This chapter describes how to set up a basic Charon-SSP instance in Google Cloud.

Prerequisites

General Prerequisites

To install and configure Charon-SSP in the Google cloud, you need an account on the Google cloud platform.

Licensing

Charon-SSP requires a license to run emulated SPARC systems. For a typical cloud-based installation, there are two different Charon-SSP product variants with two different licensing models (availability may differ depending on cloud environment):

The cloud-specific, prepackaged Charon-SSP AL (Automatic Licensing) image utilizing a public, Stromasys-operated cloud-specific license server.
Charon-SSP VE (Virtual Environment) utilizing a customer-operated, private VE license server in a supported cloud environment. Charon-SSP VE is available as a prepackaged image on some cloud platforms, and in RPM package format for a conventional installation.

Both licensing options are briefly described below. Please contact your Stromasys representative for any questions about product availability and licensing options.

Please note: the user is responsible for any Solaris licensing obligations and has to provide the appropriate licenses

Charon-SSP Automatic Licensing Overview

Not available on Google cloud. This section is for information only.

Charon-SSP AL images with automatic licensing use a specialized Charon-SSP environment. They require a license to run emulated SPARC systems. This license is created automatically upon first launch of the Charon-SSP instance. Please note the following points:

The Charon-SSP instance requires Internet access (via public IP address or NAT) for the license mechanism to work. If NAT is used, the gateway must be an instance in the same cloud-environment (the source address must be from the address range of the same cloud provider in which the Charon-SSP host instance runs). The public, Stromasys-operated license servers must be reachable on port 8080. Also, a DNS service must be reachable to resolve the host names of the license servers, or corresponding entries in /etc/hosts must exist. The license server details will be provided by Stromasys for platforms supporting the Charon-SSP AL images.
If you change the instance type after first launching the instance and thereby change the number of CPU cores (or if the number of CPU cores is changed by any other method), the license will be invalidated.
Some licensing problems or other requirements (e.g., additional CPU cores needed) may make it necessary to move the emulator to a new instance. Therefore, it is strongly recommended to store all relevant emulator data on a separate data volume that can easily be detached from the old instance and attached to a new instance.
Should access to the license be lost, there is a grace period of 24 hours. If license access is not restored within this period, the emulator will stop (if a guest system is running at the time, this is the equivalent of disconnecting the power without clean shutdown, i.e., it may lead to loss of data).

Charon-SSP VE Licensing Overview

This licensing option is applicable to prepackaged Charon-SSP VE images on cloud marketplaces and to VE-capable Charon-SSP emulator software installed from RPM packages.

Charon-SSP VE license characteristics

The main characteristics of VE licenses are the following:

Software licenses only.
Installed on Charon-SSP host or separate license server.
Require the Charon-SSP VE license server software (RPM package included in the prepackaged, cloud-specific marketplace Charon-SSP VE image).
Require matching Charon-SSP emulator software (preinstalled on the prepackaged, cloud-specific marketplace Charon-SSP VE image).

If supported by the cloud provider, the VE license server instance can be moved to a different subnet, as long as the original instance can be moved. It is also possible to backup and restore (to the same instance) the license server data. However, the following actions will invalidate the license:

Changing the number of CPU cores of the license server system.
Copying the license server data to a different instance.
Seriously damaging the root filesystem of the license server system.
Re-installing the license server system.

Charon-SSP VE License Server Communication Requirements

For proper functionality, the system on which the license server runs must be able to communicate with the cloud infrastructure:

The metadata server of the cloud environment (169.254.169.254)
The host www.googleapis.com

It must also be able to communicate with the client systems using the license. The following ports are used for this communication:

TCP/8083: must be permitted from the client to the license server to enable the use of the license by the client.
TCP/8084: must be permitted by the license server for any system that should access the web interface to display license information.

Basic License Installation Steps Before an Emulator Can be Started

If there is no VE license server running already, decide on which cloud instance it should run and install the VE License Server package on the selected system. The VE License Server RPM package is included in the prepackaged Charon-SSP VE marketplace images. Alternatively, Stromasys will provide a download location. See Installing the VE License Server Software.

If you don't already have a license, contact your Stromasys representative to procure an appropriate license.
Log in on your Charon-SSP VE License Server instance.
Create a C2V file and send it to the email address Stromasys will provide to you.
Install the V2C file you will receive from Stromasys.
Configure the emulator instance(s) to use the license server.

Please refer to the VE License Server User's Guide for more information.

GCP Machine Type Prerequisites (Hardware Prerequisites)

By selecting machine type in GCP you select the virtual hardware that will be used for Charon-SSP in GCP. Therefore, the selection of an instance type determines the hardware characteristics of the Charon-SSP virtual host hardware (e.g., how many CPU cores and how much memory your virtual Charon host system will have).

The minimum hardware requirements are described below. To learn about the default settings and how to use the Charon-SSP configuration options to determine the resource allocation, refer to the different configuration sections of the general Charon-SSP User's Guide of your Charon-SSP version (see CHARON-SSP for Linux), in particular, the CPU Configuration section.

GCP Login and New Instance Launch

Logging in to GCP

To log in perform the following steps:

Go to https://console.cloud.google.com. You will see the login screen.
Enter your login credentials.
Upon successful login, a Google cloud dashboard screen will be displayed similar to the example below:

Preparation

Select or Create Project

A project organizes all your Google Cloud resources. To organize all resources for a certain application purpose, you can group them in their own project. So before you start creating resources, select or create the appropriate project.

To select or create a project, select the project list from the top of the Google cloud console window, as shown below:

Either select the correct project or create a new one by clicking on the NEW PROJECT button.

Create VPCs and Subnets for Instance

Important rules for Google cloud instances with respect to network interfaces:

Interfaces can only be added during instance creation.
Each network interface configured in a single instance must be attached to a different VPC network.
The additional VPC networks that the multiple interfaces will attach to must exist before an instance is created. See Using VPC Networks for instructions on creating additional VPC networks.
You cannot delete a network interface without deleting the instance.
IP forwarding can only be enabled when the instance is created.
The VPC network has a maximum transmission unit (MTU) of 1460 bytes for Linux images and Windows Server images. Operating system images provided by Compute Engine are already configured with the appropriate MTU. For custom images, set the MTU to 1460 for custom Linux images and Windows Server images to avoid the increased latency and packet overhead caused by fragmentation.

Setting up a GCP Cloud Instance for Charon-SSP

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