Introduction

This tutorial outlines the process of creating an IBM AIX environment on IBM Power Virtual Server and logging in to the AIX system using your terminal.

Prerequisite

Before you proceed, make sure you have an IBM Cloud account.

About Power Virtual Server

IBM Power Virtual Server is an IBM Power offering. The Power Virtual Servers are located in IBM data centers, distinct from IBM Cloud servers, with separate networks and direct-attached storage. The environment is in its own pod, and the internal networks are fenced but offer connectivity options to meet customer requirements. This infrastructure design enables Power Virtual Server to maintain key enterprise software certification and support, as the Power Virtual Server architecture is identical to certified on-premises infrastructure. The virtual servers, also known as logical partitions (LPARs), run on IBM Power hardware with IBM PowerVM Hypervisor.

With the Power Virtual Server, you can quickly create and deploy one or more virtual servers (that are running IBM AIX, IBM i, or Linux operating systems). After you provision the Power Virtual Server, you get access to infrastructure and physical computing resources without the need to manage or operate them. However, you must manage the operating system, the software applications, and the data.

Steps

Perform the following steps to provision AIX on Power Virtual Server:

1. Log in to IBM Cloud and create a workspace for Power Virtual Server:
   1. Access your IBM Cloud account and navigate to the Catalog section.
   2. Use the search bar to find Workspace for Power. View larger image
   3. Select Workspace for Power Virtual Server and click Create a Workspace. View larger image
   4. From the Data Center list, select a region of your choice (for example, Chennai 01) and click Continue. View larger image
   5. In the Details section, specify details such as name and resource group type for your workspace. User tags and Access management tags fields are optional. Click Continue. View larger image
   6. In the Integrations section, set Monitoring to on or off depending on your requirements. Click Finish to create the workspace. View larger image
2. Locate your newly created workspace:
   1. You will be redirected to the Power Virtual Server workspaces page upon creation. If not redirected, access it through the main menu on the upper left corner. Click Resource list 🡪 Compute and then select the workspace you just created. View larger image
3. Create an AIX server instance:
   1. After your workspace is provisioned (usually within minutes), select the workspace and click Create Instance. View larger image
   2. In the General section, enter a name in the Instance name field and specify the count in the Number of Instances field.
   3. For now, set Virtual server pinning to None and create an SSH key later (not required for this exercise). Click Done editing to continue. View larger image
   4. In the Boot image section, from the Operating system list select AIX, from the Image list select 7300-02-01 and use the default settings for the Tier and Storage pool elements. Click Done editing to continue. View larger image
   5. In the Profile section, from the Machine type list select s922 and click Shared uncapped radio button as Core type. Use the default settings for Cores and Memory elements. Click Done editing to continue. View larger image
   6. In the Storage volumes section, you can skip creating additional storage as the default 20 GB will suffice for this tutorial. Click Done editing to continue. View larger image
   7. In the Network Interfaces section, ensure that Public Network is set to On. View larger image
   8. Click Finish and then click Create the service to initiate the creation process.
4. Access your AIX server:
   1. After the AIX instance is created, click Open console. If the OS status shows a warning, you can restart the instance. View larger image
   2. The console typically opens in a pop-up window. You may need to enable pop-ups in your browser settings to view it.
   3. Within the console, you can set a new password for the ‘root’ user (minimum 15 characters). View larger image
   4. After setting your password, navigate back to the instance details section and locate the external IP address assigned to the server.

5. Login via SSH:

   1. Use your terminal application to connect to the AIX server via SSH using the following command:

      ssh root@<your_server_ip_address>

      Replace <your_server_ip_address> with the actual IP address you obtained in step 4.

   2. You will be prompted to enter the password you set earlier for the ‘root’ user. View larger image

Conclusion

By following the steps mentioned in this tutorial, you have successfully created an AIX environment on IBM Power Virtual Server and established an SSH connection to your AIX machine. You can now begin exploring and utilizing the AIX system.