Nutanix NCP-MCA Practice Test - Questions Answers, Page 3

Alerts are a way of monitoring the health and performance of the Nutanix cluster and the VMs running on it. Alerts can be triggered by various metrics, such as CPU usage, memory usage, disk space, network traffic, etc. Alerts can also be configured to send notifications to the administrator or other recipients via email, Slack, PagerDuty, etc. To satisfy the request from the Accounting department, the administrator should create an Alert with the following settings:

Trigger: CPU Usage (%) > 90 OR Memory Usage (%) > 90

Scope: VM

Category: LOB:Accounting

Notification: Email to [email protected] This way, the Alert will only apply to the VMs that belong to the Accounting department, and will send an email notification to the Accounting department when any of their VMs exceed the specified thresholds.Reference:Nutanix Multicloud Automation Administration (NMCAA), page 9;Nutanix Certified Professional - Multicloud Automation (NCP-MCA), section 1; [Nutanix Prism Central Guide - Alerts]

The alert in Prism Central indicates that Calm showback is not able to reach the beam service. This could be due to network connectivity issues or incorrect configurations. The administrator should check the DNS configuration in Prism Central (Option A) to ensure that it is correctly configured to allow communication with the Beam service. Additionally, checking if Prism Element is configured with Proxy settings (Option C) is essential as it can also affect the communication between Calm and Beam. Pulse (Option B) and Flow (Option D) are not related to the Calm showback feature and do not impact its functionality.

Nutanix Certified Professional - Multicloud Automation (NCP-MCA) v6.5, Section 2 - Deploy and Configure Nutanix Calm and Related Components, Objective 2.4 - Identify required configuration settings for a Nutanix Calm deployment

Enabling and Disabling Showback in Calm | Nutanix Community

To ensure the VMs are properly remediated, the Playbook actions should be added in the following order: Take a VM Snapshot, VM add Memory, Resolve Alert. This is because Memory Hot Add allows the administrator to increase the memory allocation of a running VM without powering it off. Taking a VM snapshot before adding memory provides a backup point in case of any issues. Resolving the alert after adding memory clears the notification and updates the status of the VM. Powering off the VM is not necessary and may cause downtime or disruption to the applications running on the VM.Reference:Nutanix Certified Professional - Multicloud Automation (NCP-MCA) Exam Blueprint Guide, page 11; Nutanix Calm SaaS User Guide, section 4.2.3.

The Playbook is designed to manually reduce the vCPU count on any selected VM within the environment. However, it failed during a test run on VM2 because there was a running snapshot of the VM.According to Nutanix Multicloud Automation (NCP-MCA) principles, you cannot reduce the vCPU count on a VM that has an active snapshot1.This is because the snapshot captures the state of the VM configuration and data, and reverting to a snapshot will restore both the guest OS and the virtual hardware2. Therefore, changing the vCPU count while a snapshot is running will cause inconsistency and error. The other options are incorrect because:

A)The Playbook can be executed against a VM on AHV, as long as there is no snapshot running3.

B)The VM does not need to be powered off before vCPU can be reduced, as this can be done using hot-plug CPU feature4.

D) The play will not cause the VM to go below the minimum vCPU, as the minimum number of vCPUs is set to 1 in the Playbook, and the VM has 4 vCPUs initially.Reference:Nutanix Support & Insights,Solved: Snapshot query !! - VMware Technology Network VMTN,Calm on ESXi Deployment | Nutanix Community,Virtual CPU Configuration and Limitations - VMware Docs

The most likely reason for this behavior is that the developer created a post-create task for reserving the IP address. A post-create task is executed after the VM is created and powered on, which means that the VM already obtained a DHCP IP address before the task is run. To reserve the IP address in IPAM as part of the deployment process, the developer should create a pre-create task instead. A pre-create task is executed before the VM is created and powered on, which allows the task to reserve the IP address in IPAM and assign it to the VM.Reference:Nutanix Certified Professional - Multicloud Automation (NCP-MCA) Exam Blueprint Guide, page 15;Nutanix NCP-MCA Questions, question 57.

A Calm Developer is a role that allows a user to create, update, and execute Playbooks in Calm. A Playbook is a collection of Tasks that can be executed on one or more Targets, such as VMs, applications, or services. A Calm Developer can also create and use Runbooks, Blueprints, and Library items in Calm. A Prism Admin is a role that allows a user to manage the Prism Central instance and its features, such as users, roles, alerts, policies, etc. A Calm Admin is a role that allows a user to manage the Calm service and its settings, such as endpoints, credentials, projects, etc. A Project Admin is a role that allows a user to manage a specific project and its resources, such as applications, Blueprints, Runbooks, etc.Reference:

Nutanix Certified Professional - Multicloud Automation (NCP-MCA) Exam Blueprint Guide, page 14, section 4.1.1

Nutanix Calm Roles and Permissions

Nutanix Calm Playbooks

Runbooks are a feature of Calm that allows for the creation of task-based automation against dynamic lists of Windows or Linux VMs. A runbook is a collection of tasks that can be executed on one or more VMs or services. A task is a unit of automation that can perform actions such as executing commands, running scripts, invoking APIs, or sending notifications. A runbook can be triggered manually, on a schedule, or based on an event. Runbooks can be used to automate common operations such as backup, restore, patching, scaling, or troubleshooting.Reference:Nutanix Certified Professional - Multicloud Automation (NCP-MCA) Exam Blueprint Guide, page 16; Nutanix Calm User Guide, section 3.4.

Within a Calm blueprint, an administrator can apply two actions to a Service under the Guest Customization section: Apply a Cloudinit Script and Apply a Sysprep file. These actions allow the administrator to customize the configuration and behavior of the virtual machines that are provisioned from the blueprint. A Cloudinit Script is a set of commands or scripts that run on Linux-based virtual machines during the boot process. A Sysprep file is a configuration file that specifies the Windows settings and options for the virtual machines. These actions can be used to perform tasks such as setting the hostname, network configuration, user accounts, software installation, and more.Reference:

Nutanix Certified Professional - Multicloud Automation (NCP-MCA) v6.5, Section 2 - Deploy and Configure Nutanix Calm and Related Components, page 3

Nutanix Multicloud Automation Administration (NMCAA), Module 2 - Nutanix Calm, Lesson 2.2 - Blueprint Management, page 9

Nutanix Calm User Guide, Blueprint, Guest Customization

A Playbook is a collection of tasks that can be executed based on a trigger, such as a time, a webhook, or a manual action. A Playbook can be used to automate workflows across different systems and services, such as Nutanix Prism, VMs, hosts, and external APIs. A Playbook can also use variables, conditions, and loops to customize the execution logic and data.

In this scenario, the administrator wants to automate the batch processing application on the Linux VM, which can only be controlled by a command on the VM console. The application should run only outside of business hours, and the VM should send REST API calls to Prism to report its status.

The best way to configure a Playbook for this process is to use a Time Trigger, which allows the administrator to specify a schedule for the Playbook execution, such as daily, weekly, or monthly. The Time Trigger can also be configured to run only on certain days or hours, such as weekdays or nights. This way, the administrator can ensure that the Playbook runs only outside of business hours, without requiring any manual intervention.

The Playbook should then have two VM SSH tasks, one to initiate the batch processing application, and one to terminate it. A VM SSH task is a task that executes a command or script on a target VM using SSH. A VM SSH task can be used to control applications or services that do not have a programmatic interface, such as the batch processing application in this scenario. The VM SSH task can also use variables to pass data to or from the command or script, such as the VM name, IP address, or output.

The Playbook should also have a Wait for Some Time task, which is a task that pauses the Playbook execution for a specified duration or until a condition is met. A Wait for Some Time task can be used to ensure that the batch processing application has enough time to complete its work, or to wait for a certain event or state to occur, such as a file creation, a service status, or a VM power state.

The Playbook should also have two REST API tasks, one before and one after the Wait for Some Time task. A REST API task is a task that executes an HTTP request to a specified URL, with optional headers, body, and authentication. A REST API task can be used to interact with external systems or services that expose an API, such as Nutanix Prism in this scenario. The REST API task can also use variables to pass data to or from the HTTP request, such as the VM name, IP address, or response.

The REST API tasks should be configured to send the VM status to Prism, such as the start and end time of the batch processing, the CPU and memory usage, or the output of the application. This way, the administrator can monitor and manage the VM and the application from Prism, without having to connect to the VM console.

The Playbook configuration should look something like this:

Time Trigger: Set the schedule to run daily, only on weekdays, and only at night (e.g., 10 PM to 6 AM).

VM SSH: Set the target VM to the Linux VM, and set the command or script to initiate the batch processing application (e.g.,./batch.sh start).

REST API: Set the URL to the Prism API endpoint, and set the HTTP method, headers, body, and authentication as required. Use variables to pass the VM name, IP address, and start time of the batch processing to the HTTP request (e.g.,{'vm_name': '{{vm_name}}', 'vm_ip': '{{vm_ip}}', 'start_time': '{{start_time}}'}).

Wait for Some Time: Set the duration to the expected time for the batch processing to finish, or set a condition to wait until a certain event or state occurs (e.g.,wait until file /tmp/batch.done exists).

REST API: Set the URL to the Prism API endpoint, and set the HTTP method, headers, body, and authentication as required. Use variables to pass the VM name, IP address, end time, and output of the batch processing to the HTTP request (e.g.,{'vm_name': '{{vm_name}}', 'vm_ip': '{{vm_ip}}', 'end_time': '{{end_time}}', 'output': '{{output}}'}).

VM SSH: Set the target VM to the Linux VM, and set the command or script to terminate the batch processing application (e.g.,./batch.sh stop).

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