If the resources that are currently allocated for the NSX Application Platform reach the threshold values set by the system, the system generates an alarm. To accommodate the needs of the NSX Application Platform core services, you must scale out the platform.

Use the following table to determine the minimum number of nodes required to scale out the core services and to learn what improvements are obtained after successfully scaling out the core services.

Core Service Name

Minimum # of nodes required for a Scale Out operation

What improves after scaling out the service

Messaging

At least five nodes

Scaling out the Messaging service increases messaging broker instance in your TKG Cluster on Supervisor or upstream Kubernetes cluster.

Analytics

At least four nodes

Scaling out the Analytics service increases the overall data pipeline processing throughput of the NSX Intelligence features.

Data Storage

At least eight nodes

Scaling out Data Storage service adds more object storage broker instances in your TKG Cluster on Supervisor or upstream Kubernetes cluster.

Metrics

At least three nodes

Scaling out the Metrics service increases the metrics data processing throughput of the NSX Metrics feature.
Caution:

Select the All check box in the Scale Out dialog box and let the system decide which of the cores services must be scaled out. Arbitrarily scaling out a core service category might lead to more resources being used without achieving any performance improvement. Consult the VMware support team before scaling out a single core service category.

Prerequisites

  • All existing nodes in your TKG Cluster on Supervisor or upstream Kubernetes cluster must be in a healthy and ready state before you can scale out the NSX Application Platform.

  • Before proceeding with the scale-out procedures, ensure that your infrastructure administrator has already allocated the minimum number of nodes required for scaling out the NSX Application Platform services.

Procedure

  1. From your browser, log in with Enterprise Admin privileges to an NSX Manager at https://<nsx-manager-ip-address>.
  2. Navigate to System > NSX Application Platform.
  3. In the bottom-left corner of the NSX Application Platform section of the UI page, click Actions and select Scale Out from the drop-down menu.
    Note: The Scale Out action is only supported if you deployed the NSX Application Platform using the Advanced form factor. The action is not supported for Standard or Evaluation form factor deployments.

    If all of the services are scaled out already, the Scale Out button is disabled on the drop-down menu. In this case, it indicates that your cluster nodes have reached the maximum number of nodes allocated. You must first request for your infrastructure administrator to add five more nodes to your current cluster before you can continue with the next steps. To scale out all of the services, you must have a total of eight worker nodes in your cluster.

  4. Select the All checkbox.
  5. In the Advanced Options section, ensure that all of the services available for the scale-out action are selected.

    Unless specifically advised by the VMware support team, ensure that all of the core services are selected so that the system can decide which of the core services must be scaled out. Scaling out one core service arbitrarily can lead to more resources being used without any improvement to the system performance. Before proceeding with single-category service scale out procedure, consult the VMware support team or confirm that you know clearly what can happen if you scale out a single-category service.

  6. Click Scale Out.

    The UI displays the progress of the scale out operation.

Results

If there are no errors encountered, the message banner with Scale out completed successfully! is displayed.