configuration

God damn it this is the worst thing I've ever had to install and I've used BITBUCKET before.

You should now have a VM that has booted to the hypervisor with no cluster created or running.

  • Default username to the hypervisor is root
  • Default password to the hypervisor is nutanix/4u

Ok, yay, we're in the hypervisor - now to SSH into the CVM from there...

ssh nutanix@CVM_IP_HERE

  • Default username to the CVM is nutanix
  • Default password to the CVM is nutanix/4u

Now just spray in the following commands all willy-nilly, just trust me:

cluster -s "CVM_IP_HERE" --redundancy_factor=1 create
ncli cluster add-to-name-servers servers="YOUR_DNS_SERVER_IP_HERE"

# Get rid of Google auto-set nameservers maybe if you need
ncli cluster remove-from-name-servers servers="8.8.8.8"
ncli cluster remove-from-name-servers servers="8.8.4.4"

ncli cluster edit-params new-name="MyCluster"
ncli cluster set-external-ip-address external-ip-address="CLUSTER_VIP_HERE"
ncli cluster edit-params external-data-services-ip-address="DATA_SERVICES_IP_HERE"

cluster start

Now you should be able to navigate in your browser to Prism, it'll be at https://CVM_IP_ADDRESS:9440/

  • Default username to Prism is admin
  • Default password to Prism is nutanix/4u

You'll be prompted to change the default password in Prism upon initial log in and then redirected back to the log in screen because it doesn't know how to just handle the new auth flow...

Next you'll be prompted for your log in to Nutanix NEXT.

Prism Configuration

Prism is to AHV/AOS as vCenter is to vSphere and RHV-M is to RHV.

Of course you'll need to set up a few things before you can really start creating VMs.

Creating a Network

  1. Click the drop-down menu to the right of your cluster name in the top bar - select VM
  2. In the secondary menu bar right below, all the way to the right, click "Network Config"
  3. Click "Create Network" - give it a name and VLAN if you need, or 0 if you're rolling defaults.

Creating a new Storage Container

You create Storage Containers from Storage Pools and you can create a new Storage Container or not - I just use the default one there.

From here, you should be able to start creating VMs

Bonus: Creating a Single Node OpenShift (SNO) Cluster

  1. Navigate to https://console.redhat.com/openshift/assisted-installer/clusters
  2. Click the big blue Create New Cluster button
  3. Do this:
  • Give it a Cluster Name and Base Domain - this is your DNS stuff
  • Check the box that says "Install single node OpenShift (SNO)
  • The OpenShift Version will change to at least 4.8.x
  • Click Next
  1. Click the "Generate Discovery ISO" button - input an SSH Public Key authorized hosts line/file and download the ISO
  2. In Prism, click on the Settings Cog Icon in the upper right portion of the screen to the left of your username drop-down
  3. In the left pane, navigate to "Image Configuration" and upload the ISO you just downloaded
  4. In Prism, click the "VM" option from the main menu drop-down - click "Create VM"
  5. Create a VM for SNO with the following:
  • Name: whatever
  • Description: sure
  • Timezone: who cares
  • vCPUs: 1
  • Number Of Cores Per vCPU: 8
  • Memory: 32GiB
  • Legacy BIOS
  • The default CD-ROM Device will be empty - click the pencil icon to edit. Select the "Clone from Image Service" option and select your uploaded Discovery ISO
  • Add New Disk, at least 120GiB
  • Add a New NIC - select the Network you'd like
  • Click Create/Save
  • Hope it works cause it didn't for me

From here, you can select the VM in the Table view and click "Power On" to assemble your SNO deployment

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