If your support agent asks you to create a support bundle for troubleshooting purposes, follow this procedure. The bundle creation process extracts information from your VAST Cluster into a compressed file that you can send to us. There is also an option to download support bundle files to your own machine.
Generated bundle files are not automatically overwritten when a new collection is requested. By default, data is collected from all CNodes and DNodes. Optionally you can restrict it to specific nodes. Sensitive data can also be obfuscated during creation.
Support bundles are placed into an execution queue with a status of Queued, allowing you to create multiple bundles sequentially without waiting for active collections to complete.
Support bundles can be initiated via the VAST Web UI prior to full cluster deployment for any nodes that are known and reachable by VMS over SSH. In this state, each node generates and uploads its bundle independently.
Selecting a VIP Pool enables you to select a specific VIP address or the default of all VIPs. The bundle automatically includes CNode that held specified VIPs, Leader, and VMS during the specified timeframe, labeled as historical nodes.
System Collection Features And Execution Queue Capabilities
Requests are placed into an execution queue with a status of Queued, enabling sequential bundle creation without waiting for prior jobs to complete. View queue placement in the Position in Queue column under Support > Support Bundle.
Collections can be initiated via the VAST Web UI prior to full cluster deployment for any nodes reachable by VMS over SSH. In this pre-installation state, each node generates and uploads its bundle independently.
Selecting a VIP Pool enables targeting a specific VIP address or the default "All VIPs". The collection automatically includes all historical CNodes, Leader, and VMS nodes active during the specified timeframe.
HPE AHS hardware logs matching the collection timeframe are automatically included for HPE nodes.
System CPU isolation parameters are automatically captured via
/proc/cmdline.Traces triggered by VMS-level LUNA events are automatically captured.
Cloud instance metadata is automatically collected into
instance_metadata.txtfrom AWS, GCP, or Azure IMDS endpoints (http://169.254.169.254/latest,http://metadata.google.internal/computeMetadata/v1, orhttp://169.254.169.254/metadata)
Creating a Support Bundle
From the left navigation menu, select Support and then Bundles.
Click + Create Support Bundle.
In the Create Support Bundle dialog, complete these fields:
Preset
Select a category (or categories) that best suits the issue for which you are creating the support bundle.
Each category includes a predefined set of data objects in the support bundle. Verify with your support engineer which category is suitable for your needs.
This field is optional. The default is the 'Standard' preset.
Prefix (required)
Enter an identifying label to include in the bundle file name.
The prefix can contain up to 64 characters. Special characters are not allowed (except _ and -). The first character must be a letter or digit.
The name of the bundle will be bundle-<preset>-<cluster name>-<prefix>-<timestamp>.tar, where <prefix> is the prefix specified here. If the bundle is obfuscated (
--obfuscateoption, below), <cluster-name> is omitted.For example, if the prefix is MyUrgentIssue, a bundle using the mini preset created at exactly 7:45 am UTC on September 3rd, 2020 on a cluster called cluster1 would be named bundle-mini-cluster1-MyUrgentIssue-2020-09-03-074500.tar.
Start time
Specify a start time in UTC+0 for the period from which to collect information.
End time
Specify an end time in UTC+0 for the period to collect information.
It's usually advisable to consult with the support engineer on the time frame so that you can make it as short as possible and minimize the size of the bundle.
Obfuscated
Converts all bundled objects to text and obfuscates them. Any data that cannot be converted to text is not included in the bundle. The following types of information are replaced with a non-reversible hash: file and directory names, IP addresses, host names, user names, MAC addresses.
Delete after send
The bundle is deleted from the cluster after it is sent to VAST.
Optionally, select Advanced to further specify which data to collect, and also configure upload settings:
CNodes only
Enable this setting to collect data from CNodes only.
DNodes only
Enable this setting to collect data from DNodes only.
CNode
Select specific CNodes to collect data from those CNodes and not from the other CNodes. This selection is ignored if DNodes only is selected.
Note
If you selected the Metadata preset, you can choose only one CNode.
DNode
Select specific DNodes to collect data from those DNodes and not from the other DNodes. This selection is ignored if CNodes only is selected.
VIPPool
Select virtual IP pools to collect data only from CNodes that are included in these pools.
Hubble args
Enter any arguments to pass to Hubble, per instructions from the support engineer.
Astron args
Enter any arguments to pass to Astron, per instructions from the support engineer.
Max binary trace size (GB)
Enter a maximum data limit to apply to the collection of binary trace files, in GB.
Luna
Select commands for Luna, from the list. Luna is a postprocessing tool that can process data collected in support bundles.
Maximum bundle size (GiB)
Set the maximum bundle size (in GiB).
Split time (in seconds)
Set the time interval (in seconds) for splitting large bundles. in order to upload them as a set of smaller files.
If this value is set,
Delete after sendmust also be set.Default: 300s.
Note
If this field is changed from its default value, the only option available in the next step is Create & Upload.
Do either of the following:
Click Create to create a support bundle.
The bundle is created and listed in the Bundles page, from where you can upload it to VAST Data Support at any time.
Click Create & Upload to create a support bundle and upload it immediately to to VAST Data Support.
Uploading a Support Bundle
When bundle creation is completed, the bundle can be uploaded to VAST Data Support.
You can upload the support bundle to VAST Data Support immediately upon bundle creation or at a later time.
To have a support bundle uploaded immediately upon its creation, complete the upload settings in the Advanced pane in the Create Support Bundle dialog.
To upload a created support bundle at a later time:
From the left navigation menu, select Support and then Bundles.
Open the Actions menu for the bundle and select Upload.
The Upload bundle to S3 dialog appears.
Click Upload.
The upload begins.
While the upload is in process, you'll see the Activities icon at the top of the page. Once upload is complete, it will disappear. The upload task is logged in the Activities page, which you can open from the menu.
Downloading a Support Bundle to Your Local Machine
You can download a support bundle to your local machine.
From the left navigation menu, select Support and then Bundles.
Open the Actions menu for the bundle and select Download.
The bundle file is downloaded to your machine.
Deleting a Support Bundle
When you delete a support bundle, the corresponding bundle files are deleted from the nodes, and the bundle entry is removed from the displayed list.
Caution
Deleting a support bundle before it is completely created generates the following behaviors:
When the status is QUEUED, delete performs a soft delete. The bundle is removed from the queue and retained for one hour.
When the status is CREATING, COMPLETING, UPLOADING or DELETING, an error is returned - 400 Bad Request
From the left navigation menu, select Support and then Bundles.
Open the Actions menu for the bundle and select Delete.
Click Yes to confirm.
The bundle is deleted.