Use Virtual Machine Prioritization settings to specify the order in which VMs shut down and power on. VM Prioritization is configured in the main PowerChute interface and is disabled by default.
Enable VM Prioritization screen
To enable VM Prioritization, select the Enable VM Prioritization checkbox. Three options display:
Virtual Machines can be grouped into five priority groups – High, Medium, Low, Group 1 and Group 2. When VM Prioritization is enabled, an inventory view of the datacenter, clusters, and VMs appear on the left. On the right, the High, Medium, Low, Group 1 and Group 2 priority groups are listed.
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NOTE: Controller VMs and AFS VMs are not displayed and cannot be added to a priority group. |
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For PowerChute to correctly identify Clusters and VMs, their names must be unique. It is not supported to have more than one VM with the same VM name. |
Datacenter inventory view and VM Priority Groups
You can assign a VM to a priority group by clicking on a VM on the left-hand side and dragging it to a priority group on the right.
Move VMs between priority groups by dragging them from one group to another. To remove a VM from a priority group, select the VM and click the Remove button. Any VM in the inventory that is not assigned to a priority group is considered to be Un-prioritized.
You can configure durations for each priority group, for VM Shutdown and VM Startup.
For Priority Groups:
VM Shutdown duration sets the time allowed for all VMs in the Priority Group to shut down gracefully. This also represents the delay between shutting down VMs for each Priority Group.
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The VM Shutdown Duration can be set to 0 seconds for any priority group to handle any special VMs that need to be shut down later in the shutdown sequence via a command file or SSH action. If you set a 0 second shutdown duration for a priority group, the shutdown action will be skipped for all VMs in that priority group. |
Set VM Operation durations - VM Shutown and Startup
You can set durations for the VM in the High, Medium, Low, Group 1 and Group 2 priority Groups, and for VMs that are Un-prioritized. When VM Prioritization is enabled for the first time, High, Medium, Low, Group 1 and Group 2 durations will have a default value of 0.
Durations for Un-prioritized VMs are automatically set to the global duration values for VM Shutdown and VM Startup, as configured on the Virtualization Settings page.
VM Startup durations can be configured to have a value of zero, to skip the start up of VMs after a critical event is resolved. If VM Startup is set to zero for a priority group, VMs will not start up when the critical event is resolved.
A warning will display in the VM Prioritization screen if a VM Shutdown Duration is set to zero for any priority group.
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If the VM Shutdown Duration is set to zero for a priority group, the VMs in that group will not be shut down. This may result in the Nutanix Controller VMs and the Cluster unsuccessfully shutting down as VMs are still running. To ensure graceful shutdown of your Nutanix Cluster, configure a VM Shutdown Duration for priority groups in the VM Prioritization screen, or configure a command file or SSH action to shut down VMs in priority groups later in the shutdown sequence. |
When VM Prioritization is enabled, the VM Startup and VM Shutdown durations set on the Virtualization Settings page automatically match the sum of the respective priority group durations set on the VM Prioritization page.
For example, if VM Shutdown durations set on the VM Prioritization screen are as follows:
the VM Shutdown duration on the Virtualization Settings page is automatically set to:
90 + 60 + 60 + 30 + 30 + 30 = 300 seconds
Virtualization Setting page - VM Shutdown duration
If Advanced UPS Configuration is used, the durations for each UPS Setup are also changed to reflect the sum of the respective priority group durations for VM Startup and Shutdown.
On the Virtualization Settings page when VM Prioritization is enabled, VM Startup and Shutdown durations become read-only and are automatically populated, as described above. If VM Prioritization is disabled, the durations retain the values set by VM Prioritization, but become editable once more.
Operations such as VM Shutdown and VM Startup can be performed for VMs in a priority group.
For VM Startup, the order in which priority groups are processed is as follows:
For VM Shutdown the order in which priority groups are processed is:
The sequences below describe the VM Shutdown and Startup Sequence for all UPS Configurations.
In this scenario:
VM Shutdown is enabled
VM Startup is enabled
As the critical event continues, PowerChute begins sequenced VM Shutdown. First, the un-prioritized VMs are shut down sequentially. After the duration for un-prioritized VMs elapses, the Group 2 priority VMs are shut down sequentially, followed by Group 1 priority VMs, Low priority VMs, Medium priority VMs and finally the High priority VMs are shut down sequentially. When all priority group VMs have been shut down, PowerChute shuts down the AFS VMs, the Nutanix Cluster, and Controller VMs. PowerChute then shuts down the hosts and the physical PowerChute server.
When the UPS critical event is resolved and the hosts and physical machine running PowerChute are powered back on, the Controller VM starts up, followed by the Cluster and AFS VMs, if running. PowerChute begins to start the High priority VMs with respect to their VM startup duration. When the High priority startup duration elapses, the Medium priority VMs are started, followed by the Low priority VMs, Group 1 and Group 2 priority VMs, and finally, the un-prioritized VMs are started.
In Advanced UPS configuration, all hosts in the Nutanix Cluster must be protected by the same UPS or UPS group..
In this example, UPS 2 may experience a critical event at a different time to UPS 1. If the UPS Setups for Host A and B have VM Prioritization enabled, the VM operations that are performed on the priority groups of the two hosts will occur at different times. For example, if UPS 2 experiences a critical event 2 minutes before UPS 1, the High priority VMs on Host B may be shut down at the same time as the Low priority VMs on Host A. VM operations on priority groups occur at the host level.
