This article is being written to help my team to understand what goes on behind the scenes when you install vRealize Automation 7.4
My environment consists of 3 vRA appliances with 1 IAAS node.
vRA
nukesvra01.nukescloud.com
nukesvra02.nukescloud.com
nukesvra03.nukescloud.com
IAAS
nukesiaas.nukescloud.com
I am using NSX Load Balancer in my Lab , so let me show you the configuration which goes into it before we begin vRA installation
Configure Edge with the VIP's used for vRA Web , IaaS Web , IaaS Manager and vRO Control Center
Then , create application profiles
Post that configure Health Monitors or Service Monitoring
Then create pools , which has only primary appliance for vRA and IaaS node as it's members. We would be adding other vRA appliances , post installation
After pools , then create virtual servers by selecting VIP and mapping them to appropriate pools
Now that we have completed all configuration with respect to load balancer , let's kick in the installation part.
After deploying vRA and IaaS VM's let's now login to primary appliance's VAMI , you would be now presented with the installation wizard
Accept EULA
Select the type of installation you would like to perform in your environment
Download IaaS ManagementAgent and install it on all of the IAAS nodes present. I have only one of them so , once installed that would be displayed as shows below.
Now define all vRA appliances which are supposed to be in a cluster
Accept the certificate fetched from second and third appliance by the first or the Master appliance
Define roles for various IAAS nodes in the environment. I am using only one IAAS node as i stated above hence all Web , Manager Service , DEM's and Agent's would all go into one box
Run Pre-Requisite checker , this would fail as we have not performed any manual configuration in the IAAS node. So let the pre-req-check fail and then click on Fix to automatically fix the IAAS machines thorough script
Looks like I did miss taking screenshot of two steps vRA host and SSO , that's where you define vRA LB and SSO default tenant password.
Post that you would then configure IaaS Web and IaaS Manager LB's
Mention Database information on the page. Perform validation here itself so that you would not have any surprises later during installation
In the next pane , we have to provide IIS Website name and port for Web components. Also , we got to mention credentials for the IIS application pools which would be used during deployment.
As there is only one IAAS node that would be the active one. Mention the credentials which would be used for the service startup and configuration.
Configure DEM's
Configure Agent's and mention endpoint information. This same information must be used while configuring in UI , post installation.
Configure vRA , Web and Manager certificates
Next pane would give you the information on what are the LB addresses being used in the installation and the nodes which has have to present or configured on LB.
As stated in the UI , during installation process only the Load Balancer Members shown in this pane must be added to LB. Other's can be added post installation which i would show later.
Once done , validation of all configurations performed till now would occur and then wizard would remind you to take snapshots of all vm's and appliances involved in installation.
Once snapshots are taken , by clicking on the "Install" option below installer would begin a series of steps.
Below are the steps involved during installation. Remember, installation steps would vary depending on the scale of the environment.
Configure SSO
It would first check if there are any horizon services running
Since this is a greenfield installation , it will not be able to find the pid for horizon and it would go ahead with enabling services
Runs Workspace Portal Initial Configuration utility
Configures certificate
Recalculates Memory for various components in the appliance list network elasticsearch vco-server vco-configurator rabbitmq-server vcac-server & vrhb-service
Initializes horizon
Initiates default tenant or organization
Logs in as administrator
Disables single tenant mode
Enables advanced user role feature
Enables tenant features
Enables local users support and user store
Creates first connector and get's it's activation token to activate it
Updates user attribute definitions
After successful initialization of horizon , vcac service is registered with horizon
Configure Postgres
Finds all applications that contains DB scripts and then executes them to configure primary appliance's postgres database
These applications or services are
It updates all the services mentioned in the screenshot above and then identifies that this node is configured to be in clustered mode
Post that it starts vcac service
Verify that all services are started
Perform a health check to see if all services are started on the primary appliance
Install Web certificate on IAAS
Certificate installed successfully
Configure SQL
Runs vCloud Automation Software Configuration Wizard in silent mode and configures IaaS database
Configure IaaS Web
Configures or Installs vCAC IaaS core components
Model Manager Web Service
Model Manager Data
Administration Portal Website
Configures WAPI and runs RegisterCatalogTypes
Configure IaaS Manager Service
Installs Manager Service
Updates Manager Service config file and then changes startup type to "Automatic"
VMware vCloud Automation Center Service is stopped and started to ensure changes take place immediately
Configure DEO
Silent Installation of DEM Orchestrator is performed
Configure DEM
Silent Installation of DEM Worker is performed
Configure Agent
Installs vCAC vSphere Agent Service
Joins second and third appliance to the Master ( first appliance where the installation was initiated )
This part of installation takes very long time , approximately 90 minutes
There would be service restarts on the Master and the Replica nodes
Once all above steps are completed successfully, that marks the end of installation
Configure Licensing
After Licensing , If needed you may run initial content configuration or run migration or leave it as it is and manually configure your vRA environment.
In the next pane , you would be presented with the environment details , that's Post Installation configuration. It would show LB addresses along with health monitors which we already configured on NSX
That's it from vRA installation perspective. Now we need to go back to NSX and add the other two vRA appliances to vRA Web and vRO CC LB Pools
Finally , we got to see all pools in healthy state on NSX
This sums up the installation for vRA 7.4. Next blog would be on configuration.