Upgrading Cisco Application Centric Infrastructure (ACI) Virtual Edge is similar to installing it. You download a new Cisco ACI Virtual Edge OVF file from Cisco.com and upload it to the VMware vCenter content library. You then upgrade by redeploying Cisco ACI Virtual Edge on the ESXi hosts.

You perform these upgrade tasks using the Cisco ACI vCenter plug-in only. You cannot use the VMware PowerCLI or a Python script.

The Cisco ACI vCenter plug-in was originally designed to work with Adobe Flash. However, and Adobe has deprecated flash in VMware vSphere version 6.7, and Adobe will stop updating Flash at the end of 2020. Beginning with the VMware vSphere 6.7 release, a new version—Cisco ACI HTML5 vCenter plug-in—designed to work with HTML5 is available. This section includes upgrade procedures for both plug-ins.

Note

The name of the VMware vSphere client differs depending on whether you use the Flash or HTML5 version. The Flash version is referred to as the VMware vSphere Web Client; the HTML5 version is referred to as the VMware vSphere Client. Do not use the vSphere (thick) Client to upgrade Cisco ACI Virtual Edge or modify its vApp properties. Use only the Cisco ACI vCenter plug-in. Use only the vSphere Web Client to modify Cisco ACI Virtual Edge vApp properties. The Cisco ACI Virtual Edge upgrade gets stuck on hosts through the Cisco ACI fabric plug-in in VMware vCenter 7.0U1. It also fails to put the host into maintenance mode to install the new Cisco ACI Virtual Edge virtual machine (VM). This happens when you try to upgrade try Cisco ACI Virtual Edge on VMware vCenter 7.0U1 that has vSphere Custer Services (vCLS)-enabled VMs deployed in a cluster by default. Doing so is required for Distributed Resource Scheduler (DRS) and high availability. To remedy the issue, manually migrate the vCLS VMs from the host in the cluster where the Cisco ACI Virtual Edge VM upgrade is scheduled to any other host in the cluster. Migrate from Cisco Application Virtual Switch (AVS) to Cisco ACI Virtual Edge before upgrading to Cisco Application Policy Infrastructure Controller (APIC) 5.0(x) and later releases. Cisco AVS VMM domains are not supported beginning in Cisco APIC release 5.0(x).

The following sections provide information about prerequisites and installation.

For information about other Cisco Cisco ACI Virtual Edge tasks, see the following sections in this guide.

• Installing Cisco ACI Virtual Edge: See the chapter Cisco ACI Virtual Edge Installation.

• Migrating from Cisco AVS to Cisco ACI Virtual Edge: See the chapter Migration from Cisco AVS to Cisco ACI Virtual Edge.

• Migrating from VMware VDS to Cisco ACI Virtual Edge: See the chapter Migration from VMware VDS to Cisco ACI Virtual Edge.

When you upgrade the Cisco APIC, NX-OS software on the fabric switches, or Cisco ACI Virtual Edge, upgrade them all so they remain compatible.

To avoid network traffic disruption, we recommend that you perform the different upgrades in the following order:

Important

Before you upgrade the Cisco APIC, fabric switches, and Cisco ACI Virtual Edge, check the Cisco Application Policy Infrastructure Controller Release Notes and the Cisco ACI Virtual Edge Release Notes for software compatibility information. All are available on Cisco.com.

1. The Cisco APIC software image—Follow the instructions in the Cisco APIC Management, Installation, Upgrade, and Downgrade Guide.

   If you have Cisco APIC clusters, the clusters are upgraded one by one automatically.

2. The switch software on the fabric switches—Follow the instructions in the Cisco APIC Management, Installation, Upgrade, and Downgrade Guide.

   To avoid network traffic disruption during the upgrade, provide a path for Cisco ACI Virtual Edge traffic by putting the TORs and spines into different firmware or maintenance groups and then upgrading each firmware or maintenance group individually.

3. The Cisco ACI Virtual Edge—Complete the following tasks:

   1. Follow the instructions in this chapter.

   2. Complete one of the following steps:

      • Run the vem restart command on the VIBs if you decide to keep the VIBs on the current release.

      • Upgrade the VIBs to the later release if you decide to upgrade the VIBs.

This section provides a high-level description of the tasks required to upgrade the Cisco ACI Virtual Edge.

1. Fulfill all the prerequisites. See the section Prerequisites for Upgrading Cisco ACI Virtual Edge in this guide for instructions.

2. Download the Cisco ACI Virtual Edge Open Virtualization Format (OVF) file from Cisco.com and then upload it to the vCenter content library. See the section Upload the Cisco ACI Virtual Edge VM OVF File to the VMware vCenter in this guide for instructions.

3. Deploy Cisco ACI Virtual Edge on the ESXi hosts. See the section Upgrade Cisco ACI Virtual Edge Using the Flash Version of the Cisco ACI vCenter Plug-In in this guide for instructions.

Perform the following tasks before you upgrade Cisco ACI Virtual Edge:

• Ensure that the Cisco ACI Virtual Edge that you plan to upgrade is properly configured and is operating without any issues.

• Check the Cisco ACI Virtual Edge Release Notes on Cisco.com for information about upgrading to the desired version.

• Ensure that OpFlex is online.

• In order to use the Cisco ACI vCenter plug-in, we recommend that you use vCenter 6.0 Update 3 or later.

• If you want to use the Cisco ACI vCenter plug-in to upgrade the Cisco ACI Virtual Edge, you first must upgrade the plug-in to the version shipped with the Cisco APIC version (4.x).

• If you use static or DHCP IP pools, ensure that you have enough IP addresses.

  There must be more IP addresses in the static or DHCP pools than there are the in the Cisco ACI Virtual Edge service VMs in the data center in VMware vCenter. Otherwise, the upgrade of the new Cisco ACI Virtual Edge will fail.

• If the host is not part of a DRS cluster, manually move the non-Cisco ACI Virtual Edge VMs out of the host or power them off before the upgrade. If the host is part of a DRS cluster, non-Cisco ACI Virtual Edge VMs are moved out of the host automatically.

After you fulfill the upgrade prerequisites, you can use the Cisco Application Centric Infrastructure (ACI) Virtual Edge VMware vCenter to install . You use the Cisco ACI plug-in for VMware vCenter, which automates the process.

Note	If you use a version of VMware vSphere earlier than 6.7, you use the Cisco ACI vCenter plug-in, which is designed to work with Flash. If you use VMware vSphere 6.7, you use the Cisco ACI HTML5 vCenter plug-in, which is designed to work with HTML5. This section provides procedures for both plug-ins.

You first upload the Cisco ACI Virtual Edge VM OVF file to the VMware vCenter content library. You can then deploy Cisco ACI Virtual Edge on the ESXi hosts.

Note	If you use a local data store for content library storage, re-create the content library after you remove a host and then reattach it to vCenter. That is because the data store ID changes after the host is reattached, breaking the association between the content library and the data store.

Note	After you deploy Cisco ACI Virtual Edge, do not remove it from the vCenter inventory and add it back. Doing so removes all the configurations you made during deployment. Deploy a new Cisco ACI Virtual Edge instead of adding an existing one back to the inventory.