NVMe/FC Host Configuration for SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 15 SP2 with ONTAP

07/22/2024 Contributors

NVMe/FC is supported on ONTAP 9.6 and above with SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 15 SP2. The SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 15 SP2 host can run both NVMe/FC, & FCP traffic through the same fibre channel initiator adapter ports. See the Hardware Universe for a list of supported FC adapters and controllers.

For the most current list of supported configurations & versions, see the NetApp Interoperability Matrix.

You can use the configuration settings provided in this document to configure cloud clients connected to Cloud Volumes ONTAP and Amazon FSx for ONTAP.

Known limitations

SAN booting using the NVMe-oF protocol is currently not supported.

Enable NVMe/FC on SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 15 SP2

Upgrade to the recommended SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 15 SP2 MU kernel version.
Upgrade the native nvme-cli package.

This native nvme-cli package contains the NVMe/FC auto-connect scripts, ONTAP udev rule which enables round-robin load balancing for NVMe Multipath as well as the NetApp plug-in for ONTAP namespaces.
```
# rpm -qa|grep nvme-cli
nvme-cli-1.10-2.38.x86_64
```

On the SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 15 SP2 host, check the host NQN string at /etc/nvme/hostnqn and verify that it matches the host NQN string for the corresponding subsystem on the ONTAP array. For example:

# cat /etc/nvme/hostnqn
nqn.2014-08.org.nvmexpress:uuid:3ca559e1-5588-4fc4-b7d6-5ccfb0b9f054

::> vserver nvme subsystem host show -vserver vs_fcnvme_145
Vserver Subsystem Host NQN
------- --------- ----------------------------------------------------------
vs_fcnvme_145
nvme_145_1
nqn.2014-08.org.nvmexpress:uuid:c7b07b16-a22e-41a6-a1fd-cf8262c8713f
nvme_145_2
nqn.2014-08.org.nvmexpress:uuid:c7b07b16-a22e-41a6-a1fd-cf8262c8713f
nvme_145_3
nqn.2014-08.org.nvmexpress:uuid:c7b07b16-a22e-41a6-a1fd-cf8262c8713f
nvme_145_4
nqn.2014-08.org.nvmexpress:uuid:c7b07b16-a22e-41a6-a1fd-cf8262c8713f
nvme_145_5
nqn.2014-08.org.nvmexpress:uuid:c7b07b16-a22e-41a6-a1fd-cf8262c8713f
5 entries were displayed.

Reboot the host.

Configure the Broadcom FC Adapter for NVMe/FC

Verify that you are using the supported adapter. For the most current list of supported adapters see the NetApp Interoperability Matrix.

# cat /sys/class/scsi_host/host*/modelname
LPe32002-M2
LPe32002-M2

# cat /sys/class/scsi_host/host*/modeldesc
Emulex LightPulse LPe32002-M2 2-Port 32Gb Fibre Channel Adapter
Emulex LightPulse LPe32002-M2 2-Port 32Gb Fibre Channel Adapter

Verify that you are using the recommended Broadcom lpfc firmware and native inbox driver versions.

# cat /sys/class/scsi_host/host*/fwrev
12.6.240.40, sli-4:2:c
12.6.240.40, sli-4:2:c

# cat /sys/module/lpfc/version
0:12.8.0.2

Verify that lpfc_enable_fc4_type is set to 3.

# cat /sys/module/lpfc/parameters/lpfc_enable_fc4_type
3

Verify that the initiator ports are up and running.

# cat /sys/class/fc_host/host*/port_name
0x100000109b579d5e
0x100000109b579d5f

# cat /sys/class/fc_host/host*/port_state
Online
Online

Verify that the NVMe/FC initiator ports are enabled, running and able to see the target LIFs.

# cat /sys/class/scsi_host/host*/nvme_info
NVME Initiator Enabled
XRI Dist lpfc0 Total 6144 IO 5894 ELS 250
NVME LPORT lpfc0 WWPN x100000109b579d5e WWNN x200000109b579d5e DID x011c00 ONLINE
NVME RPORT WWPN x208400a098dfdd91 WWNN x208100a098dfdd91 DID x011503 TARGET DISCSRVC ONLINE
NVME RPORT WWPN x208500a098dfdd91 WWNN x208100a098dfdd91 DID x010003 TARGET DISCSRVC ONLINE
NVME Statistics
LS: Xmt 0000000e49 Cmpl 0000000e49 Abort 00000000
LS XMIT: Err 00000000 CMPL: xb 00000000 Err 00000000
Total FCP Cmpl 000000003ceb594f Issue 000000003ce65dbe OutIO fffffffffffb046f
abort 00000bd2 noxri 00000000 nondlp 00000000 qdepth 00000000 wqerr 00000000 err 00000000
FCP CMPL: xb 000014f4 Err 00012abd
NVME Initiator Enabled
XRI Dist lpfc1 Total 6144 IO 5894 ELS 250
NVME LPORT lpfc1 WWPN x100000109b579d5f WWNN x200000109b579d5f DID x011b00 ONLINE
NVME RPORT WWPN x208300a098dfdd91 WWNN x208100a098dfdd91 DID x010c03 TARGET DISCSRVC ONLINE
NVME RPORT WWPN x208200a098dfdd91 WWNN x208100a098dfdd91 DID x012a03 TARGET DISCSRVC ONLINE
NVME Statistics
LS: Xmt 0000000e50 Cmpl 0000000e50 Abort 00000000
LS XMIT: Err 00000000 CMPL: xb 00000000 Err 00000000
Total FCP Cmpl 000000003c9859ca Issue 000000003c93515e OutIO fffffffffffaf794
abort 00000b73 noxri 00000000 nondlp 00000000 qdepth 00000000 wqerr 00000000 err 00000000
FCP CMPL: xb 0000159d Err 000135c3

Validate NVMe/FC

Verify the following NVMe/FC settings.

# cat /sys/module/nvme_core/parameters/multipath
Y

# cat /sys/class/nvme-subsystem/nvme-subsys*/model
NetApp ONTAP Controller

# cat /sys/class/nvme-subsystem/nvme-subsys*/iopolicy
round-robin

Verify that the namespaces are created.

# nvme list
Node SN Model Namespace Usage Format FW Rev
---------------- -------------------- ---------------------------------------- --------- -------------------------- ---------------- --------
/dev/nvme1n1 814vWBNRwfBGAAAAAAAB NetApp ONTAP Controller 1 85.90 GB / 85.90 GB 4 KiB + 0 B FFFFFFFF

Verify the status of the ANA paths.

# nvme list-subsys /dev/nvme1n1
nvme-subsys1 - NQN=nqn.1992-08.com.netapp:sn.04ba0732530911ea8e8300a098dfdd91:subsystem.nvme_145_1
\
+- nvme2 fc traddr=nn-0x208100a098dfdd91:pn-0x208200a098dfdd91 host_traddr=nn-0x200000109b579d5f:pn-0x100000109b579d5f live inaccessible
+- nvme3 fc traddr=nn-0x208100a098dfdd91:pn-0x208500a098dfdd91 host_traddr=nn-0x200000109b579d5e:pn-0x100000109b579d5e live inaccessible
+- nvme4 fc traddr=nn-0x208100a098dfdd91:pn-0x208400a098dfdd91 host_traddr=nn-0x200000109b579d5e:pn-0x100000109b579d5e live optimized
+- nvme6 fc traddr=nn-0x208100a098dfdd91:pn-0x208300a098dfdd91 host_traddr=nn-0x200000109b579d5f:pn-0x100000109b579d5f live optimized

Verify the NetApp plug-in for ONTAP devices.

# nvme netapp ontapdevices -o column
Device Vserver Namespace Path NSID UUID Size
---------------- ------------------------- -------------------------------------------------- ---- -------------------------------------- ---------
/dev/nvme1n1 vserver_fcnvme_145 /vol/fcnvme_145_vol_1_0_0/fcnvme_145_ns 1 23766b68-e261-444e-b378-2e84dbe0e5e1 85.90GB

# nvme netapp ontapdevices -o json
{
"ONTAPdevices" : [
     {
       "Device" : "/dev/nvme1n1",
       "Vserver" : "vserver_fcnvme_145",
       "Namespace_Path" : "/vol/fcnvme_145_vol_1_0_0/fcnvme_145_ns",
       "NSID" : 1,
       "UUID" : "23766b68-e261-444e-b378-2e84dbe0e5e1",
       "Size" : "85.90GB",
       "LBA_Data_Size" : 4096,
       "Namespace_Size" : 20971520
     },
  ]
}

Known issues

There are no known issues.

Enable 1MB I/O Size for Broadcom NVMe/FC

ONTAP reports an MDTS (Max Data Transfer Size) of 8 in the Identify Controller data. This means the maximum I/O request size can be up to 1MB. To issue I/O requests of size 1 MB for a Broadcom NVMe/FC host, you should increase the lpfc value of the lpfc_sg_seg_cnt parameter to 256 from the default value of 64.

These steps don't apply to Qlogic NVMe/FC hosts.

Steps

Set the lpfc_sg_seg_cnt parameter to 256:

cat /etc/modprobe.d/lpfc.conf

options lpfc lpfc_sg_seg_cnt=256

Run the dracut -f command, and reboot the host.
Verify that the expected value of lpfc_sg_seg_cnt is 256:
```
cat /sys/module/lpfc/parameters/lpfc_sg_seg_cnt
```

LPFC Verbose Logging

Set the lpfc driver for NVMe/FC.