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VCF 9.1 - Deploying VCF Automation (VCFA) to non-Management Network

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Similar to VCF Management Services (VCFMS), VCF Automation (VCFA) can also be deployed to a non-management network using an API workflow. A typically deployment workflow is to first upgrade to VCF 9.1, deploy VCFMS and then deploy VCFA as a Day-N operation using the new VCF Operations Fleet Lifecycle Management (Fleet LCM) capability, located within VCF Operations under Build->Lifecycle->VCF Management.


When using the Fleet LCM UI to deploy VCFA, you will see that the required IP address input uses a CIDR format. This is not ideal for VCFA, which requires exactly 5 IP addresses for the VCF services runtime; the smallest CIDR that meets this requirement is a /29, which ends up consuming 8 IP addresses.


The good news is that we can use the Fleet LCM API to select an alternative vSphere-based network (VLAN or NSX Overlay) and we also get added benefit to use an alternative IP allocation method, which would allow us to specify the exact number of IP Addresses that is required!

Note: This solution is only applicable for brand new deployments of VCFA, for existing Aria Automation 8.x or VCF Automation 9.0.x/9.1.x deployments, the upgrade workflow will use the existing network that VCFA is deployed on and will availabled IP Addresses from that network.

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VCF 9.1 - Deploying VCF Management Services (VCFMS) to non-Management Network during VCF Upgrade

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As part of upgrading an existing VMware Cloud Foundation (VCF) deployment from either VCF 5.x or 9.0.x to VCF 9.1, one of the required steps is deploying the new VCF Management Services (VCFMS) component using a workflow provided by SDDC Manager.


The current default behavior of the VCFMS deployment workflow is to automatically deploy the VCFMS components, shown below, onto the existing VM Management network. This is typically the same network that hosts infrastructure components such as vCenter Server, NSX and other management services.


While defaulting to the management network may be convenient, most enterprise organizations do not have a large number of free IP addresses sitting idle. Even if there was available IP capacity, it is usually not contiguous blocks of IPs, which can make accommodating the CIDR-based IP allocation requirements of VCFMS more challenging than expected.

The good news is that we can use the SDDC Manager API to select an alternative vSphere-based network (VLAN or NSX Overlay) to deploy VCFMS!

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VCF 9.1 - Side-loading VCF binaries into VCF Installer & Fleet Depot Service for Air-Gapped Environments

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VMware Cloud Foundation (VCF) 9.1 continues to support side-loading, or direct upload, of VCF binaries into the VCF Installer, similar to VCF 9.0. However, there is now an additional workflow required after the VCF Fleet has been deployed, where the VCF management component binaries must also be uploaded to the new Fleet Depot Service.

When using either an Online or Offline VCF Software Depot, the Fleet Depot Service automatically retrieves the required VCF binaries from the configured source. However, when using a "Disconnected" or local depot, users must now manually upload those binaries into the Fleet Depot Service to support Day-N operations such as deploying optional VCF components including Log Management, Realtime Metrics and VCF Operations for Networks, as well as provisioning new VCF Instances and Domains.

Having recently gone through this workflow myself (detailed instructions below), I think customers with air-gapped requirements will have a much better experience using a VCF Offline Depot. It works just as well within those network constraints and avoids the need to manually upload binaries to multiple locations, especially for customers managing a large number of deployments.

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