Install > Preinstallation tasks > Prepare the environment > Configuration of additional components

Configuration of additional components

This section provides information about configuring the following additional components:

FIPS compliance options

HPE Server Automation (SA) complies with the Federal Information Processing Standards publication 140-2, a security standard that enables government entities to procure equipment that uses validated cryptographic modules. During installation you can choose to enable FIPS by setting the fips.mode parameter to enabled.

You will be prompted during the installation to specify whether FIPS should be enabled or not.

Under normal security conditions, HPE recommends using SHA256 with a key length of 2048. Higher security requirements could require FIPS with a key length of 4096 or other hash functions from SHA-2 family. Note that use of FIPS or other hash functions from SHA-2 family can impact core performance. Contact your Security Administrator for more information.

See FIPS 140-2 compliance.

Note In FIPS mode, sufficient entropy stemming from the character device /dev/random must be available on the core servers, to ensure proper startup and functionality of SA components.

Enabling IPv6 networking

To enable IPv6 networking, run the enable_ipv6.sh script as a post-installation or upgrade step. This enables IPv6 on the SA core and satellite gateways and OS provisioning components on SA 10.2 or later releases. The script is available on all infrastructure, slices, boot servers, and satellite systems. For more information, see Enable IPv6 networking post installation.

For further information about IPv6 and the enable_ipv6.sh script, see “SA Remote Communications Administration” in the SA 10.60 Administer section.

For information about running the enable_ipv6.sh script post-installation, see Enable IPv6 networking post installation.

Cryptographic material modes

SA 10.60 and later supports two certificate modes for installing an SA core:

  • self-signed certificate mode installation
  • third-party certificate mode installation

In self-signed certificate mode, SA uses its own Certificate Authorities (CAs) to automatically sign all the SA Core components certificates.

In third-party certificate mode, SA generates Certificate Signing Requests (CSRs) for the SA certificates. You are responsible for managing these CSRs and for providing SA with the certificates issued by your trusted CA. The SA Core installation completes only after SA can pick up the valid certificates from your specified location.

To switch from self-signed to third-party certificate mode, upgrade your SA Core and Agents, then run a Core Recertification job. This will replace all certificates signed by self-signed CAs with certificates signed by third-party CAs.

  • Your selected certificate mode applies to all the SA Cores and Satellites in the SA mesh. This means that you cannot target only specific cores for third-party certification and keep others under SA certification.
  • SA certificates are unique for each Core, Satellite and managed server. SA Core and Satellite components have unique certificates based on the server they are installed on. For example, on a Core with two slices installed on two servers, the slice certificates of the first server are different from the slice certificates of the second server.
In third-party certificate mode, make sure that all the SA Core and Satellite hosts define the hostnames of all Core or Satellite hosts at the beginning of their /etc/hosts file. Otherwise, the SA installation will fail.
Listing these hostnames in the /etc/hosts file enables SA to generate correct certificate signing requests (CSRs) for the SA hosts.

Example: to install an SA mesh with the following topology,
16.77.42.65 (oracle_sas, truth_mm_overlay)
16.77.41.24 (infrastructure, word_uploads)
16.77.43.252 (slice, osprov)
16.77.45.21 (satellite)
add the following lines at the beginning of the /etc/hosts file for 16.77.42.65, 16.77.41.24 and 16.77.43.252:
16.77.42.65 hostname1.example.com hostname1
16.77.41.24 hostname2.example.com hostname2
16.77.43.252 hostname3.example.com hostname3
The 16.77.45.21 (satellite) server does not need to be listed here because this server is part of the mesh and not part of the Core.

Starting with SA 10.60, if you want to use cryptographic material from a previous SA installation (SA 10.0 or earlier), you can no longer simply copy the existing crypto file due to enhancements to the way SA handles encryption.
You can, however, copy the crypto file from an existing SA 10.1 or later SA Core. You can do so by copying the crypto file /var/opt/opsware/crypto/cadb/realm/opsware-crypto.db.e and the /etc/opt/opsware/crypto/security.conf file to the same locations on the server that will host the SA Core or First Core (Multimaster Mesh) before beginning the installation. During installation, do not have the installer generate cryptographic material and when you are prompted, provide the password for this cryptographic material.

Mounting the SA ISO media

The SA installation/upgrade media is organized into separate categories in the downloaded file structure, for example:

  • oracle_sas (HPE Server Automation Database)

    The media used to install the Oracle database

  • primary (HPE Server Automation Product Software)

    The media used to install the SA Core Components

  • upload (HPE Server Automation Agents and Utilities)

    The media used to upload and install SA Core content and tools

  • sat_base (HPE Server Automation Satellite Base)

    The media used to install the SA Satellite components, it does not include the OS Provisioning components and is therefore smaller and can be helpful when you are transferring the media over the network.

  • sat_osprov (HPE Server Automation Satellite Base including OS Provisioning)

    The media used to install the SA Satellite and the Satellite’s OS Provisioning components.

Initial invocation of the hpsa* scripts for core install/upgrade for SA Cores must be from the primary media, Satellites from the sat_base or sat_osprov media.

The SA Installer requires that the media directory structure be maintained, for example:

<mountpoint>/<user_defined_prefix>-<media_name>/disk001/opsware_installer/hpsa*.sh

where <user_defined_prefix>-<media_name> is, for example, hpsa-primary, hpsa-sat_base, etc. HPE recommends the prefix hpsa and the media category identifiers shown above (sat_base,primary, etc.). The hyphen after hpsa is required even if you do not append a prefix.

SA is delivered as media that can be copied to a local disk or mounted as an NFS mount point. You must mount all media on a host where install script will be invoked. If media is mounted as follows the SA installer will auto mount it on local or remote core host(s) as needed. For example:

  • oracle_sas

    mount oracle_sas.iso /<mountpoint>/hpsa-oracle_sas/

  • primary

    mount primary.iso /<mountpoint>/hpsa-primary/

  • upload

    mount upload.iso /<mountpoint>/hpsa-upload/

  • sat_base

    mount upload.iso /<mountpoint>/hpsa-sat_base/

  • sat_osprov

    mount upload.iso /<mountpoint>/hpsa-sat_osprov/

Where <mountpoint> is a media mount location of your choosing, for example /mnt.

If you use a different directory structure, the SA Installer will prompt you for the path each time it needs to access the media.

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