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How to install the HANA server software on a virtual machine

This guide describes how to install the SAP HANA server software on a VMware virtual
machine. Normally, SAP HANA will only install on certified (and very expensive) hardware,
but there is a workaround for this.
As this is my very first SCN blog post, i would welcome all of you to provide me with feedback on it! Thanks!
When you want to have a HANA demo or sandbox environment, there are roughly two possibilities:
- Buy a certified appliance from a hardware vendor
- Use Amazon AWS
The first one has the disadvantage that you need to invest a significant amount of money for something that's
just a demo/sandbox machine. The second option is pretty cheap (although the costs can run up if you leave it
running all the time), but is limited in terms of memory amount. Also, it's not possible to run BW or ECC on
HANA with the AWS solution.
So, with the above in mind, I suggested within our organization that we installed HANA on a virtual machine,
so that we have our own demo environment. It turned out that that was something a lot of colleagues had already
tried before, but they didn't succeed. They didn't succeed because the HANA installation performs a hardware
check during the install, and of course a virtual machine does not meet the HANA hardware requirements.
Now, since I'm a little bit stubborn, this triggered me to find a way to work around the hardware check to be
able to install HANA on a VM. And there is one, it's quite simple actually. So, here are the steps to install HANA
on a VM:
DISCLAIMER:
Please use this guide only for internal, non-production HANA systems. Otherwise I think you will have a
problem with SAP
.

Prerequisites
A virtual machine, with at least the following specs:

o At least 24 GB RAM memory


o At least 65 GB + 5 times the amount of RAM of HDD space, for example: 48 GB RAM
and 65 + (5 * 48) = 240 GB HDD space

o Quad-core processor (but: the more processing power, the better. Do not
underestimate this!)

SUSE Linux Enterprise installation ISO file

SAP HANA installation ISO (can be downloaded from SAP Marketplace). You have to create
an ISO file from the installation files manually, for example by using ImgBurn.

VMWare vSphere or another tool to access your VM remotely

System information for your HANA server:

o System ID (SID)
o Hostname (Fully Qualified Domain Name, FQDN)
o Instance number

Patience

Client PC with PuTTY and HANA Studio installed

Install OS
First of all, you need to install the Linux OS. You need the SLES (Suse Linux Enterprise) distro to
install HANA. I have tried to install HANA on Opensuse, but it did not work.

Start the VMware virtual machine with the Suse installation ISO mounted on the VMs disk
drive.

Perform the installation of SLES as normal. There are no special things to consider, except:

o I used the default Gnome install to be able to run the HANA Studio on the server to
test. Its not really necessary to install a window environment on the Linux server, but
Im finding it helpful sometimes.

o Hostname: be careful to set this correct!


o IP and domain
o Make sure SSH access is possible
o Disable any firewalls

During the installation, or afterwards, you need to set up a few partitions mounted on
predefined mount points. The table below will display the file system you need, and the
minimal sizes of the different partitions. Ive also included a column of the file system Ive
created during my installation:

Mount Point
/
/hana/shared

/hana/shared/<SID>
/usr/sap
/hana/shared/data
/hana/shared/log

Minimal size
10 GB
5 GB
1x RAM size
50 GB
3x RAM size
1x RAM size

My size
30 GB
No separate partition or mount point
50 GB
50 GB
200 GB
50 GB

After installation, boot up your fresh Linux installation and use Putty to make a SSH connection to it.
Log in as root. You can also use the remote desktop graphical environment if you want, but in this
example I will use Putty.

First, check if the filesystem is set up correctly:


df h

Next, we are going to install a few software packages that are required for the HANA installation.
Please make sure that you have your SLES DVD mounted properly, or that you have a working
internet connection. Then, give the following command:
zypper in gtk2 java-1_6_0-ibm libicu mozilla-xulrunner* ntp sudo
syslog-ng tcsh libssh2-1
expect autoyast2-installation yast2-ncurses python
Have the packages that are missing installed by confirming the installation

Next, mount the HANA installation DVD

Find the file


/<dvdlocation/DATA_UNITS/HANA_IM_LINUX__X86_64/setuphana.slmodel.template.v2 and
open it with a text editor

Fill in the right parameters in the XML file. Please note how this corresponds to your file
system. Read the XML instructions carefully. Because these settings are system specific, I
cannot tell you how to fill this in or how I filled in these parameters.

Save the file as /tmp/hana.model

Create directory /tmp/hanainstdir:


mkdir /tmp/hanainstdir

Next, we will create a system environment variable called IDSPISPOPD. This will make sure the
HANA installer bypasses the hardware check (since were not using certified hardware). IDSPISPOPD
is actually a cheat code in DOOM, called No Clipping mode. LOL @ the HANA developers there!
export IDSPISPOPD="1"
Check if the OS variable is set correctly with python:
python
>>> import os
>>> IDSPISPOPD in os.environ.keys()
This should return True. Exit python by typing
>>> exit()

So, now we have the file system in place, we have the required packages installed and we have set
the No Clipping mode to on. Time to start the HANA installer.

CD to /<dvd-location/DATA_UNITS/HANA_IM_LINUX__X86_64/

Start the installer script with the following command:


./setup.sh /tmp/hanainstdir /tmp/hana.model

The installer will first extract into your installation dir. After this, the installer will prompt you for a
password. This is actually the password for the DB admin. Enter it twice.

After that, it will install SAPHostAgent. Dont worry if it says it cant connect a few times, this
happened to me too. Just wait and it will continue eventually.

After this, the installation doesnt require input anymore, so you can leave it until it is
completed. Sit back and enjoy the ride...

When the installation is complete, start the HANA Modeler on the local machine to see if your
HANA server is running. Connect to the hostname and instance number you provided during
the install. Use the username SYSTEM and the password you entered during the installation.

So, now you have a HANA server for playing around. Have fun with it!

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