Overview

Cisco Data Center Network Manager (DCNM) is a management system for Cisco NXOS-based storage fabrics. In addition to provisioning, monitoring, and troubleshooting the data center network infrastructure, the Cisco DCNM provides a comprehensive feature-set that meets the routing, switching, and storage administration needs of data centers. It streamlines the provisioning for the Programmable Fabric and monitors the SAN components.

Cisco DCNM provides a high level of visibility and control through a single web-based management console for Cisco Nexus Series Switches, Cisco MDS, and Cisco Unified Computing System (UCS) products. Cisco DCNM also includes Cisco DCNM-SAN client and Device Manager functionality.

This section contains the following sections:

Introduction

Cisco DCNM provides an alternative to the command-line interface (CLI) for switch configuration commands.

In addition to complete configuration and status monitoring capabilities for Cisco MDS 9000 switches, Cisco DCNM-SAN provides powerful fiber channel troubleshooting tools. The in-depth health and configuration analysis capabilities leverage unique MDS 9000 switch capabilities: Fiber Channel Ping and Traceroute.

Beginning with Release 11.1(1), Cisco DCNM allows you to monitor Cisco UCS Blade servers also.

Cisco DCNM includes these management applications:

Cisco DCNM Server

The Cisco DCNM-SAN Server component must be started before running Cisco DCNM-SAN. Cisco DCNM-SAN server is installed as a service. This service can then be administered using the Windows Services in the control panel. Cisco DCNM-SAN Server is responsible for discovery of the physical and logical fabric and for listening for SNMP traps, syslog messages, and Performance Manager threshold events.

Cisco DCNM Web UI

Cisco DCNM Web UI allows operators to monitor and obtain reports for Cisco MDS and Nexus events, performance, and inventory from a remote location using a web browser. Licensing and discovery are part of the Cisco DCNM Web UI. You can configure the MDS9000 Fabric, also.

Cisco DCNM-SAN Client

The Cisco DCNM-SAN Client displays a map of your network fabrics, including Cisco MDS 9000 Family switches, third-party switches, hosts, and storage devices. The Cisco DCNM-SAN Client provides multiple menus for accessing the features of the Cisco DCNM SAN functionality.

Device Manager

The Device Manager is embedded with the Cisco DCNM Web UI. After the switches are discovered, navigate to Inventory > Switches > Device Manager to launch the Device Manager.

Cisco DCNM-SAN automatically installs the Device Manager. Device Manager provides two views of a single switch:

  • Device View : displays a graphic representation of the switch configuration and provides access to statistics and configuration information.

  • Summary View : displays a summary of xE ports (Inter-Switch Links), Fx ports (fabric ports), and Nx ports (attached hosts and storage) on the switch, Fibre Channels, and IP neighbor devices. You can create charts, print, or save the summary or real-time statistics to a file in tab-delimited format.

Performance Manager

Performance Manager presents detailed traffic analysis by capturing data with SNMP. This data is compiled into various graphs and charts that can be viewed on the Cisco DCNM Web UI. Performance Manager stores data into Elastic search time series database. DCNM doesn't support API access to Elastic search.

Installation Options

Cisco DCNM software images are packaged with the Cisco DCNM installer, signature certificate, and signature verification script. Unzip the desired Cisco DCNM installer image ZIP file to a directory. Verify the image signature by following the steps in the README file. The installer from this package installs the Cisco DCNM software.

DCNM Windows Installer

This installer is available as an executable (.exe) file.

DCNM Linux Installer

This installer is available as a binary (.bin) file.

Deployment Options

You can deploy the Cisco DCNM installer in one of the following modes:

Standalone Server

All types of installers are packaged along with PostgreSQL database. The default installation steps for the respective installers result in this mode of deployment.

Standalone with external Oracle

If you have more switches in your setup or you expect your setup to grow over time, we recommend that you use an external Oracle server. This mode of deployment requires the default installation setup, followed by steps to configure DCNM to use the external Oracle. For more information about Scalability, see https://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/td/docs/switches/datacenter/sw/11_0_1/scalability_guide/b_scale_guide_dcnm_11.html.

DCNM Federation

Cisco DCNM federation is the HA mechanism for SAN devices. Every node in the DCNM federated setup can manage many groups of SAN devices. A single client interface can manage all devices. Federation mode is used for resilience and scalability. It allows you to monitor 20,000 FC ports. DCNM Windows and Linux Installers can be deployed in Federation mode to have resilience in case of application or OS failures. For Cisco DCNM-SAN federation, the database URL (properties) must remain the same for all Cisco DCNM-SAN nodes in the federation.

System Requirements for Cisco DCNM


Note

We recommend that you do not upgrade any underlying third-party software separately. All the necessary software components will be updated during the inline upgrade procedure. Upgrading the components outside of DCNM upgrade will cause performance issues.

This section describes the various system requirements for proper functioning of your Cisco DCNM, Release 11.2(1).

Java Requirements

The Cisco DCNM Server is distributed with JRE 1.8.0_201 into the following directory: 

DCNM_root_directory/java/jre1.8

Server Requirements

Cisco DCNM, Release 11.2(1), supports the Cisco DCNM Server on these 64-bit operating systems:

  • SAN Deployments:

    • Microsoft Windows 2016

    • Microsoft Windows 2012 R2

    • Red Hat Enterprise Linux Release 7.3, 7.4, and 7.6

Cisco DCNM Release 11.2(1) supports the following databases:

  • Oracle11g Express (XE), Standard, and Enterprise Editions, and Oracle 11g Real Application Clusters (RAC)

  • Oracle 12c Enterprise Edition (Conventional)—(Nonpluggable installation)


    Note

    Cisco DCNM Release 11.2(1) does not support the Oracle 12c pluggable database version installation.

  • Oracle 12c RAC (nonpluggable installation)


Note

The Cisco DCNM database size is not limited. The database size increases according to the number of nodes and ports that the DCNM manages, with Performance Manager Collections enabled. You cannot restrict the database size. If you choose an Oracle database, we recommend that you use Oracle SE or Enterprise edition, instead of Oracle XE due to table space limitations.


Note
You are responsible for all the support that is associated with the Oracle databases, including maintenance, troubleshooting, and recovery. We recommend that you take regular backup of the database; either daily or weekly, to ensure that all the data is preserved.

Supported Hypervisors

Server Resource Requirements

Deployment

Deployment Type

Small (Lab or POC)

Large (Production)

Compute

SAN

Windows, Linux (standalone or VM)

CPU: 8 vCPUs

RAM: 24 GB

DISK: 500 GB

CPU: 16 vCPUs

Note 

Standalone functioning of SAN Insights requires 28 vCPUs.

RAM: 128 GB RAM(with SAN Insights) or 32 GB (without SAN Insights)

DISK: 10 TB Disk (with SAN Insights) or 500 GB (without SAN Insights)

Not Applicable

Note

  • Cisco DCNM Small deployments does not support SAN Insights feature.

  • You can use the SAN Insights feature on a medium-sized deployment with 2 TB disk space as well.

  • Every Federation node must consists of 3 Large configuration nodes.

  • From Cisco DCNM Release 11.2(1), you must synchronize the Federation nodes from the Primary node only.

Client Requirements

Cisco DCNM SAN desktop client and Cisco Device Manager support Microsoft Windows 10, Microsoft Windows 2012, Microsoft Windows 2016, and Red Hat Linux. The following table lists the minimum hardware requirements for these client systems.

Table 1. Client Hardware Requirements

Hardware

Minimum Requirements

RAM (free)

6 GB or more

CPU speed

3 GHz or faster

Disk space (free)

20 GB

If you install Cisco DCNM on a virtual machine, you must reserve resources equal to the server resource requirements to ensure a baseline with the physical machines.

Some Cisco DCNM features require a license. Before using the licensed features, you must install a Cisco DCNM license for each Nexus-managed or MDS-managed platform. For information about Licensing in DCNM, see https://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/td/docs/switches/datacenter/sw/11_x/licensing/cisco_dcnm_licensing_guide_11_x.html.

Supported Web Browsers

Cisco DCNM supports the following web browsers:

  • Google Chrome Version 74.0.3729.13

  • Mozilla Firefox Version 66.0.4 (32/64 bit)

  • Microsoft Internet Explorer Version 11.706 update version 11.0.120

Other Supported Software

The following table lists the other software that is supported by Cisco DCNM, Release 11.2(1).

Table 2. Other Supported Software

Component

Features

Security

  • ACS versions 4.0, 5.1, 5.5, and 5.8.

  • Telnet Disabled: SSH Version 1, SSH Version 2, Global Enforce SNMP Privacy Encryption.

  • Web Client and Cisco DCNM-SAN Server Encryption: HTTPS with TLS 1, 1.1 and 1.2

Also, Cisco DCNM supports call-home events, fabric change events, and events that are forwarded by traps and email.