SimplyGeek.co.uk – Page 2 – A vAdmin's journey into the world of DevOps & Automation

Deploying NSX-T Using Ansible – Part 3: Running The Playbook

April 10, 2019April 10, 2019 Gavin Stephens Leave a comment

In this post I am going to cover the running of the Ansible NSX-T playbook, so that you can get NSX-T deployed in your environment(s). In case you missed them, in my previous posts, I detailed how to set up your Ansible environment and configure the playbook in preparation for deploying NSX-T.

If you arrived here and want to figure it out for yourself, you can download my playbooks here: https://github.com/nmshadey/Ansible-NSXT

Playbook Overview

The main playbook that you will need to run is called ‘nsxt_create_environment.yml‘, which is located in the root of the Ansible-NSXT folder.

---
## Deploys an NSX-T environment
- hosts: nsxt_managers_controllers
  connection: local
  become: yes
  gather_facts: False
  vars:
    nsxt_deployment_vcenter: "{{ mgmt_vcenter_server }}"
    nsxt_deployment_vcenter_username: "{{ mgmt_vcenter_admin_username }}"
    nsxt_deployment_vcenter_password: "{{ mgmt_vcenter_admin_password }}"
    nsxt_deployment_datacenter: "{{ mgmt_vcenter_datacenter }}"
    nsxt_deployment_cluster: "{{ mgmt_vcenter_cluster }}"
    nsxt_deployment_datastore: "{{ nsxt_datastore }}"
    nsxt_deployment_portgroup: "{{ nsxt_portgroup }}"
    nsxt_deployment_size: "{{ nsxt_default_deployment_size }}"
    nsxt_role: "{{ nsxt_default_role }}"

    compute_managers:
    - name: "{{ nsxt_compute_manager_name }}"
      host: "{{ nsxt_compute_manager_host }}"
      transport_clusters: "{{ nsxt_transport_clusters }}"

    ip_pools:
    - display_name: "{{ nsxt_transport_switch_ip_pool_name }}"
      subnets:
      - allocation_ranges:
        - start: "{{ nsxt_transport_switch_ip_pool_start }}"
          end: "{{ nsxt_transport_switch_ip_pool_end }}"
        cidr: "{{ nsxt_transport_switch_ip_pool_cidr }}"

    transport_zones:
    - display_name: "{{ nsxt_transport_zone_name }}"
      description: "{{ nsxt_transport_zone_desc }}"
      transport_type: "OVERLAY"
      transport_switch_name: "{{ nsxt_transport_switch_name }}"

    uplink_profiles:
    - display_name: "{{ nsxt_transport_switch_uplink_profile_name }}"
      teaming:
        active_list:
        - uplink_name: "{{ nsxt_transport_switch_uplink_1 }}"
          uplink_type: PNIC
        - uplink_name: "{{ nsxt_transport_switch_uplink_2 }}"
          uplink_type: PNIC
        policy: "{{ nsxt_transport_switch_uplink_profile_policy }}"
      transport_vlan: "{{ nsxt_transport_switch_uplink_profile_vlan }}"

    transport_node_profiles:
    - display_name: "{{ nsxt_transport_node_profile_name }}"
      description: "{{ nsxt_transport_switch_profile_desc }}"
      host_switches:
      - host_switch_profiles:
        - name: "{{ nsxt_transport_switch_uplink_profile_name }}"
          type: UplinkHostSwitchProfile
        host_switch_name: "{{ nsxt_transport_switch_name }}"
        pnics:
        - device_name: "{{ nsxt_transport_switch_pnic_1 }}"
          uplink_name: "{{ nsxt_transport_switch_uplink_1 }}"
        - device_name: "{{ nsxt_transport_switch_pnic_2 }}"
          uplink_name: "{{ nsxt_transport_switch_uplink_2 }}"
        ip_assignment_spec:
          resource_type: StaticIpPoolSpec
          ip_pool_name: "{{ nsxt_transport_switch_ip_pool_name }}"
      transport_zone_endpoints:
      - transport_zone_name: "{{ nsxt_transport_zone_name }}"
    
  roles:
    - nsxt_deploy_ova
    - nsxt_apply_license
    - nsxt_add_compute_managers
    - nsxt_create_ip_pools
    - nsxt_create_transport_zones
    - nsxt_create_uplink_profiles
    - nsxt_create_transport_profiles
    - nsxt_configure_transport_clusters

---

## Deploys an NSX-T environment

- hosts: nsxt_managers_controllers

connection: local

become: yes

gather_facts: False

vars:

nsxt_deployment_vcenter: "{{ mgmt_vcenter_server }}"

nsxt_deployment_vcenter_username: "{{ mgmt_vcenter_admin_username }}"

nsxt_deployment_vcenter_password: "{{ mgmt_vcenter_admin_password }}"

nsxt_deployment_datacenter: "{{ mgmt_vcenter_datacenter }}"

nsxt_deployment_cluster: "{{ mgmt_vcenter_cluster }}"

nsxt_deployment_datastore: "{{ nsxt_datastore }}"

nsxt_deployment_portgroup: "{{ nsxt_portgroup }}"

nsxt_deployment_size: "{{ nsxt_default_deployment_size }}"

nsxt_role: "{{ nsxt_default_role }}"

compute_managers:

- name: "{{ nsxt_compute_manager_name }}"

host: "{{ nsxt_compute_manager_host }}"

transport_clusters: "{{ nsxt_transport_clusters }}"

ip_pools:

- display_name: "{{ nsxt_transport_switch_ip_pool_name }}"

subnets:

- allocation_ranges:

- start: "{{ nsxt_transport_switch_ip_pool_start }}"

end: "{{ nsxt_transport_switch_ip_pool_end }}"

cidr: "{{ nsxt_transport_switch_ip_pool_cidr }}"

transport_zones:

- display_name: "{{ nsxt_transport_zone_name }}"

description: "{{ nsxt_transport_zone_desc }}"

transport_type: "OVERLAY"

transport_switch_name: "{{ nsxt_transport_switch_name }}"

uplink_profiles:

- display_name: "{{ nsxt_transport_switch_uplink_profile_name }}"

teaming:

active_list:

- uplink_name: "{{ nsxt_transport_switch_uplink_1 }}"

uplink_type: PNIC

- uplink_name: "{{ nsxt_transport_switch_uplink_2 }}"

uplink_type: PNIC

policy: "{{ nsxt_transport_switch_uplink_profile_policy }}"

transport_vlan: "{{ nsxt_transport_switch_uplink_profile_vlan }}"

transport_node_profiles:

- display_name: "{{ nsxt_transport_node_profile_name }}"

description: "{{ nsxt_transport_switch_profile_desc }}"

host_switches:

- host_switch_profiles:

- name: "{{ nsxt_transport_switch_uplink_profile_name }}"

type: UplinkHostSwitchProfile

host_switch_name: "{{ nsxt_transport_switch_name }}"

pnics:

- device_name: "{{ nsxt_transport_switch_pnic_1 }}"

uplink_name: "{{ nsxt_transport_switch_uplink_1 }}"

- device_name: "{{ nsxt_transport_switch_pnic_2 }}"

uplink_name: "{{ nsxt_transport_switch_uplink_2 }}"

ip_assignment_spec:

resource_type: StaticIpPoolSpec

ip_pool_name: "{{ nsxt_transport_switch_ip_pool_name }}"

transport_zone_endpoints:

- transport_zone_name: "{{ nsxt_transport_zone_name }}"

roles:

- nsxt_deploy_ova

- nsxt_apply_license

- nsxt_add_compute_managers

- nsxt_create_ip_pools

- nsxt_create_transport_zones

- nsxt_create_uplink_profiles

- nsxt_create_transport_profiles

- nsxt_configure_transport_clusters

Deploying NSX-T Using Ansible – Part 2: Setting Up The Playbook

April 10, 2019April 11, 2019 Gavin Stephens Leave a comment

In my previous post I covered how to prepare your Ansible environment and install the VMware NSX-T modules. I also provided the details on how to install my Ansible playbooks for deploying NSX-T in your environments.

In this post I am going to detail how to configure these playbooks to meet your environment/requirements. I have chosen to break out my variables into multiple files. This gives me the flexibility to assign values specific to a group of hosts, inherit values from a parent group and to store usernames, passwords and license information more securely, in their own Ansible Vault encrypted file.

The deployment examples that I will demonstrate include 2 sites, that each include the following:

A management environment at each site. This includes a vCenter Server instance with a single management cluster.
A compute resource (CMP) environment at each site. This includes a vCenter Server instance with a single resource cluster.

I will deploy an NSX-T instance at each management cluster. These NSX-T instances will be used to provide SDN capabilities to the compute resource clusters (when I get time I’ll create a diagram!).

An overview of the playbook tree:

├── ansible.cfg
├── nsxt_create_environment.yml
├── nsxt_example_add_compute_manager.yml
├── nsxt_example_apply_license.yml
├── nsxt_example_create_ip_pools.yml
├── nsxt_example_create_transport_profiles.yml
├── nsxt_example_create_transport_zones.yml
├── nsxt_example_create_uplink_profiles.yml
├── nsxt_example_deploy_ova.yml
├── group_vars
│   ├── all
│   ├── nsxt_managers_controllers
│   ├── site_a
│   ├── site_a_cmp_nsxt
│   ├── site_b
│   └── site_b_cmp_nsxt
├── inventory
│   └── hosts
├── roles
│   ├── nsxt_add_compute_managers
│   ├── nsxt_apply_license
│   ├── nsxt_check_manager_status
│   ├── nsxt_configure_transport_clusters
│   ├── nsxt_create_ip_pools
│   ├── nsxt_create_transport_profiles
│   ├── nsxt_create_transport_zones
│   ├── nsxt_create_uplink_profiles
│   └── nsxt_deploy_ova
├── ssh_config

├── ansible.cfg

├── nsxt_create_environment.yml

├── nsxt_example_add_compute_manager.yml

├── nsxt_example_apply_license.yml

├── nsxt_example_create_ip_pools.yml

├── nsxt_example_create_transport_profiles.yml

├── nsxt_example_create_transport_zones.yml

├── nsxt_example_create_uplink_profiles.yml

├── nsxt_example_deploy_ova.yml

├── group_vars

│ ├── all

│ ├── nsxt_managers_controllers

│ ├── site_a

│ ├── site_a_cmp_nsxt

│ ├── site_b

│ └── site_b_cmp_nsxt

├── inventory

│ └── hosts

├── roles

│ ├── nsxt_add_compute_managers

│ ├── nsxt_apply_license

│ ├── nsxt_check_manager_status

│ ├── nsxt_configure_transport_clusters

│ ├── nsxt_create_ip_pools

│ ├── nsxt_create_transport_profiles

│ ├── nsxt_create_transport_zones

│ ├── nsxt_create_uplink_profiles

│ └── nsxt_deploy_ova

├── ssh_config

Deploying NSX-T Using Ansible – Part 1: Setting Up The Environment

April 10, 2019April 10, 2019 Gavin Stephens Leave a comment

When I saw the release of NSX-T 2.4, I decided that I would upgrade my compute clusters to utilise this new version. Since I manage the compute NSX managers mostly through the API, I figured this would provide me with some good experience and also allow me to understand how this is deployed.

In my lab I run vRealize Automation with a management cluster (CMP stack), 2 nested vCenter Servers and ESXi Clusters (compute) that mimic two geographically dispersed data centres. Until now I had deployed a dedicated NSX-V instance for each of my three vCenter deployments, that provides the logical switching and routing required for my lab.

I didn’t want to create yet another ‘how to’ guide on how to do this using the GUI, so instead, I am going to attempt to accomplish this using Ansible. VMware have handily made available Ansible modules for NSX-T, which are supported for the 2.4 release and above (note that these are still in preview). I will attempt to make use of these modules, but if I discover broken or missing functionality, then I will revert to using the NSX-T Rest API.

Link to the VMware Github repository for Ansible NSX-T: https://github.com/vmware/ansible-for-nsxt

Link to my Github Ansible NSX-T Deployment Playbooks: https://github.com/nmshadey/Ansible-NSXT

I am going to provide a series of posts that will cover the set up of the Ansible environment, how to install the VMware NSX-T modules and use the playbooks and roles that I have created to deploy NSX-T in your environments. Read More

vRealize Automation Virtual Machine is Missing after being Moved or Recovered

March 11, 2019March 11, 2019 Gavin Stephens Leave a comment

Have you ever seen a deployed virtual machine in the vRA portal have its status changed to ‘Missing‘? This can happen for two reasons; The first, obvious reason, is that the source virtual machine has been deleted. Not much you can do about that except re-provision it or restore the vm from backup. The second reason, is because the reference information that vRA holds about the virtual machine is no longer valid (perhaps from an earlier restore).

In this post, I will discuss and provide a solution that will address the latter for a vSphere hosted virtual machine.

When in this state, you will not be able to perform day 2 actions on this virtual machine (apart from destroy).

The following scenarios can explain why vRA has incorrect reference data about the virtual machine:

The virtual machine has been recovered from backup and a new instance uuid has been created;
The virtual machine has moved to another vCenter Server, maybe during a DR event. I know that Zerto will create a new virtual machine at the DR site which will have a different instance uuid (SRM’s shadow VMs are most likely similar but I can’t confirm);
The virtual machine was cloned and the original has been deleted;
The instance uuid for the virtual machine has been changed, either manually or by some other process.

vRA Developer: Part 6 – Working with vCAC Virtual Machine Custom Properties

February 27, 2019March 6, 2019 Gavin Stephens 3 Comments

In part 4 and part 5, I covered a lot of ground on how to work with vcac virtual machine objects, such as getting property values and discovering relationships to other entities. This post will continue exploring vcac virtual machines and will focus on custom properties.

Custom Properties are key/value pairs of data that are associated with the virtual machine. There are many default/built-in custom properties that provide the compute cluster, storage cluster, disk, cpu, network information and much more.

It’s also possible to create your own custom properties and associate these with your virtual machine deployments. This allows great flexibility as you can apply any key/value to your deployments and use this information in your workflows. An example might be to set a site identifier that associates the virtual machine to a specific site.

VMware provides a Custom Properties Reference, which details all the built-in custom properties that are available.

All code that I have provided or talked about in this post can be downloaded as a vRO package for your consumption here.

Retrieving Custom Properties Assigned to a Virtual Machine

There are two main ways to retrieve the custom properties that have been associated with a virtual machine deployment. The first, is during the build process, where an Event Broker Subscription is used to call a vRO workflow, to perform some task. The second, is by reading the custom properties from the vcac database (via the entities) for those that are related to the virtual machine.

Here is an example of a default set of Custom Properties associated with a deployed virtual machine:

__api.request.callback.service.id: 8596e261-d50d-4139-9de4-0785e65aa56e
__api.request.id: f4c168ec-5ce6-4afb-b985-a4dc2a46fee7
__Cafe.Request.BlueprintType: 1
__Cafe.Root.Request.Id: 681db0aa-3a52-47dc-9b62-8a6f5262bd8c
__iaas_request_binding_id: f8832686-273b-491e-bfa5-3a42b7c060d0
__InterfaceType: vSphere
__Legacy.Workflow.ImpersonatingUser: 
__Legacy.Workflow.User: stephensg@sgroot.local
__ovf_use_proxy: False
__ovfAuthNeeded: False
__request_reason: 
__reservationPolicyID: 2a539d78-c6a8-446b-b9d7-a72d04fbbdda
__trace_id: CmGY5ZR3
__VirtualMachine.Allocation.InitialMachineState: SubmittingRequest
__VirtualMachine.ProvisioningWorkflowName: BasicVmWorkflow
_number_of_instances: 1
Cafe.Shim.VirtualMachine.TotalStorageSize: 1
trace_id: CmGY5ZR3
VirtualMachine.Admin.AgentID: f8611a42-2d9a-8544-df8e-bf4e5291bd37
VirtualMachine.Admin.Hostname: SITEA-CLS-CLOUD-01
VirtualMachine.Admin.ThinProvision: True
VirtualMachine.Admin.TotalDiskUsage: 1024
VirtualMachine.Admin.UUID: 501a484f-d95c-0cb8-42b6-cf174af3db2d
VirtualMachine.Cafe.Blueprint.Component.Cluster.Index: 0
VirtualMachine.Cafe.Blueprint.Component.Id: vm1
VirtualMachine.Cafe.Blueprint.Component.TypeId: Infrastructure.CatalogItem.Machine.Virtual.vSphere
VirtualMachine.Cafe.Blueprint.Id: VM_NoDisk
VirtualMachine.Cafe.Blueprint.Name: VM_NoDisk
VirtualMachine.CPU.Count: 1
VirtualMachine.Disk0.DeviceID: SCSI (0:0)
VirtualMachine.Disk0.ExternalID: 6000C296-9f11-58ec-31ca-058625b51c19
VirtualMachine.Disk0.IsClone: false
VirtualMachine.Disk0.IsFixed: False
VirtualMachine.Disk0.Name: Hard disk 1
VirtualMachine.Disk0.Size: 1
VirtualMachine.Disk0.Storage: DSC-SITEA-BRONZE-01
VirtualMachine.Disk0.Storage.Cluster.ExternalReferenceId: group-p291
VirtualMachine.Disk0.Storage.Cluster.Name: DSC-SITEA-BRONZE-01
VirtualMachine.Memory.Size: 1024
VirtualMachine.Network0.MacAddress: 00:50:56:9a:3e:5f
VirtualMachine.Network0.Name: vxw-dvs-314-virtualwire-8-sid-5005-SiteA-Transit-South
VirtualMachine.Storage.Cluster.Automation.Behavior: manual
VirtualMachine.Storage.Cluster.Automation.Enabled: True
VirtualMachine.Storage.Cluster.ExternalReferenceId: group-p291
VirtualMachine.Storage.Cluster.Name: DSC-SITEA-BRONZE-01
VirtualMachine.Storage.Name: DSC-SITEA-BRONZE-01
VMware.VirtualCenter.OperatingSystem: windows7Server64Guest
Vrm.ProxyAgent.Uri: https://sg1-vrm001.sgroot.local/VMPS2Proxy

__api.request.callback.service.id: 8596e261-d50d-4139-9de4-0785e65aa56e

__api.request.id: f4c168ec-5ce6-4afb-b985-a4dc2a46fee7

__Cafe.Request.BlueprintType: 1

__Cafe.Root.Request.Id: 681db0aa-3a52-47dc-9b62-8a6f5262bd8c

__iaas_request_binding_id: f8832686-273b-491e-bfa5-3a42b7c060d0

__InterfaceType: vSphere

__Legacy.Workflow.ImpersonatingUser:

__Legacy.Workflow.User: stephensg@sgroot.local

__ovf_use_proxy: False

__ovfAuthNeeded: False

__request_reason:

__reservationPolicyID: 2a539d78-c6a8-446b-b9d7-a72d04fbbdda

__trace_id: CmGY5ZR3

__VirtualMachine.Allocation.InitialMachineState: SubmittingRequest

__VirtualMachine.ProvisioningWorkflowName: BasicVmWorkflow

_number_of_instances: 1

Cafe.Shim.VirtualMachine.TotalStorageSize: 1

trace_id: CmGY5ZR3

VirtualMachine.Admin.AgentID: f8611a42-2d9a-8544-df8e-bf4e5291bd37

VirtualMachine.Admin.Hostname: SITEA-CLS-CLOUD-01

VirtualMachine.Admin.ThinProvision: True

VirtualMachine.Admin.TotalDiskUsage: 1024

VirtualMachine.Admin.UUID: 501a484f-d95c-0cb8-42b6-cf174af3db2d

VirtualMachine.Cafe.Blueprint.Component.Cluster.Index: 0

VirtualMachine.Cafe.Blueprint.Component.Id: vm1

VirtualMachine.Cafe.Blueprint.Component.TypeId: Infrastructure.CatalogItem.Machine.Virtual.vSphere

VirtualMachine.Cafe.Blueprint.Id: VM_NoDisk

VirtualMachine.Cafe.Blueprint.Name: VM_NoDisk

VirtualMachine.CPU.Count: 1

VirtualMachine.Disk0.DeviceID: SCSI (0:0)

VirtualMachine.Disk0.ExternalID: 6000C296-9f11-58ec-31ca-058625b51c19

VirtualMachine.Disk0.IsClone: false

VirtualMachine.Disk0.IsFixed: False

VirtualMachine.Disk0.Name: Hard disk 1

VirtualMachine.Disk0.Size: 1

VirtualMachine.Disk0.Storage: DSC-SITEA-BRONZE-01

VirtualMachine.Disk0.Storage.Cluster.ExternalReferenceId: group-p291

VirtualMachine.Disk0.Storage.Cluster.Name: DSC-SITEA-BRONZE-01

VirtualMachine.Memory.Size: 1024

VirtualMachine.Network0.MacAddress: 00:50:56:9a:3e:5f

VirtualMachine.Network0.Name: vxw-dvs-314-virtualwire-8-sid-5005-SiteA-Transit-South

VirtualMachine.Storage.Cluster.Automation.Behavior: manual

VirtualMachine.Storage.Cluster.Automation.Enabled: True

VirtualMachine.Storage.Cluster.ExternalReferenceId: group-p291

VirtualMachine.Storage.Cluster.Name: DSC-SITEA-BRONZE-01

VirtualMachine.Storage.Name: DSC-SITEA-BRONZE-01

VMware.VirtualCenter.OperatingSystem: windows7Server64Guest

Vrm.ProxyAgent.Uri: https://sg1-vrm001.sgroot.local/VMPS2Proxy

The first set are prefixed with a double underscore (__), which denotes that these are ‘hidden’ properties that are used by the system and provide object references to the reservation and the request (note that these properties will not be referenced in the official VMware Custom Properties Reference).

The remaining properties are the key/values associated with the virtual machine and can provide cpu count, amount of assigned memory, used storage, etc. and any user-defined custom properties that you have created. Unlike the hidden properties. you will find a reference to all of these in the VMware Custom Properties Reference.

One important thing to note, is that when you are working with custom property values, these are always returned as a string, regardless of what data is being stored. I.e. if a custom property has a value of ‘false’, this is the literal string “false” and not Boolean false. Read More

vRA Developer: Part 5 – Working with vCAC Virtual Machine Linked Entities

February 15, 2019May 4, 2019 Gavin Stephens 1 Comment

In my previous post vRA Developer: Part 4 – Working with vCAC Virtual Machine Entities, I demonstrated how you could find vCAC virtual machine entities and retrieve and update their properties. In this post I am going to focus on linked entities.

All code that I have provided or talked about in this post can be downloaded as a vRO package for your consumption here.

There are additional properties that can be retrieved which are part of other entities that the virtual machine has a relationship with. Here are some examples of information that can be retrieved through linked entities (the code for all of these examples is included in the package link provided at the beginning of this post).

Host/Cluster Name
Reservation Name
Owner Username
IPv4 Addresses
Snapshots
Networks

The virtual machine entity object has a method ‘.getLink(vcacHost, “linkKey_string”)‘ that can be used to get the linked entity objects. The ‘.getProperty(“key_string”)‘ can then be used on these entities to get a specific property value, such as the reservation name.

Get the Host or Cluster Name

The following code can be used to get the host or cluster name that the virtual machine (this is referred to as the compute resource within the vRA portal) is hosted on.

/*global vcacHost vcacVmEntity*/

/**
 * Get the compute resource name for the vcac virtual machine entity.
 * @author Gavin Stephens <gavin.stephens@simplygeek.co.uk>
 * @version 1.1.0
 * @function getComputeResourceNameForVirtualMachineEntity
 * @param {vCAC:VCACHOST} vcacHost - The vCAC Host.
 * @param {vCAC:Entity} vcacVmEntity - The vCAC virtual machine entity.
 * @returns {string} Returns the compute resource name.
 */

function checkParams(vcacHost, vcacVmEntity) {
    var inputErrors = [];
    var errorMessage;
    if (!vcacHost || System.getObjectType(vcacHost) !== "vCAC:VCACHost") {
        inputErrors.push(" - vcacHost missing or not of type 'vCAC:VCACHost'");
    }
    if (!vcacVmEntity || System.getObjectType(vcacVmEntity) !== "vCAC:Entity") {
        inputErrors.push(" - vcacVmEntity missing or not of type 'vCAC:Entity'");
    }
    if (inputErrors.length > 0) {
        errorMessage = "Mandatory parameters not satisfied:\n" + inputErrors.join("\n");
        log.error(errorMessage);
    }
}

var logType = "Action";
var logName = "getComputeResourceNameForVirtualMachineEntity"; // This must be set to the name of the action
var Logger = System.getModule("com.simplygeek.library.util").logger(logType, logName);
var log = new Logger(logType, logName);
var hostEntities = [];
var hostEntity;
var hostName = "";
var hostId = "";
var vmEntityName = "";
var numHostEntities = 0;

try {
    checkParams(vcacHost, vcacVmEntity);
    vmEntityName = vcacVmEntity.getProperty("VirtualMachineName");
    log.log("Getting compute resource name for virtual machine entity: " + vmEntityName);
    hostEntities = vcacVmEntity.getLink(vcacHost, "Host");
    numHostEntities = hostEntities.length;
    if (numHostEntities > 1 ) {
        log.error("More than one compute resource was found.");
    } else if (numHostEntities > 0) {
        hostEntity = hostEntities[0];
        hostName = hostEntity.getProperty("HostName");
        hostId = hostEntity.getProperty("HostID");
        log.log("Found compute resource '" + hostName + "' with entity id '" + hostId + "'");
    } else {
        log.error("No compute resource was found.");
    }
} catch (e) {
    log.error("Action failed to get compute resource name for virtual machine entity.",e);
}

return hostName;

/*global vcacHost vcacVmEntity*/

/**

* Get the compute resource name for the vcac virtual machine entity.

* @author Gavin Stephens <gavin.stephens@simplygeek.co.uk>

* @version 1.1.0

* @function getComputeResourceNameForVirtualMachineEntity

* @param {vCAC:VCACHOST} vcacHost - The vCAC Host.

* @param {vCAC:Entity} vcacVmEntity - The vCAC virtual machine entity.

* @returns {string} Returns the compute resource name.

function checkParams(vcacHost, vcacVmEntity) {

var inputErrors = [];

var errorMessage;

if (!vcacHost || System.getObjectType(vcacHost) !== "vCAC:VCACHost") {

inputErrors.push(" - vcacHost missing or not of type 'vCAC:VCACHost'");

}

if (!vcacVmEntity || System.getObjectType(vcacVmEntity) !== "vCAC:Entity") {

inputErrors.push(" - vcacVmEntity missing or not of type 'vCAC:Entity'");

}

if (inputErrors.length > 0) {

errorMessage = "Mandatory parameters not satisfied:\n" + inputErrors.join("\n");

log.error(errorMessage);

}

var logType = "Action";

var logName = "getComputeResourceNameForVirtualMachineEntity"; // This must be set to the name of the action

var Logger = System.getModule("com.simplygeek.library.util").logger(logType, logName);

var log = new Logger(logType, logName);

var hostEntities = [];

var hostEntity;

var hostName = "";

var hostId = "";

var vmEntityName = "";

var numHostEntities = 0;

try {

checkParams(vcacHost, vcacVmEntity);

vmEntityName = vcacVmEntity.getProperty("VirtualMachineName");

log.log("Getting compute resource name for virtual machine entity: " + vmEntityName);

hostEntities = vcacVmEntity.getLink(vcacHost, "Host");

numHostEntities = hostEntities.length;

if (numHostEntities > 1 ) {

log.error("More than one compute resource was found.");

} else if (numHostEntities > 0) {

hostEntity = hostEntities[0];

hostName = hostEntity.getProperty("HostName");

hostId = hostEntity.getProperty("HostID");

log.log("Found compute resource '" + hostName + "' with entity id '" + hostId + "'");

} else {

log.error("No compute resource was found.");

}

} catch (e) {

log.error("Action failed to get compute resource name for virtual machine entity.",e);

}

return hostName;

Log output:

[] [I] [Action: getComputeResourceNameForVirtualMachineEntity] Getting compute resource name for virtual machine entity: SG-BG-Deliv0005
[] [I] [Action: getComputeResourceNameForVirtualMachineEntity] Found compute resource 'SITEA-CLS-CLOUD-01' with entity id '355c617e-f9e0-4726-abcf-81f5748c50db'

1 2	[] [I] [Action: getComputeResourceNameForVirtualMachineEntity] Getting compute resource name for virtual machine entity: SG-BG-Deliv0005 [] [I] [Action: getComputeResourceNameForVirtualMachineEntity] Found compute resource 'SITEA-CLS-CLOUD-01' with entity id '355c617e-f9e0-4726-abcf-81f5748c50db'

vRA Developer: Part 4 – Working with vCAC Virtual Machine Entities

February 15, 2019March 1, 2019 Gavin Stephens 2 Comments

In the first post in this series, vRA Developer: Part 1 – IaaS & Understanding The Entity Framework I detailed how you can view the vCAC entities and their associated properties. In this post I am going to cover how you can find a virtual machine entity using different property references and get/update their properties in your vRO workflows. I had intended to provide a single post for this, but felt it would be useful to provide a number of posts, for each specific vCAC entity type. In this post I am going to be looking at the vCAC virtual machine entities.

All code that I have provided or talked about in this post can be downloaded as a vRO package for your consumption here.

Finding vCAC Virtual Machine Entities

When I need to find a vCAC virtual machine entity, there are 4 search references that work well for all of my use cases. These are to search by:

VirtualMachineID – The entity ID.
VirtualMachineName – The VM name. Take caution as it’s possible to have duplicate entities with the same VirtualMachineName.
VMUniqueID – The unique identifier for the vm (i.e. vCenter VM instance UUID).
ExternalReferenceId – The external reference id (i.e. vCenter VM Id (MoRef)).

I have provided all the Actions below which perform these searches and an example log output for each.

Find Virtual Machine By Entity Id

The following code can be used to get the virtual machine entity by its entity id.

/*global vcacHost virtualMachineId*/

/**
 * Searches for a vcac virtual machine entity by its entity id.
 * @author Gavin Stephens <gavin.stephens@simplygeek.co.uk>
 * @version 1.1.0
 * @function findVirtualMachineEntityByVirtualMachineId
 * @param {vCAC:VCACHost} vcacHost - The vCAC Host.
 * @param {string} virtualMachineId - The virtual machine entity id.
 * @returns {vCAC:Entity} Returns the virtual machine entity.
 */

function checkParams(vcacHost, virtualMachineId) {
    var inputErrors = [];
    var errorMessage;
    if (!vcacHost || System.getObjectType(vcacHost) !== "vCAC:VCACHost") {
        inputErrors.push(" - vcacHost missing or not of type 'vCAC:VCACHost'");
    }
    if (!virtualMachineId || typeof virtualMachineId !== "string") {
        inputErrors.push(" - virtualMachineId missing or not of type 'string'");
    }
    if (inputErrors.length > 0) {
        errorMessage = "Mandatory parameters not satisfied:\n" + inputErrors.join("\n");
        log.error(errorMessage);
    }
}

var logType = "Action";
var logName = "findVirtualMachineEntityByVirtualMachineId"; // This must be set to the name of the action
var Logger = System.getModule("com.simplygeek.library.util").logger(logType, logName);
var log = new Logger(logType, logName);
var properties = new Properties();
var vcacVmEntity;
var vcacEntityFieldName = "VirtualMachineID";
var entitySetName = "VirtualMachines";
var vcacVmName = "";

try {
    checkParams(vcacHost, virtualMachineId);
    log.log("finding virtual machine entity with entity id: " + virtualMachineId);
    properties.put(vcacEntityFieldName, virtualMachineId);
    vcacVmEntity = System.getModule("com.simplygeek.library.vcac.entities").getVcacEntitiyByUniqieId(vcacHost,
                                                                                                     entitySetName,
                                                                                                     properties);
    vcacVmName = vcacVmEntity.getProperty("VirtualMachineName");
    log.log("Found virtual machine entity: " + vcacVmName + " with entity id: " + virtualMachineId);
} catch (e) {
    log.error("Action failed to locate vCAC virtual machine entity.",e);
}

return vcacVmEntity;

/*global vcacHost virtualMachineId*/

/**

* Searches for a vcac virtual machine entity by its entity id.

* @author Gavin Stephens <gavin.stephens@simplygeek.co.uk>

* @version 1.1.0

* @function findVirtualMachineEntityByVirtualMachineId

* @param {vCAC:VCACHost} vcacHost - The vCAC Host.

* @param {string} virtualMachineId - The virtual machine entity id.

* @returns {vCAC:Entity} Returns the virtual machine entity.

function checkParams(vcacHost, virtualMachineId) {

var inputErrors = [];

var errorMessage;

if (!vcacHost || System.getObjectType(vcacHost) !== "vCAC:VCACHost") {

inputErrors.push(" - vcacHost missing or not of type 'vCAC:VCACHost'");

}

if (!virtualMachineId || typeof virtualMachineId !== "string") {

inputErrors.push(" - virtualMachineId missing or not of type 'string'");

}

if (inputErrors.length > 0) {

errorMessage = "Mandatory parameters not satisfied:\n" + inputErrors.join("\n");

log.error(errorMessage);

}

var logType = "Action";

var logName = "findVirtualMachineEntityByVirtualMachineId"; // This must be set to the name of the action

var Logger = System.getModule("com.simplygeek.library.util").logger(logType, logName);

var log = new Logger(logType, logName);

var properties = new Properties();

var vcacVmEntity;

var vcacEntityFieldName = "VirtualMachineID";

var entitySetName = "VirtualMachines";

var vcacVmName = "";

try {

checkParams(vcacHost, virtualMachineId);

log.log("finding virtual machine entity with entity id: " + virtualMachineId);

properties.put(vcacEntityFieldName, virtualMachineId);

vcacVmEntity = System.getModule("com.simplygeek.library.vcac.entities").getVcacEntitiyByUniqieId(vcacHost,

entitySetName,

properties);

vcacVmName = vcacVmEntity.getProperty("VirtualMachineName");

log.log("Found virtual machine entity: " + vcacVmName + " with entity id: " + virtualMachineId);

} catch (e) {

log.error("Action failed to locate vCAC virtual machine entity.",e);

}

return vcacVmEntity;

Log output:

[] [I] [Action: findVirtualMachineEntityByVirtualMachineId] finding virtual machine entity with entity id: 05b6a7b4-1cd6-4762-85ce-fe427c33496a
[] [I] [Action: findVirtualMachineEntityByVirtualMachineId] Found virtual machine entity: SG-BG-Deliv0005 with entity id: 05b6a7b4-1cd6-4762-85ce-fe427c33496a

[] [I] [Action: findVirtualMachineEntityByVirtualMachineId] finding virtual machine entity with entity id: 05b6a7b4-1cd6-4762-85ce-fe427c33496a

[] [I] [Action: findVirtualMachineEntityByVirtualMachineId] Found virtual machine entity: SG-BG-Deliv0005 with entity id: 05b6a7b4-1cd6-4762-85ce-fe427c33496a

Advanced vRA Data Collection vRO Workflow

February 9, 2019March 1, 2019 Gavin Stephens 2 Comments

Data Collection in vRealize Automation is a process that keeps the vRA database in sync with endpoints such as vCenter Server. Most people reading this most likely already know how clunky this process is. Also, It’s not immediately obvious how this process can be automated from a vRO prospective. If you are performing any tasks against objects on your endpoints, such as day 2 actions that add or remove hard disks, networks, etc (and not using the OOTB reconfigure actions) then you almost certainly need to be able to programmatically invoke the data collection process to update all the information in vRA.

I have come across many different snippets of code that solved parts of the problem but were far from perfect and the code was ugly. I therefore decided to create something to make this process easy, whilst providing some additional quality of life features. So I present my Advanced Data Collection workflow for your pleasure.