How well does MAAS handle changing machine networks after commission?

Users
1

I’m starting to look into MAAS as an option to build the foundation layer for a new environment we are getting set up, but just had a few questions before I go and try testing things on actual hardware.

  1. How well does MAAS handle automatic discovery and setup of IPMI/iDRAC power management through the BMC? We have fairly modern Dell PowerEdge servers, and ideally once the host boots into MAAS it should be able to create its own IPMI credentials through the BMC as well as getting the IPMI IP that it needs to talk to for power management. Is this something I can expect or is the initial setup likely to be more manual?

  2. How well does MAAS handle both the host and IPMI power management endpoints changing IPs after deployment/commissioning? All our servers will likely be connected to provisioning host and provisioning iDRAC VLANs initially, however once they are assigned to customers they will be moved to isolated VLANs.

2

Is this something I can expect or is the initial setup likely to be more manual?

You can expect MAAS to setup the IPMI credentials during commissioning

How well does MAAS handle both the host and IPMI power management endpoints changing IPs after deployment/commissioning? All our servers will likely be connected to provisioning host and provisioning iDRAC VLANs initially, however once they are assigned to customers they will be moved to isolated VLANs.

I don’t fully get what you mean here. When you deploy a machine with MAAS you’ll set the IP configurations for the interfaces. If you then move these machines to isolated VLANs after deployment it’s something outside MAAS. If the machines are still able to reach out to MAAS and you have enabled hardware sync during deployment, MAAS will also reflect the new network config you apply to the machine

3

Thanks for the quick response :slight_smile:

You can expect MAAS to setup the IPMI credentials during commissioning

Awesome! - Does this include pulling the IPMI IP too or does that still need to be set manually in MAAS?

If the machines are still able to reach out to MAAS and you have enabled hardware sync during deployment, MAAS will also reflect the new network config you apply to the machine

Most of my concern here is around decommissioning customer servers after use, I’m not too bothered about changes customers make while it’s in their hands. The isolated VLANs will still have a DHCP server with PXE pointing at MAAS, so I’m wondering if it’ll still be just fine starting the decommissioning process while the machine is on a different network to the one it was initially discovered on.