System requirements

Before you install IBM® Maximo® Application Suite, you must prepare your environment so that all software requirements and dependencies are met.

The requirements differ depending on the Maximo Application Suite applications that you plan to deploy, and the size requirements of these applications.

To successfully plan your Maximo Application Suite installation use the following sections:

After completing these prerequirement steps, continue on with:

Requirements and capacity planning

For more information about environment requirements and capacity planning, see the Maximo Application Suite system requirements document.

The Capacity planning section includes the IBM Maximo Application Suite infrastructure calculator worksheet, which is used to estimate your OpenShift Worker Node configuration requirements, storage requirements, and memory requirements.

To use the calculator:

  1. Download and open the spreadsheet.
  2. Select or enter values for the yellow fields to match your planned application deployment.
  3. The calculator provides estimated total system requirements in VPCs and Memory (GB) for your configuration in the Resulting Complete Environments Requirements section of the Output table.

Supported software versions

Supported version information for the prerequisite products listing that follows is included in the Prerequisites section of the Software Product Compatibility Reports (SPCR). Use the reports to understand the architecture, containers, prerequisite versions, supported software and hardware for Maximo Application Suite and its components.

To access SPCR reports:

  1. Go to the Software Product Compatibility Reports page.
  2. From the menu, select the type of report to create, for example Detailed system requirements.
  3. Search for Maximo Application Suite, then select the product version for which to create a report.
  4. Click Submit to create the report.

Tip: You can download the created SPCR report as a PDF, or bookmark a permanent link to the page for reference.

Workstation requirements

To accept the license during installation, the workstation on which you run the Maximo Application Suite installer must have a Java Runtime Environment configured.

For more information, see the Maximo Application Suite Software Product Compatibility Report.

Maximo Application Suite requirements

The following software components are required for Maximo Application Suite:

OpenShift Container Platform

An OpenShift cluster must be configured and running.

Installation environments

Maximo Application Suite runs on top of OpenShift.

You can run Maximo Application Suite on:

Important: To successfully install and administer Maximo Application Suite, you must have a strong understanding of OpenShift processes and concepts.

Maximo Application Suite can run on top of version 4.6 or version 4.8 of OpenShift Container Platform.

For more information, see the OpenShift Container Platform product documentation for version 4.6 or version 4.8.

Capacity planning and sizing

For more information about environment requirements and capacity planning, see the Maximo Application Suite system requirements Capacity planning section.

Use the IBM Maximo Application Suite infrastructure calculator worksheet to estimate your OpenShift Worker Node configuration requirements, storage requirements, and memory requirements. This spreadsheet is linked directly from the system requirements document.

To use the calculator:

  1. Download and open the spreadsheet.
  2. Select or enter values for the yellow fields to match your planned application deployment.
  3. The calculator provides estimated total system requirements in VPCs and Memory (GB) for your configuration in the Resulting Complete Environments Requirements section of the Output table.

OpenShift security context constraints requirements

The Maximo Application Suite installer requires that the OpenShift default restricted security context constraint (SCC) is bound to the target namespaces before installation.

Service Binding Operator

Maximo Application Suite uses Service Binding Operator to bind applications together with operator-managed backing services. This operator is installed automatically when you install the Suite.

For more information about this operator, see this OperatorHub documentation.

IBM Certificate Manager

Maximo Application Suite uses IBM Certificate Manager service to control certificate management. This service ensures that certificates are valid and up to date, and attempts to renew certificates at a configured time before expiry.

To install this service into your OpenShift cluster, you install the IBM® Cloud Pak foundational services operator and create an OperandRequest instance that includes the ibm-cert-manager-operator operator in the list of requested services.

For more information, see the IBM Cloud Pak foundational services installation documentation.

MongoDB

Maximo Application Suite uses MongoDB for data dictionary and local user management. Your MongoDB instance can run in the OpenShift cluster or external to it.

For installation and configuration information, see the MongoDB documentation.

Note: For Maximo Application Suite, you can use the Community Edition of MongoDB. To set up MongoDB Community Edition on OpenShift, use the MongoDB quick start guide on GitHub. Before you run the installation script in this guide, you must set the MONGODB_STORAGE_CLASS variable to the storage class that you want to use for persistent volume claims. To make sure that you defined an appropriate storage class, run the following command before you run the installation script: 

oc patch storageclass ocs-storagecluster-ceph-rbd -p '{"metadata": {"annotations": {"storageclass.kubernetes.io/is-default-class": "true"}}}'

If you want to use a different storage provider, replace the ocs-storagecluster-ceph-rbd parameter with the appropriate value for your provider.

To work with Maximo Application Suite, your MongoDB instance must support the transport layer security (TLS) communication protocol. For more information, see TLS/SSL (Transport Encryption) in the MongoDB documentation.

Take note of the following MongoDB information, as you will need it to complete the setup of the Suite:

Behavior Analytics Services

The Behavior Analytics Services (BAS) operator collects and processes Maximo Application Suite license and usage information.

Maximo Application Suite records information that is necessary to provide you with access to the suite and to ensure that AppPoints are correctly managed based on individual user entitlements. Maximo Application Suite also records usage against different components to monitor compliance of Maximo Application Suite license terms. Register the required contact information for IBM to use in communication about compliance and usage of your Maximo Application Suite installation. For more information, see the IBM Privacy Statement.

Before you deploy an instance of BAS into your cluster, you must specify a deployment type. To ensure that your Maximo Application Suite instance can communicate with the BAS instance, specify an Analytics Proxy deployment. After you deploy the BAS instance, record its endpoint URL and generate an API key for the BAS operator. You need these values to finish the BAS setup after you complete the installation of Maximo Application Suite.

Tip: The BAS operator requires both a file system-based storage class and a block storage class.

You can use the BAS quick-start installation guide to complete the following steps:

  1. Configure storage and authentication settings for an Analytics Proxy deployment of BAS.
  2. Run a script that deploys the BAS instance and displays the endpoint URL and API key.

Alternatively, you can deploy your BAS instance by using the BAS installation guides for the OpenShift command-line interface or console.
Note: After you install the BAS operator, do not complete the steps to create a Full deployment custom resource (CR). Ensure that you complete the steps to create an Analytics Proxy deployment CR.

IBM Suite License Service

The Suite License Service (SLS) stores and manages the Maximo Application Suite license. You upload the license file to the SLS server as part of initial setup.

Each Maximo Application Suite instance can be connected to a unique SLS instance. Two or more Maximo Application Suite instances can also share an SLS and the corresponding license file.

SLS is installed from the OpenShift OperatorHub. The Suite License Service catalog entry includes the complete installation instructions.

Before you install SLS, you must have the following information:

To install SLS on OpenShift:

  1. Enable the IBM Operator Catalog in your OpenShift cluster.
    For more information, see Red Hat Catalog Enablement for the IBM Operator Catalog in the IBM GitHub organization.
  2. From your OpenShift user interface, go to the OperatorHub.
  3. In the filter field, enter IBM Suite License Service.
  4. Install SLS.
    The installation instructions are provided in the OperatorHub Suite License Service catalog entry.
  5. Save the URL, registration key, and the CA from the Suite Registration configmap. You use this information to configure SLS during initial setup.

SMTP

An SMTP server connection is required to enable email notifications for Maximo Application Suite system events such as new user welcome emails and password reset communication.

You can configure SMTP as part of setup or later.

Certificate issuer

At installation time, you can provide a Cluster Issuer that is based on a trusted certificate authority (CA) for signing the certificates that are generated for your Maximo Application Suite domains.

By default, Maximo Application Suite provides a Cluster Issuer that generates Maximo Application Suite certificates that are signed by a self-signed CA. To use your own Cluster Issuer, include the following optional parameter when you run the Maximo Application Suite installer:
-c myClusterIssuerName

Maximo Application Suite uses IBM Certificate Manager for automatic management and issuance of TLS certificates.

Optional: Identity providers

Identity provider prerequisites for Maximo Application Suite.

LDAP server

To use LDAP user registry with Maximo Application Suite, you need the following LDAP server information.

Important: To use the LDAP server for user and group synchronization, the server must support the secure LDAP (LDAPS) protocol. Non-TLS connections are not supported.

Configuration parameters

The following parameters are configurable:

Required by

SAML server

Configuring SAML user authentication for use with Maximo Application Suite is a multistep process:

  1. Create SAML service provider information
    Your Maximo Application Suite server acts as service provider for the SAML identify provider (IdP). You need to provide a preferred service provider name and select a name identifier format, or use the defaults. The information is written to a service provider metadata file that you use to configure your SAML provider.
  2. Register with the SAML provider.
    Configure your SAML IdP to recognize Maximo Application Suite. Use the downloaded SP file and follow the information for your SAML provider to complete this step.
  3. From your SAML IdP, download the SAML IdP metadata XML file to Maximo Application Suite.

Configuration parameters

The following parameters are configurable: