Sometimes at work priorities change. Right now for me that means that my vRA studying is going to need to go on the back burner while I step into some Kubernetes sized shoes. This is both exciting and frustrating at the same time. On the one hand, learning Kubernetes is very exciting and full of a lot of diverse technologies. While on the other, I’ve spent a great deal of time working with an old version of vRA just for the purposes of the VCAP-CMA exam.
Disclaimer: These are my notes from studying for the 3V0-31.18 exam. If something doesn’t make sense, please feel free to reach out. The main goal for this objective is the security of vRealize Automation. Objective 8.2 – Secure a vRealize Automation deployment in accordance with the VMware hardening guide References Secure Configuration Guide This is very much around the appliance itself so familiarity with Linux hardening, particularly around SSH will be beneficial.
Disclaimer: These are my notes from studying for the 3V0-31.18 exam. If something doesn’t make sense, please feel free to reach out. The main goal for this objective is the security of vRealize Automation. Objective 8.1 – Renew, and/or replace security certificates on distributed vRealize Automation components References Updating vRealize Automation Certificates This is about replacing the certificates on these components: vRA appliance IaaS Manager Service Server Web Server Other certificates that are in use manage themselves through self signed certificates to communicate.
Disclaimer: These are my notes from studying for the 3V0-31.18 exam. If something doesn’t make sense, please feel free to reach out. The main goal for this objective is the initial installation & configuration of vRB in line with vRA. Objective 7.2 – Integrate vRealize Business with vRealize Automation References vRealize Automation Installation & Configuration vRealize Business Installation & Configuration Pretty simple objective this one. Once you’ve deployed the vRB appliance, browse to the vRB VAMI page, on the Register tab complete the details of the vRA appliance and hit register.
Disclaimer: These are my notes from studying for the 3V0-31.18 exam. If something doesn’t make sense, please feel free to reach out. The main goal for this objective is scaling vRealize Automation Objective 7.1 – Scale vRealize Automation components to a highly-available configuration References vRealize Automation Installation & Configuration There are a few ways to scaling a vRA installation. The simplest of which involves installing IaaS components on your Windows servers & using the VAMI to add another vRA node to the cluster.
Disclaimer: These are my notes from studying for the 3V0-31.18 exam. If something doesn’t make sense, please feel free to reach out. The main goal for the whole of section 6 is to understand the tenant administration required. Objective 6.2 – Add additional tenants and/or business groups to existing ones References Configuring vRealize Automation This should be a fairly quick objective to cover off. Add additional tenants Creating additional tenants is done by logging in as a System Administrator to the default tenant.
Disclaimer: These are my notes from studying for the 3V0-31.18 exam. If something doesn’t make sense, please feel free to reach out. The main goal for the whole of section 6 is to understand the tenant administration required. Objective 6.1 – Manage Authentication Configuration to meet Business Requirements References Configuring vRealize Automation Identity Management in vRealize Automation 7 My study guide for the VCP-CMA – Objectives 2.2, 2.3 & 2.
Disclaimer: These are my notes from studying for the 3V0-31.18 exam. If something doesn’t make sense, please feel free to reach out. The main goal for the whole of section 4 is to know where to start with troubleshooting various aspects of vRealize Automation. Objective 4.2 – Troubleshoot Tenant Operations References Installing vRealize Automation Configuring vRealize Automation Objective 2.4 – VCP7-CMA What kind of issues might you run into with respect to tenant operations?
Disclaimer: These are my notes from studying for the 3V0-31.18 exam. If something doesn’t make sense, please feel free to reach out. The main goal for the whole of section 4 is to know where to start with troubleshooting various aspects of vRealize Automation. Objective 4.1 – Troubleshoot Infrastructure Issues References Installing vRealize Automation Objective 2.4 – VCP7-CMA I’m going to break this down into user troubleshooting (think permissions, blueprints, business group etc.
Disclaimer: These are my notes from studying for the 3V0-31.18 exam. If something doesn’t make sense, please feel free to reach out. The main goal for the whole of section 3 is to understand how to build governance into your vRA installation. Objective 3.2 – Implement a Governance Model that Maps to Given Business Needs References Working with Approval Policies This is very much around approval policies so we need to think about how to define a policy & how to consume said policy.
Disclaimer: These are my notes from studying for the 3V0-31.18 exam. If something doesn’t make sense, please feel free to reach out. The main goal for the whole of section 3 is to understand how to build governance into your vRA installation. Objective 3.1 – Manage Multiple Reservations to Meet Business Needs References Configuring vRealize Automation Installing vRealize Automation Reservation Selection To reiterate again we need to think about what could be involved end to end so in a scenario where multiple reservations are the answer, what else could be involved?
Disclaimer: These are my notes from studying for the 3V0-31.18 exam. If something doesn’t make sense, please feel free to reach out. The main goal for the whole of section 2 is to understand how to configure vRA to be able to consume resources. Objective 2.3 -Configure vRealize Automation to consume NSX resources References Configuring vRealize Automation Installing vRealize Automation First thing you’re going to need to do if you want to setup NSX within vRA is confirm that NSX is healthy.
Disclaimer: These are my notes from studying for the 3V0-31.18 exam. If something doesn’t make sense, please feel free to reach out. The main goal for the whole of section 2 is to understand how to configure vRA to be able to consume resources. Objective 2.2 – Create and Manage Storage Profiles References Configuring vRealize Automation Installing vRealize Automation This would seem to cover off two key parts of a storage profile.
Disclaimer: These are my notes from taking the 2V0-731 exam. If something doesn’t make sense, please feel free to reach out. The goal of this objective is be comfortable with installing plugins into vRO and doing the initial configuration. Particular emphasis on VMware products (no surprises!) Objective 6.4 – Install and Configure Plugins in vRealize Orchestrator Install and configure plug-in in vRealize Orchestrator Install and configure vRealize Automation plugin Install and configure VMware NSX plugin Run configuration workflows in vRealize Orchestrator client Run configuration workflows for vRealize Automation plugin Run configuration workflows for NSX plugin Run configuration workflows for vSphere plugin Determine if a plugin is enabled References Configuring vRealize Automation Life Cycle Extensibility Using the vRealize Orchestrator Plug-in for vRealize Automation Plugins can be downloaded from VMware solution exchange as .
Disclaimer: These are my notes from taking the 2V0-731 exam. If something doesn’t make sense, please feel free to reach out. The goal of this objective is be comfortable with automated certain tasks based on the lifecycle state of a VM. Objective 6.3 – Configure Virtual Machine Lifecycle Automation Configure automatic post-provisioning actions based on design criteria Configure automatic deactivation of a virtual machine based on condition criteria Configure automated event brokering for different status or event criteria based on design requirements References Managing vRealize Automation Configuring vRealize Automation Life Cycle Extensibility Eric Shanks Pluralsight Course on vRA Extensibility (no longer have access so I can’t verify exactly what its called) These all rely on creating vRO workflows based on specific events.
Disclaimer: These are my notes from studying for the 3V0-31.18 exam. If something doesn’t make sense, please feel free to reach out. The main goal for the whole of section 2 is to understand how to configure vRA to be able to consume resources. Objective 2.1 – Create and Manage Multiple Endpoints References Configuring vRealize Automation Installing vRealize Automation As I’ve said previously the VCAP-CMA exam is objective based, so you’re likely to be asked to achieve an end goal.
Disclaimer: These are my notes from taking the 2V0-731 exam. If something doesn’t make sense, please feel free to reach out. The goal of this objective is be comfortable with subscription events. Objective 6.2 – Create and Manage Event Broker Subscriptions Determine appropriate subscription option based on design (blockable, replyable, schema) Configure subscription conditions based on the design (data, core event message values) Configure subscription workflow including input and output parameters based on the design Configure subscription details based on the design (priority, timeout, blocking) References Managing vRealize Automation Configuring vRealize Automation Eric Shanks Pluralsight Course on vRA Extensibility (no longer have access so I can’t verify exactly what its called) All subscriptions are configured per tenant, nothing global.
Disclaimer: These are my notes from taking the 2V0-731 exam. If something doesn’t make sense, please feel free to reach out. The goal of this objective is be comfortable setting the vRO endpoints up. Objective 6.1 – Configure vRealize Orchestrator for use with vRealize Automation Configure vRealize Automation to use an external vRealize Orchestrator server Configure default vRealize Orchestrator settings in vRealize Automation Set tenant specific vRealize Orchestrator settings in vRealize Automation References Managing vRealize Automation Configuring vRealize Automation Not a great deal to this one, but we’ll crack on anyway.
Disclaimer: These are my notes from taking the 2V0-731 exam. If something doesn’t make sense, please feel free to reach out. The goal of this objective is be comfortable managing the fabric and associated reservations. Objective 5.2 – Create and Manage Fabric Groups, Reservations and Network Profiles Create and configure a fabric group Select compute resources to include in the fabric group Configure compute resource Data Collection Create a vSphere reservation Assign a business group to the vSphere reservation Create a vCloud Air reservation Create and configure network profile type For static IP address assignment External network profiles NAT network profile Routed network profile Create and configure machine prefixes References Managing vRealize Automation Configuring vRealize Automation Permissions:
Disclaimer: These are my notes from taking the 2V0-731 exam. If something doesn’t make sense, please feel free to reach out. The goal of this objective is be comfortable adding endpoints to support the various integrations with other VMware endpoints. Some of this has changed in later versions, but the exam is based around vRA 7.0 so that is where this will focus. Objective 5.1 – Create and Manage VMware Endpoints Integrate vRealize Automation with NSX Add a vRealize Orchestrator endpoint to vRealize Automation Configure the NSX plugin in vRealize Orchestrator Perform data collection in vRealize Automation Create and configure a vSphere Endpoint Configure NSX Network and Security for the vSphere endpoint Create and configure a vCloud Air endpoint References Managing vRealize Automation NSX is integrated via vRO, it can’t be added as an endpoint directly in vRA (NB: this is something that changed in later versions).
Disclaimer: These are my notes from taking the 2V0-731 exam. If something doesn’t make sense, please feel free to reach out. The goal of this objective is be able to view the provisioned resources in terms of compute/storage. Short post for this one! Objective 4.5 – Manage Provisioned Resources Identify and locate owned items by assigned role Define resource quotas for managed resources based on design requirements Add resource portliest to the vRealize Automation homepage References Managing vRealize Automation Permissions required for various scenarios, screenshot taken directly from the Managing vRealize Automation document.
Disclaimer: These are my notes from studying for the 3V0-31.18 exam. If something doesn’t make sense, please feel free to reach out. The main goal for the whole of section 1 is to understand blueprint creation and modification in depth. Objective 1.5 – Consume NSX components of a complex blueprint References Configuring vRealize Automation For this objective, have a think about everything you may need to put in place to consume an NSX element within a blueprint.
Disclaimer: These are my notes from taking the 2V0-731 exam. If something doesn’t make sense, please feel free to reach out. The goal of this objective is to understand approval policies. Objective 4.4 – Locate and Reclaim Resources Based on Provided Criteria Locate resources for reclamation based on provided criteria Initiate a system reclamation Eliminate known used systems References Managing vRealize Automation Using Administration, Reclamation you can search for VMs to reclaim.
Disclaimer: These are my notes from taking the 2V0-731 exam. If something doesn’t make sense, please feel free to reach out. The goal of this objective is to understand approval policies. Objective 4.2 – Create and Manage Approval Policies Create approval policies Specify approval policy informationDetermine when approvals should be executed Add pre-approval and post-approval levels Configure approval forms with defined approvers Manage approval policies Modify, deactivate, and delete approval policies References Managing vRealize Automation Generally approval policies are used when governance is required to manage resources in your environment.
Disclaimer: These are my notes from studying for the 3V0-31.18 exam. If something doesn’t make sense, please feel free to reach out. The main goal for the whole of section 1 is to understand blueprint creation and modification in depth. Objective 1.4 – Create and Manage Property Definitions/Groups and Component Profiles References vRA 7.3 Component Profiles (Courtesy of the IT Hollow) Blueprint Parameterisation Preparing and Using Service Blueprints Permissions: Need to be either a Tenant Administrator or a Fabric Administrator to be able to create & manage property definitions & groups.
Disclaimer: These are my notes from studying for the 3V0-31.18 exam. If something doesn’t make sense, please feel free to reach out. The main goal for the whole of section 1 is to understand blueprint creation and modification in depth. Objective 1.3 – Import/Export blueprints You may have noticed that blueprint import/export can’t be done directly from the GUI within vRA. You need to use either the API or Cloud Client.
Disclaimer: These are my notes from studying for the 3V0-31.18 exam. If something doesn’t make sense, please feel free to reach out. The main goal for the whole of section 1 is to understand blueprint creation and modification in depth. As this is a practical, advanced level, exam I don’t expect to be given tasks in a direct manner. More that requirements will be given and it is down to you to interpret & fulfil these requirements.
Disclaimer: These are my notes from taking the 2V0-731 exam. If something doesn’t make sense, please feel free to reach out. The goal of this objective is to understand catalogue creation & management. Objective 4.1 – Manage the vRealize Automation Catalog Create and configure the catalog service Activate the catalog service Add catalog items to the service Specify users and groups for entitlements Add and manage entitlement services Add and manage catalog items Add and manage actions Activate entitlements References Managing vRealize Automation To create a catalogue service you need to be logged in as a tenant administrator.
Disclaimer: These are my notes from taking the 2V0-731 exam. If something doesn’t make sense, please feel free to reach out. The goal of this objective is to understand basic troubleshooting. Objective 3.4 – Troubleshoot Common vRealize Automation Installation & Configuration Errors Perform a rollback installation on a minimal or enterprise deployment Revert to pre-installation snapshots if available Generate a vRealize Automation support bundle Validate DNS configuration settings Confirm time synchronisation Confirm machine certificates Validate credentials used to configure endpoints References Configuring vRealize Automation Managing vRealize Automation Installing vRealize Automation Rollback installation at a high level:
Disclaimer: These are my notes from taking the 2V0-731 exam. If something doesn’t make sense, please feel free to reach out. The goal of this objective is to understand how to deploy vRA. Objective 3.2 – Install an Enterprise Deployment Identify IaaS minimal deployment prerequisites Validate environment readiness for a given design based on install type and size Deploy and configure vRealize Automation Appliance OVF Install using the installation wizard Determine and select appropriate deployment based on size Determine and select the appropriate servers for component installation Prepare the environment for installation based on deployment size Install IaaS Web components and model manager data Install IaaS Manager server and DEM Orchestrator components Install DEM Workers Install Management Agents Implement and manage CA signed certificates References Installing vRealize Automation vRealize Automation Reference Architecture An Enterprise deployment involves distributed components and load balancing to give both scalability and availability.
Disclaimer: These are my notes from taking the 2V0-731 exam. If something doesn’t make sense, please feel free to reach out. The goal of this objective is to understand how to deploy vRA. Objective 3.1 – Install a Minimal Deployment Identify IaaS minimal deployment prerequisites Validate environment readiness for a given design based on install type Deploy and configure vRealize Automation Appliance OVF Install using the installation wizard Install manually, remediating IaaS prerequisites and install all IaaS components Install Management Agent(s) at the appropriate time Implement and manage CA signed certificates References Installing vRealize Automation vRealize Automation Port Requirements These are the key inbound ports required for vRA, for more information check the documentation listed in the references.
Disclaimer: These are my notes from taking the 2V0-731 exam. If something doesn’t make sense, please feel free to reach out. The goal of this objective is to understand how to manage the Users and Groups within vRealize Automation. Objective 2.4 – Manage User and Group Role Assignments Explain the roles available to vRealize Automation & vRealize Business Assign roles to individual users for a given design Assign roles to directory groups for a given design Create vRealize Automation custom groups and assign roles References Configuring vRealize Automation Tenant Roles & Responsibilities Table shows the a summary permissions, and the tabs available to each role.
Disclaimer: These are my notes from taking the 2V0-731 exam. If something doesn’t make sense, please feel free to reach out. The goal of this objective is to understand how to manage the Business Groups within vRealize Automation. Objective 2.3 – Create and Manage Business Groups Configure Business Groups for a given design Add users and groups to appropriate support roles for a given design Determine and select the appropriate machine prefix for the Business Group References Configuring vRealize Automation Logon to vRA as a Tenant Administrator, goto Administration, Users & Groups, Business Groups.
Disclaimer: These are my notes from taking the 2V0-731 exam. If something doesn’t make sense, please feel free to reach out. The goal of this objective is to understand how to manage the Active Directory (or another user authentication solution) synchronisation within vRealize Automation. Short objective this one. Objective 2.2 – Create and Manage Directories Create and manage LDAP directory for Active Directory in vRealize Automation Create and manage Windows Integrated Authentication Directory in vRealize Automation Determine and configure appropriate user and directory binding details Evaluate directory synchronization health and troubleshoot issues References Configuring vRealize Automation Directories are synchronised using a connector through an identity provider, vIDM built into vRA by default.
Disclaimer: These are my notes from taking the 2V0-731 exam. If something doesn’t make sense, please feel free to reach out. The goal of this objective is to understand how to manage the tenants within your environment. Objective 2.1 - Create and Manage Tenants Create a new tenant for a given design Create, add, and manage local users Configure administrative access and describe privilege level differences between roles Determine the unique URL used to access the tenant References Managing vRealize Automation Tenant Roles & Responsibilities Create a tenant by logging in with system administrator (administrator@vsphere.
Disclaimer: These are my notes from taking the 2V0-731 exam. If something doesn’t make sense, please feel free to reach out. The goal of this objective is to understand the XaaS functionality within vRA Objective 1.2 – Create and Manage XaaS Blueprints with Custom Resource Mappings Create and manage XaaS resources in vRealize Automation based on the design Configure Active Directory plugin Configure REST plugin Configure PowerShell plugin Configure SOAP plugin Configure vCenter Server plugin Create and manage custom resources Create and manage XaaS Service Blueprints Create a service blueprint form Configure output parameters Publish the blueprint Create and manage XaaS resource actions Create a service blueprint form Configure output parameters Publish the blueprint Create and manage resource mappings with specific conditions References Managing vRealize Automation XaaS is a means of presenting vRO workflows through vRA.
Disclaimer: These are my notes from taking the 2V0-731 exam. If something doesn’t make sense, please feel free to reach out. The goal behind this objective is to be familiar with Blueprint creation. Objective 1.1 – Create, Modify and Publish Blueprints Based on a Given Design Select the provisioning workflow, virtual machine template, and customization specification Configure expiration and archive durations Configure machine prefixes Configure and manage networking components Specify compute, memory, and storage resources Configure custom properties and property groups Create nested blueprints Create and add software components Publish blueprints References Configuring vRealize Automation Nested Blueprint Behaviour Permissions – A role with ‘architect’ in the title
Welcome to my blog, mainly focused around VMware technologies. It’s intended to be somewhere for me to document some of thing I’ve learned along the way, hopefully helping a few people out at the same time.