Associating a NEPP with a Secure Fabric

To participate in a given secure fabric, a nonpartitionable enterprise partition platform (NEPP) must meet the following requirements:

The platform must contain an InfiniBand HCA card with drivers that support InfiniBand PKEYs (identified as subnet tags on the Fabric Manager user interface).
For Windows, the minimum level of the drivers is 4.90. If applicable, download the drivers from Mellanox, and install them on the NEPP.
```
http://www.mellanox.com/page/products_dyn?product_family=32&mtag=windows_sw_drivers
```
For Linux, the minimum level of the driver is 2.4-1.0.4. If applicable, download the drivers from Mellanox, and install them on the NEPP.
```
http://www.mellanox.com/page/products_dyn?product_family=26&mtag=linux_sw_drivers
```
For VMware, the minimum level of the driver is 1.8.2.4. If applicable, download the drivers from Mellanox, and install them in the VMware ESXi environment on the NEPP.
```
http://www.mellanox.com/page/products_dyn?product_family=36&mtag=vmware_drivers
```
The ports of the InfiniBand HCA card must be connected to ports on the respective InfiniBand switches in the Interconnect for redundancy purposes.
The ports of the InfiniBand HCA card must be included in the InfiniBand switch’s Subnet Manager (SM) list of endpoints configured with the subnet tag (PKEY) of the secure fabric.
The NEPP is currently monitored and managed by the Fabric Manager.

You should also obtain the range of available addresses for the secure fabric that you want to associate your NEPP with.

Do the following to configure a NEPP for participating in the secure fabric:

Obtain the following information for each secure fabric that you want to associate your NEPP with:
- Subnet IP address
- Subnet mask
- Subnet tag (PKEY)
If your fabric environment includes partitionable enterprise partition platforms (PEPPs), and the given secure fabric is added to the Fabric Manager, access the Secure Fabrics screens, locate the information for the secure fabric, and then note down the information.
If your fabric environment does not include a PEPP, decide an appropriate IP address, subnet mask, and quality of service (QoS)—Platinum, Gold, Silver, or Bronze—for each secure fabric you want to associate your NEPP with, and then refer to Choosing from Predefined Secure Fabrics for a NEPP-only Fabric Environment to select a subnet tag (PKEY) for each secure fabric based on the desired QoS.
If you are configuring a NEPP with a Windows or Linux operating environment, using the partition image console, access the NEPP, and do the following to complete associating the NEPP with a given secure fabric:
1. Create a virtual IP over InfiniBand (IPoIB) interface—a child of the InfiniBand HCA port IPoIB interface— in the operating system environment.
2. Associate the virtual IPoIB interface with the subnet tag (PKEY) of the secure fabric.
3. Configure the virtual IPoIB interface with an IP address within the range of available addresses of the secure fabric.
Depending on the operating system on the nonpartitionable enterprise partition platform (NEPP), refer to one of the following to associate the NEPP with a given secure fabric:
If you are configuring a NEPP with a VMware operating environment, do the following to associate the NEPP with a given secure fabric:
1. Using the VMware vSphere Client or vCenter, create a virtual switch with the InfiniBand interfaces (vmnic_ib0 and vmnic_ib1) as the uplinks for the switch; and then for each secure fabric you want to associate the NEPP with, create a VLAN-tagged interface to the virtual switch using the subnet tag (PKEY) value of the secure fabric as the VLAN tag value for the switch interface.
2. Using the VMware vSphere Client or vCenter, locate the virtual machine (guest) on the host platform, and then add and specify a network adapter to connect to the VLAN-tagged network segment on the virtual switch.
3. After booting the virtual machine, configure network settings for the network adapter in the operating system on the virtual machine.
For more information, refer to Associating a VMware Operating Environment with a Secure Fabric.
Using the Fabric Manager, access the platform summary page and edit the platform description to manually record information of the secure fabric (subnet tag, subnet IP address, and so on) that the platform is associated with.
For more information, refer to Editing a Platform’s Name and Description.