Citrix ADC virtual CPU licensing

Data center administrators like you are moving to newer technologies that simplify network functions while offering lower costs and greater scalability. Newer data center architecture must include the following features in the least:

• Software-defined networking (SDN)

• Network functions virtualization (NFV)

• Network virtualization (NV)

• Micro-services

Such a movement also needs that the software requirements to be dynamic, flexible, and agile to meet the ever-changing business needs. Licenses are also expected to be managed by a central management tool with full visibility into the usage.

Virtual CPU licensing for Citrix ADC VPX

Earlier, Citrix ADC VPX licenses were allocated based on the bandwidth consumption by the instances. A Citrix ADC VPX is restricted to use a specific bandwidth and other performance metrics based on the license edition that it is bound to. To increase the available bandwidth, you must upgrade to a license edition that provides more bandwidth. In certain scenarios, the bandwidth requirement might be less, but the requirement is more for other L7 performance such as SSL TPS, compression throughput, and so on. Upgrading the Citrix ADC VPX license might not be suitable in such cases. But you might still have to buy a license with large bandwidth to unlock the system resources required for CPU-intense processing. Citrix ADM now supports allocating licenses to the Citrix ADC instance based on the virtual CPU requirements.

In the virtual CPU-usage-based licensing feature, the license specifies the number of CPUs that a particular Citrix ADC VPX is entitled to. So, the Citrix ADC VPX can check out licenses for only the number of virtual CPUs running on it from the license server. Citrix ADC VPX checks out licenses depending on the number of CPUs running in the system. Citrix ADC VPX does not consider the idle CPUs while checking out the licenses. Similar to pooled license capacity and CICO licensing functionalities, the Citrix ADM license server manages a separate set of virtual CPU licenses. Here also, the three editions managed for virtual CPU licenses are standard, Advanced, and Premium. These editions unlock the same set of features as those unlocked by the editions for bandwidth licenses.

There might be a change in the number of virtual CPUs or when there is a change in the license edition. In such a case, you must always shut down the instance before you initiate a request for a new set of licenses. Restart the Citrix ADC VPX after checking out the licenses.

To configure licensing server in Citrix ADC VPX using GUI

1. In Citrix ADC VPX, navigate to System > Licenses and click Manage Licenses.

2. On the License page, click Add New License.

3. On the Licenses page, select the Use remote licensing option.

4. Select CPU licensing from the Remote Licensing Mode list.

5. Type the IP address of the license server and the port number.

6. Click Continue.

   Note

   Always register Citrix ADC VPX instance with Citrix ADM. If not done already, enable Register with Citrix ADM and type Citrix ADM login credentials.

7. In the Allocate licenses window, select the type of license. The window displays the total and the available virtual CPUs and also the CPUs that can be allocated. Click Get Licenses.

   Note

   For an ADC HA pair, allocate virtual CPU licenses to each node separately.

8. Click Reboot on the next page to apply for the licenses.

   Note

   You can also release the current license and check out from a different edition. For example, you are already running the Standard edition license on your instance. You can release that license and then check out from the Advanced edition.