NCP Nutanix Architecture and Concepts 3 — Questions and Answers
Question 1: What is the minimum number of nodes required to form a Nutanix cluster with Replication Factor 2 (RF2)?
- 1
- 2
- 3 (Correct answer)
- 4
Correct answer: 3
RF2 requires a minimum of 3 nodes to ensure that the cluster can survive a single node failure while maintaining a quorum for metadata.
Question 2: Which Nutanix service is responsible for providing the Prism Element and Prism Central web interfaces?
- Pithos
- Genesis
- Prism (Correct answer)
- Hermes
Correct answer: Prism
The Prism service runs on each CVM and provides the management web interface (Prism Element) and connects to Prism Central for multi-cluster management.
Question 3: What happens to the Controller VM (CVM) I/O path when a node fails in a Nutanix cluster?
- All I/O stops until the node is replaced
- Remote CVMs on surviving nodes take over I/O for the failed node's VMs via CVM autopathing (Correct answer)
- The cluster requires manual intervention to redirect I/O
- Only reads are served; writes are queued until recovery
Correct answer: Remote CVMs on surviving nodes take over I/O for the failed node's VMs via CVM autopathing
Nutanix's CVM autopathing automatically redirects I/O from the failed node's CVM to remote CVMs on healthy nodes, ensuring continuous operation.
Question 4: In Nutanix's storage architecture, what is the 'Extent Store'?
- A cache layer on SSDs only
- The persistent storage layer on HDDs or SSDs that stores vDisk data (Correct answer)
- A metadata index for snapshot management
- A network buffer for replication traffic
Correct answer: The persistent storage layer on HDDs or SSDs that stores vDisk data
The Extent Store is Nutanix's persistent storage tier where actual vDisk data is written after being processed through the write buffer and cache layers.
Question 5: What is the Nutanix 'Shadow Clone' feature used for?
- Creating VM backup copies for DR
- Accelerating reads for frequently accessed vDisks by caching full copies on local SSDs (Correct answer)
- Distributing write I/O across multiple nodes simultaneously
- Mirroring data between two geographically separate clusters
Correct answer: Accelerating reads for frequently accessed vDisks by caching full copies on local SSDs
Shadow Clones cache a full local copy of a vDisk on the requesting node's SSD tier when a vDisk is read frequently from multiple nodes, improving read performance.
Question 6: Which Nutanix component manages the overall health of the cluster and handles service restarts?
- Zookeeper
- Genesis (Correct answer)
- Medusa
- Pithos
Correct answer: Genesis
Genesis is the cluster initialization and service management daemon that monitors CVM services and automatically restarts them if they fail.
Question 7: What is the purpose of 'Zookeeper' in a Nutanix cluster?
- Provides distributed coordination and a consistent configuration store across all CVMs (Correct answer)
- Manages VM snapshots and clones
- Handles load balancing of user requests across Prism nodes
- Stores all VM metadata in a relational database
Correct answer: Provides distributed coordination and a consistent configuration store across all CVMs
Zookeeper provides distributed coordination services and maintains a consistent view of cluster configuration, leader election, and service discovery across all CVMs.
NCP Nutanix Architecture and Concepts 3
What is the minimum number of nodes required to form a Nutanix cluster with Replication Factor 2 (RF2)?