Deploying Nutanix Enterprise AI (NAI) NVD Reference Application

Version 2.3.0

This version of the NAI deployment is based on the Nutanix Enterprise AI (NAI) v2.3.0 release.

stateDiagram-v2
    direction LR

    state DeployNAI {
        [*] --> DeployNAIAdmin
        DeployNAIAdmin -->  InstallSSLCert
        InstallSSLCert --> DownloadModel
        DownloadModel --> CreateNAI
        CreateNAI --> [*]
    }

    [*] --> PreRequisites
    PreRequisites --> DeployNAI 
    DeployNAI --> TestNAI : next section
    TestNAI --> [*]

Prepare for NAI Deployment

Changes in NAI v2.4.0

Istio Ingress gateway is replaced with Envoy Gateway
Knative is removed from NAI
Kserve has been upgraded to 0.15.0

Enable NKP Applications through NKP GUI

Enable these NKP Operators from NKP GUI.

Note

In this lab, we will be using the Management Cluster Workspace to deploy our Nutanix Enterprise AI (NAI)

However, in a customer environment, it is recommended to use a separate workload NKP cluster.

In the NKP GUI, Go to Clusters
Click on Management Cluster Workspace
Go to Applications
Search and enable the following applications: follow this order to install dependencies for NAI application
- Kube-prometheus-stack: version 70.4.2 or later (pre-installed on NKP cluster)

Enable Pre-requisite Applications

We will enable the following pre-requisite applications through command line:

Envoy Gateway v1.3.2
Kserve: v0.15.0 in raw deployment mode

Note

The following application are pre-installed on NKP cluster with Pro license

Cert Manager

Check if Cert Manager is installed (pre-installed on NKP cluster)

CommandOutput

kubectl get deploy -n cert-manager

$ kubectl get deploy -n cert-manager

NAME                      READY   UP-TO-DATE   AVAILABLE   AGE
cert-manager              1/1     1            1           145m
cert-manager-cainjector   1/1     1            1           145m
cert-manager-webhook      1/1     1            1           145m

If not installed, use the following command to install it

kubectl apply -f https://github.com/cert-manager/cert-manager/releases/download/v1.16.4/cert-manager.yaml

Open Terminal in VSCode
Run the command to load the environment variables
```
source $HOME/.env
```

Install Envoy Gateway v1.3.2

CommandOutput

helm install eg oci://docker.io/envoyproxy/gateway-helm --version v1.3.2 -n envoy-gateway-system --create-namespace

helm install eg oci://docker.io/envoyproxy/gateway-helm --version v1.3.2 -n envoy-gateway-system --create-namespace
Pulled: docker.io/envoyproxy/gateway-helm:v1.3.2
Digest: sha256:0070bdddc186e6bd48007a84c6d264b796d14017436f38ccfe5ca621aefc1ca5
NAME: eg
LAST DEPLOYED: Mon Aug 25 04:31:06 2025
NAMESPACE: envoy-gateway-system
STATUS: deployed
REVISION: 1
TEST SUITE: None

Check if Envoy Gateway resources are ready

CommandOutput

kubectl wait --timeout=5m -n envoy-gateway-system deployment/envoy-gateway --for=condition=Available

deployment.apps/envoy-gateway condition met

Open $HOME/.env file in VSCode
Add (append) the following line and save it
```
export KSERVE_VERSION=v0.15.0
```

Install kserve using the following commands

CommandOutput

helm upgrade --install kserve-crd oci://ghcr.io/kserve/charts/kserve-crd --version ${KSERVE_VERSION} -n kserve --create-namespace

helm upgrade --install kserve oci://ghcr.io/kserve/charts/kserve --version ${KSERVE_VERSION} --namespace kserve --create-namespace \
--set kserve.controller.deploymentMode=RawDeployment \
--set kserve.controller.gateway.disableIngressCreation=true

Pulled: ghcr.io/kserve/charts/kserve-crd:v0.15.0
Digest: sha256:57ad1a5475fd625cb558214ba711752aa77b7d91686a391a5f5320cfa72f3fa8
Release "kserve-crd" has been upgraded. Happy Helming!
NAME: kserve-crd
LAST DEPLOYED: Mon May 19 06:11:30 2025
NAMESPACE: kserve
STATUS: deployed
REVISION: 2
TEST SUITE: None
(devbox)

Pulled: ghcr.io/kserve/charts/kserve:v0.15.0
Digest: sha256:905abce80e975c53b40fba7a12b0b9a1e24bdf65cceebb88fba4ef62bba01406
Release "kserve" has been upgraded. Happy Helming!
NAME: kserve
LAST DEPLOYED: Mon May 19 05:48:45 2025
NAMESPACE: kserve
STATUS: deployed
REVISION: 2
TEST SUITE: None

Check if kserve pods are running

CommandOutput

kubens kserve
kubectl get pods    # (1)!

Make sure both the containers are running for kserve-controller-manager pod

NAME                                         READY   STATUS    RESTARTS   AGE
kserve-controller-manager-58946fd54d-vsxvn   2/2     Running   0          18m

Note

It may take a few minutes for each application to be up and running. Monitor the deployment to make sure that these applications are running before moving on to the next section.

Deploy NAI

We will use the Docker login credentials we created in the previous section to download the NAI Docker images.

Change the Docker login credentials

The following Docker based environment variable values need to be changed from your own Docker environment variables to the credentials downloaded from Nutanix Portal.

$DOCKER_USERNAME
$DOCKER_PASSWORD

Open $HOME/.env file in VSCode

Add (append) the following environment variables and save it

Template .envSample .env

export DOCKER_USERNAME=_GA_release_docker_username
export DOCKER_PASSWORD=_GA_release_docker_password
export NAI_CORE_VERSION=_GA_release_nai_core_version
export NAI_DEFAULT_RWO_STORAGECLASS=_RWO_storage_class_name
export NAI_API_RWX_STORAGECLASS=_RWX_storage_class_name

export DOCKER_USERNAME=ntnxsvcgpt
export DOCKER_PASSWORD=dckr_pat_xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
export NAI_CORE_VERSION=v2.4.0
export NAI_DEFAULT_RWO_STORAGECLASS=nutanix-volume
export NAI_API_RWX_STORAGECLASS=nai-nfs-storage

Source the environment variables (if not done so already)
```
source $HOME/.env
```
In VSCode Explorer pane, browse to $HOME/nai folder

Click on New File and create file with the following name:

nkp-values.yaml

with the following content:

# nai-monitoring stack values for nai-monitoring stack deployment in NKE environment
naiMonitoring:

  ## Component scraping node exporter
  ##
  nodeExporter:
    serviceMonitor:
      enabled: true
      endpoint:
        port: http-metrics
        scheme: http
        targetPort: 9100
      namespaceSelector:
        matchNames:
        - kommander
      serviceSelector:
        matchLabels:
          app.kubernetes.io/name: prometheus-node-exporter
          app.kubernetes.io/component: metrics

  ## Component scraping dcgm exporter
  ##
  dcgmExporter:
    podLevelMetrics: true
    serviceMonitor:
      enabled: true
      endpoint:
        targetPort: 9400
      namespaceSelector:
        matchNames:
        - kommander
      serviceSelector:
        matchLabels:
          app: nvidia-dcgm-exporter

How to get nkp-values.yaml file?

It is possible to get the values file using the following command

helm repo add ntnx-charts https://nutanix.github.io/helm-releases
helm repo update ntnx-charts
helm pull ntnx-charts/nai-core --version=nai-core-version --untar=true

All the files will be untar'ed to a folder nai-core in the present working directory

Use the nkp-values.yaml file in the installation command

In VSCode, Under $HOME/nai folder, click on New File and create a file with the following name:

nai-deploy.sh

with the following content:

#!/usr/bin/env bash

set -ex
set -o pipefail

helm repo add ntnx-charts https://nutanix.github.io/helm-releases
helm repo update ntnx-charts

#NAI-core
helm upgrade --install nai-core ntnx-charts/nai-core --version=$NAI_CORE_VERSION -n nai-system --create-namespace --wait \
--set imagePullSecret.credentials.username=$DOCKER_USERNAME \
--set imagePullSecret.credentials.password=$DOCKER_PASSWORD \
--insecure-skip-tls-verify \
--set naiApi.storageClassName=$NAI_API_RWX_STORAGECLASS \
--set defaultStorageClassName=$NAI_DEFAULT_RWO_STORAGECLASS \
-f nkp-values.yaml

Run the following command to deploy NAI

CommandCommand output

$HOME/nai/nai-deploy.sh

$HOME/nai/nai-deploy.sh 

+ set -o pipefail
+ helm repo update ntnx-charts
Hang tight while we grab the latest from your chart repositories...
...Successfully got an update from the "ntnx-charts" chart repository
Update Complete. ⎈Happy Helming!⎈
helm upgrade --install nai-core ntnx-charts/nai-core --version=$NAI_CORE_VERSION -n nai-system --create-namespace --wait \
--set imagePullSecret.credentials.username=$DOCKER_USERNAME \
--set imagePullSecret.credentials.password=$DOCKER_PASSWORD \
--insecure-skip-tls-verify \
-f nkp-values.yaml
Release "nai-core" does not exist. Installing it now.
NAME: nai-core
LAST DEPLOYED: Mon Aug 25 04:59:28 2025
NAMESPACE: nai-system
STATUS: deployed
REVISION: 1

Verify that the NAI Core Pods are running and healthy

CommandCommand output

kubens nai-system
kubectl get po,deploy

$ kubectl get po,deploy
Context "nkplb-admin@nkplb" modified.
Active namespace is "nai-system".
NAME                                            READY   STATUS      RESTARTS   AGE
pod/nai-api-58cbd47f86-dqt5z                    1/1     Running     0          4m1s
pod/nai-api-db-migrate-q2urg-nb8zc              0/1     Completed   0          4m1s
pod/nai-db-0                                    1/1     Running     0          4m1s
pod/nai-iep-model-controller-64d88cd94f-q85hf   1/1     Running     0          4m1s
pod/nai-ui-dd8fb65c-zthbf                       1/1     Running     0          4m1s
pod/prometheus-nai-0                            2/2     Running     0          4m1s

NAME                                       READY   UP-TO-DATE   AVAILABLE   AGE
deployment.apps/nai-api                    1/1     1            1           4m1s
deployment.apps/nai-iep-model-controller   1/1     1            1           4m1s
deployment.apps/nai-ui                     1/1     1            1           4m1s

Uninstall NAI v2.3.0 Dependencies

If you are upgrading NAI from v2.3.0 to v2.4.0, uninstall the following:

If Helm was used:

Uninstall Istio

helm uninstall istio-ingressgateway -n istio-system --wait --ignore-not-found
helm uninstall istiod -n istio-system --wait --ignore-not-found
helm uninstall istio-base -n istio-system --wait --ignore-not-found

Uninstall Knative

kubectl delete --ignore-not-found=true KnativeServing knative-serving -n knative-serving
helm uninstall knative-operator -n knative-serving --wait --ignore-not-found
kubectl wait --for=delete pod --all -n knative-serving --timeout=300s

If NKP Application were used for installation:

Go to NKP Cluster Dashboard > Application > Search and Uninstall the following:

Istio
Knative

Install SSL Certificate and Gateway Elements

In this section we will install SSL Certificate to access the NAI UI. This is required as the endpoint will only work with a ssl endpoint with a valid certificate.

NAI UI is accessible using the Ingress Gateway.

The following steps show how cert-manager can be used to generate a self signed certificate using the default selfsigned-issuer present in the cluster.

If you are using Public Certificate Authority (CA) for NAI SSL Certificate

If an organization generates certificates using a different mechanism then obtain the certificate + key and create a kubernetes secret manually using the following command:

kubectl -n istio-system create secret tls nai-cert --cert=path/to/nai.crt --key=path/to/nai.key

Skip the steps in this section to create a self-signed certificate resource.

Get the NAI UI ingress gateway host using the following command:

NAI_UI_ENDPOINT=$(kubectl get svc -n envoy-gateway-system -l "gateway.envoyproxy.io/owning-gateway-name=nai-ingress-gateway,gateway.envoyproxy.io/owning-gateway-namespace=nai-system" -o jsonpath='{.items[0].status.loadBalancer.ingress[0].ip}' | grep -v '^$' || kubectl get svc -n envoy-gateway-system -l "gateway.envoyproxy.io/owning-gateway-name=nai-ingress-gateway,gateway.envoyproxy.io/owning-gateway-namespace=nai-system" -o jsonpath='{.items[0].status.loadBalancer.ingress[0].hostname}')

Get the value of NAI_UI_ENDPOINT environment variable
CommandCommand output
echo $NAI_UI_ENDPOINT
10.x.x.216
We will use the command output e.g: 10.x.x.216 as the IP address for NAI as reserved in this section
Construct the FQDN of NAI UI using nip.io and we will use this FQDN as the certificate's Common Name (CN).
Template URLSample URL
nai.${NAI_UI_ENDPOINT}.nip.io
nai.10.x.x.216.nip.io

Create the ingress resource certificate using the following command:

cat << EOF | k apply -f -
apiVersion: cert-manager.io/v1
kind: Certificate
metadata:
  name: nai-cert
  namespace: nai-system
spec:
  issuerRef:
    name: selfsigned-issuer
    kind: ClusterIssuer
  secretName: nai-cert
  commonName: nai.${NAI_UI_ENDPOINT}.nip.io
  dnsNames:
  - nai.${NAI_UI_ENDPOINT}.nip.io
  ipAddresses:
  - ${NAI_UI_ENDPOINT}
EOF

Patch the Envoy gateway with the nai-cert certificate details

kubectl patch gateway nai-ingress-gateway -n nai-system --type='json' -p='[{"op": "replace", "path": "/spec/listeners/1/tls/certificateRefs/0/name", "value": "nai-cert"}]'

Create EnvoyProxy

k apply -f -<<EOF
apiVersion: gateway.envoyproxy.io/v1alpha1
kind: EnvoyProxy
metadata:
  name: envoy-service-config
  namespace: nai-system
spec:
  provider:
    type: Kubernetes
    kubernetes:
      envoyService:
        type: LoadBalancer
EOF

Patch the nai-ingress-gateway resource with the new EnvoyProxy details

kubectl patch gateway nai-ingress-gateway -n nai-system --type=merge \
-p '{
    "spec": {
        "infrastructure": {
            "parametersRef": {
                "group": "gateway.envoyproxy.io",
                "kind": "EnvoyProxy",
                "name": "envoy-service-config"
            }
        }
    }
}'

Accessing the UI

In a browser, open the following URL to connect to the NAI UI
```
https://nai.10.x.x.216.nip.io
```
Change the password for the admin user
Login using admin user and password.

Download Model

We will download and user llama3 8B model which we sized for in the previous section.

In the NAI GUI, go to Models
Click on Import Model from Hugging Face
Choose the meta-llama/Meta-Llama-3.1-8B-Instruct model
Input your Hugging Face token that was created in the previous section and click Import
Provide the Model Instance Name as Meta-Llama-3.1-8B-Instruct and click Import

Go to VSC Terminal to monitor the download

CommandCommand output

Get jobs in nai-admin namespace

kubens nai-admin

kubectl get jobs

Validate creation of pods and PVC

kubectl get po,pvc

Verify download of model using pod logs

kubectl logs -f _pod_associated_with_job

Get jobs in nai-admin namespace

kubens nai-admin

✔ Active namespace is "nai-admin"

kubectl get jobs

NAME                                       COMPLETIONS   DURATION   AGE
nai-c0d6ca61-1629-43d2-b57a-9f-model-job   0/1           4m56s      4m56

Validate creation of pods and PVC

kubectl get po,pvc

NAME                                             READY   STATUS    RESTARTS   AGE
nai-c0d6ca61-1629-43d2-b57a-9f-model-job-9nmff   1/1     Running   0          4m49s

NAME                                       STATUS   VOLUME                                     CAPACITY   ACCESS MODES   STORAGECLASS      VOLUMEATTRIBUTESCLASS   AGE
nai-c0d6ca61-1629-43d2-b57a-9f-pvc-claim   Bound    pvc-a63d27a4-2541-4293-b680-514b8b890fe0   28Gi       RWX            nai-nfs-storage   <unset>                 2d

Verify download of model using pod logs

kubectl logs -f nai-c0d6ca61-1629-43d2-b57a-9f-model-job-9nmff 

/venv/lib/python3.9/site-packages/huggingface_hub/file_download.py:983: UserWarning: Not enough free disk space to download the file. The expected file size is: 0.05 MB. The target location /data/model-files only has 0.00 MB free disk space.
warnings.warn(
tokenizer_config.json: 100%|██████████| 51.0k/51.0k [00:00<00:00, 3.26MB/s]
tokenizer.json: 100%|██████████| 9.09M/9.09M [00:00<00:00, 35.0MB/s]<00:30, 150MB/s]
model-00004-of-00004.safetensors: 100%|██████████| 1.17G/1.17G [00:12<00:00, 94.1MB/s]
model-00001-of-00004.safetensors: 100%|██████████| 4.98G/4.98G [04:23<00:00, 18.9MB/s]
model-00003-of-00004.safetensors: 100%|██████████| 4.92G/4.92G [04:33<00:00, 18.0MB/s]
model-00002-of-00004.safetensors: 100%|██████████| 5.00G/5.00G [04:47<00:00, 17.4MB/s]
Fetching 16 files: 100%|██████████| 16/16 [05:42<00:00, 21.43s/it]:33<00:52, 9.33MB/s]
## Successfully downloaded model_files|██████████| 5.00G/5.00G [04:47<00:00, 110MB/s] 

Deleting directory : /data/hf_cache

Optional - verify the events in the namespace for the pvc creation

CommandCommand output

k get events | awk '{print $1, $3}'

$ k get events | awk '{print $1, $3}'

3m43s Scheduled
3m43s SuccessfulAttachVolume
3m36s Pulling
3m29s Pulled
3m29s Created
3m29s Started
3m43s SuccessfulCreate
90s   Completed
3m53s Provisioning
3m53s ExternalProvisioning
3m45s ProvisioningSucceeded
3m53s PvcCreateSuccessful
3m48s PvcNotBound
3m43s ModelProcessorJobActive
90s   ModelProcessorJobComplete

The model is downloaded to the Nutanix Files pvc volume.

After a successful model import, you will see it in Active status in the NAI UI under Models menu

Create and Test Inference Endpoint

In this section we will create an inference endpoint using the downloaded model.

Navigate to Inference Endpoints menu and click on Create Endpoint button
Fill the following details based on GPU or CPU availability:

Tip

NAI v2.3 can host a model up to 7 billion parameters on CPU only nodes
GPU AccessCPU Access
- Endpoint Name: llama-8b
- Model Instance Name: Meta-LLaMA-8B-Instruct
- Use GPUs for running the models : Checked
- No of GPUs (per instance):
- GPU Card: NVIDIA-L40S (or other available GPU)
- No of Instances: 1
- API Keys: Create a new API key or use an existing one
- Endpoint Name: llama-8b
- Model Instance Name: Meta-LLaMA-8B-Instruct
- Use GPUs for running the models : leave unchecked
- No of Instances: 1
- API Keys: Create a new API key or use an existing one
Click on Create

Monitor the nai-admin namespace to check if the services are coming up

CommandCommand output

kubens nai-admin
kubectl get po,deploy

kubens nai-admin
get po,deploy
NAME                                                     READY   STATUS        RESTARTS   AGE
pod/llama8b-predictor-00001-deployment-9ffd786db-6wkzt   2/2     Running       0          71m

NAME                                                 READY   UP-TO-DATE   AVAILABLE   AGE
deployment.apps/llama8b-predictor-00001-deployment   1/1     1            0           3d17h

Check the events in the nai-admin namespace for resource usage to make sure there are no errors

CommandCommand output

kubectl get events -n nai-admin --sort-by='.lastTimestamp' | awk '{print $1, $3, $5}'

$ kubectl get events -n nai-admin --sort-by='.lastTimestamp' | awk '{print $1, $3, $5}'

110s FinalizerUpdate Updated
110s FinalizerUpdate Updated
110s RevisionReady Revision
110s ConfigurationReady Configuration
110s LatestReadyUpdate LatestReadyRevisionName
110s Created Created
110s Created Created
110s Created Created
110s InferenceServiceReady InferenceService
110s Created Created

Once the services are running, check the status of the inference service

CommandCommand output

kubectl get isvc

kubectl get isvc

NAME      URL                                          READY   PREV   LATEST   PREVROLLEDOUTREVISION   LATESTREADYREVISION       AGE
llama8b   http://llama8b.nai-admin.svc.cluster.local   True           100                              llama8b-predictor-00001   3d17h