Author : Rajesh K. Jeyapaul, Neha Ghongade

In today’s fast-evolving IT landscape, many organizations are moving towards cloud-native technologies while still needing to maintain their mission-critical workloads on legacy systems. This is where the power of IBM mainframes comes into play. OpenShift, Red Hat’s enterprise Kubernetes platform, running on IBM’s z/OS via zCX (IBM z Systems Cloud Execution), provides a powerful solution to run containerized applications on mainframes. With the addition of Instana, a leading application performance management (APM) solution, organizations can seamlessly monitor and manage their workloads. In this step-by-step guide, we’ll show you how to deploy the Instana agent on OpenShift clusters running on z/OS with zCX for comprehensive monitoring.

What is OpenShift on z/OS with zCX?

Before we dive into the step-by-step deployment process of Instana agent, let’s clarify what OpenShift on z/OS with zCX means. 

OpenShift on z/OS using zCX refers to the deployment of the OpenShift platform on IBM’s z/OS, the operating system that runs on IBM mainframes, utilizing zCX (IBM z Systems Cloud Execution). This combination allows organizations to run cloud-native workloads like containers and Kubernetes clusters directly on IBM mainframes, taking full advantage of the mainframe's compute power and scalability.

Key Concepts to Understand 

·             OpenShift is a Kubernetes distribution from Red Hat designed to help organizations manage and deploy containerized applications at scale. 

·             z/OS is IBM’s mainframe operating system, known for its robustness, security, and reliability, especially in mission-critical industries like banking, government, and healthcare. 

·             zCX (IBM z Systems Cloud Execution) allows cloud-native workloads such as containers and Kubernetes clusters to run on the z/OS platform, leveraging the mainframe’s computing power and scalability. 

By deploying Instana on OpenShift, organizations can gain deep observability of their containerized applications, ensuring that they’re operating at peak performance.

Architecture Overview

To better understand how this deployment works, let's first visualize the architecture:

Architecture Diagram:

• Instana Self-Hosted Server: The cloud-based monitoring platform where application metrics, traces and logs are sent for real-time monitoring and analysis.
• OpenShift on zCX: OpenShift is running on IBM z/OS using zCX, which acts as the environment for your containerized workloads.
• Instana Agent: Deployed as a container within OpenShift, the Instana agent monitors the applications running on the platform, collects metrics, and sends them to Instana’s server for further analysis.

Prerequisites

Before proceeding with the deployment, make sure you meet the following prerequisites:

1. IBM zCX environment with OpenShift running on z/OS.
2. Instana Account: Ensure you have an active appropriate access rights to the Instana Server for deploying instana agent.
3. OpenShift Client: The command-line tool for interacting with your OpenShift cluster.
4. Access to the OpenShift Cluster: Ensure you have appropriate access rights for deploying resources in the OpenShift cluster.
5. Helm Installed: Helm is installed on your OpenShift running on z/OS environment. You can install Helm using the instructions provided on the official Helm website.

https://docs.redhat.com/en/documentation/openshift_container_platform/4.9/html/building_applications/working-with-helm-charts#installing-helm

Step-by-Step Guide to Deploy Instana Agent

Step 1: Add the Instana Helm Repository

First, you need to add the Instana Helm repository to your local Helm configuration to access the Instana charts.

helm repo add instana https://instana.github.io/helm-charts

helm repo update

Step 2: Install the Instana Agent using Helm

Navigate to the Instana Server, click on Deploy Agent as shown in the below screenshot

Select OpenShift using Helm Chart as shown in the screenshot

Add your cluster name, agent zone and execute command from OC command line of OpenShift running on z/OS.

Step 3: Verify the Deployment

To ensure that the Instana agent is deployed successfully, check the status of the pods in the instana-agent namespace.

oc get pods -n instana-agent

You should see the Instana agent pods running. If any pods are not in the Running state, you can view the logs for troubleshooting.

oc logs <pod-name> -n instana-agent

If any pods are not in the Running state, if it’s in the pending state, you can view the details for troubleshooting.by executing below command.

oc describe <pod-name> -n instana-agent

Step 4: Confirm Data Collection

Once the Instana agent is running, it will start collecting metrics and logs from the applications within your OpenShift cluster. You can verify that data is being sent to the Instana cloud by logging into your Instana dashboard.

• Navigate to your Instana Dashboard.
• Under the Applications section, verify that your OpenShift containers and workloads are being displayed with performance metrics and health indicators.

Step 5: Optional Configuration (Alerts, Events, etc.)

Instana provides powerful monitoring capabilities, including customizable alerts and dashboards. You can set thresholds for CPU, memory usage, application errors, and other key performance metrics. Instana will automatically notify you when these thresholds are breached, ensuring you stay on top of any performance issues.

To know more refer this doc.

https://www.ibm.com/docs/en/instana-observability/current?topic=instana-managing-events-alerts

Conclusion

Deploying the Instana agent on OpenShift running on z/OS with zCX offers organizations a seamless way to monitor and manage their cloud-native applications while still leveraging the power and reliability of IBM’s mainframe systems. With this setup, organizations can modernize their workloads, ensuring optimal performance and uptime while taking advantage of the cloud-native tools offered by OpenShift and Instana.

By following this step-by-step guide, you can easily deploy Instana to your OpenShift clusters on zCX and begin leveraging its full monitoring capabilities. With Instana, you’ll be able to gain deep insights into your containerized applications, helping you to proactively resolve issues and improve performance.

For further customization or troubleshooting, refer to the official Instana documentation, or consult IBM’s resources on OpenShift and zCX.

#Agent
#Alerting