Part 2: vRA 8.1 / vIDM 3.3 HA with F5 Deployment

vRA 2 Minutes

Introduction

This multi-part blog focuses on deploying vRA 8.1 HA, vIDM 3.3.2 HA using an F5 BIG-IP LTM load balancer. The context for the material is to call out pitfalls, direction and resolution to issues with an HA vRA 8.1 deployment. Specifically, these blogs call out additional configuration for vIDM HA scale out with vRA 8.1 HA. This content is broken into four parts:

vRSLCM 8.1 Deployment (includes vRA / vIDM)

The installations begins with mounting the vRSLCM 8.1 iso and executing installation of vRA 8.1 (x 3 nodes) HA and x 1 vIDM node.

Mount the iso file. (In this example, Windows OS is used to mount the iso file.)

Navigate and open installer.exe from path mount CDROM drive > vrlcm-ui-installer > win32

(Steps 1 and 2) Screen Shots Not Shown for vRealize Easy Installer

  • Click Install
  • Review Introduction vRA, vRSLCM and vIDM
  • Accept EULA (Optional CEIP)

(Step 3) Appliance Deployment Target

  • Configure connection to vCenter Server that vRSLCM will deploy vRSLCM, vRA and vIDM.
  • ACCEPT Certificate Warning

(Step 4) Select a Location (Not Shown)

(Step 5) Select a Compute Resource (Not Shown)

(Step 6) Select a Storage Location (Not Shown)

(Step 7) Network Configuration

(Step 8) Password Configuration / Set password for all products. It includes below passwords

  • vRealize Suite Lifecycle Manager root password and admin password
  • vRealize Automation root password.
  • VMware Identity Manager admin password,sshuser password, root password and password for the default configuration user that will be used while integrating products.
  • Note above the red highlight for Password constraints

(Step 9) Lifecycle Manager Configuration

  • Remember the virtual machine field is VM short name, hostname is an FQDN, note the screen prints may show VM hostnames and FQDN as different than elsewhere in postings.
  • Data CenterName and vCenter Name can be customized or use default
  • Its recommended to increase Disk Size in GB as vRSLCM is used to provision other vRealize solutions, ie vROPs, vRLI, vRNI, etc… The increase in disk space ensures you have capacity to download additional binaries.

(Step 10) Identity Manager Configuration

This is an configuration component with important details.

This is a local user that you create on the default tenant in VMware Identity Manager and provide the admin access in the default tenant. The same user is used for all product integration with VMware Identity Manager and the admin role is assigned in the corresponding product.

For the Default Configuration Admin – recommended to create a unique user that does not exist in your LDAP environment. There are instances if the default configuration admin name matches an account in your LDAP instance, vIDM might not distingish between the two accounts and cause issues.

  • Sync Group Members to the Directory When adding Group (optional)

(Step 11) vRealize Automation Configuration (Cluster Deployment)

In selecting Cluster Deployment, you’ll have the option to configure

  • vRealize Automation Load Balancer IP and FQDN
  • Master vRealize Automation Appliance
  • Secondary vRealize Automation Node-1
  • Secondary vRealize Automation Node-2

The vRA F5 BIP-IP Load Balancer IP and FQDN should have already been established in part 1 of the F5 BIG-IP LTM configuration. As a side note, while the configuration calls out “master” vs. “secondary” – remember, its simply vRA appliance node 1, 2 and 3.

Continuing on, we’ll configure the VM short name, IP and FQDN.

Summary

In this post, we explored the vRSLCM configuration to deploy vRA 8.1 (x 3 nodes) and vIDM 3.3 (x 1 node). Next, we’ll configure both vRA 8.1 and vIDM 3.3 in prep to scale out vIDM HA.

Published by Michael Patton

Published