Mar 8, 2024

VMware Aria Operations for Networks Deployment through Suite Lifecycle

Arun Nukula
Mar 8, 2024
3 min read

Rated NaN out of 5 stars.

Deploying VMware Aria Operations for Networks through VMware Aria Suite Lifecycle is easy

VMware Aria provides the IT Managers or Cloud admin resources to focus on business-critical initiatives, while improving time to value (TTV), reliability and consistency.

VMware’s Aria Suite of Products are great, they provide lot’s of feature and capabilities.

Supported Products:

VMware Aria Automation
VMware Aria Automation Orchestrator
VMware Aria Automation Automation Config
VMware Aria Operations
VMware Aria Operations for Logs
VMware Aria Operations for Networks

Let’s begin this blog where we describe installation of VMware Aria Operations for Networks

We begin with “Create Environment” where we give

Environment Name
Description
Choose the “Default Password,” which will be automatically highlighted in the product pane for customer convenience, especially for those who prefer not to maintain separate passwords for individual accounts within the product.
Datacenter would be the location where you would like to provision the product. If a Datacenter has multiple vCenters you can choose one in the infrastructure pane later
If you have deployed vRNI previoulsly and want to use the json exported before in this deployment request you can toggle the button

Select the product you would like to install. In this example, we will select “VMware Aria Operations for Networks”

Accept “EULA” , End User License Agreement

From VMware Aria Suite Lifecycle 8.16.0 onwards, products can be deployed in evaluation mode. So there is no mandatory rule to select a license here. That’s why you see “NEXT” option enabled even a license is not mapped.

Select the certificate needed for the product

Key in all the Infrastructure detail in this pane.

vCenter where you would like to deploy to
Based on the selection of vCenter, select the cluster you would like to deploy to
Select the folder and resource pool
Select “Network”
Select “Datastore”
Select “Disk Mode”
Togggle the button, if you woild like to integrate the product being deployed to VMware Identity Manager
If you have uploaded the ova to Conent Libarary and would like to use it for deployment, toggle the other option, if not proceed

Enter appropriate network information in the next pane

Domain Name
Domain Search Path
DNS Servers
Time Sync Mode
NTP Servers

Here comes the Product Pane

Selec the FIPS compliance mode
You have already selected certificate before. If you would like to select / change to the new one , you can very well do it here
If you would like to create an Affinity / Anti-Affinity rule do so
Product Password is already selected to “Default Password” before. If you would like to change you may do it here
Check or Uncheck the box if you would like to integrate with VMware Identity Manager
Select NTP Servers , if you wanna change anything here
Then enter details for components
- Enter Platform Details
  - IP Address
  - Display Name
  - Node Size
- Enter Collector Details
  - IP Address
  - Display Name
  - Node Size

Click on next to perform a Pre-Check

It performs checks for

Data Validation
Infrastructure Validation
VMware Aria Operations for Networks Validations

Let’s say there is a problem, then you would like to fix and then go ahead with the deployment.

Remember, you cannot proceed if the pre-check has failures

Once all checks are passed , go ahead and click on next to review summary and then deploy the product

Now the product is deployed

There are different stages which takes place during product deployment

If we go through each stages

Check Prerequisites

Deploys Platform Node
	Start
	VMware Aria Operations for Networks Deployment
	Validate Deploy Inputs
	Deploy OVF
	Power On VM
	Guest Tools Status check
	Hostname/IP status check
	VMware Aria Operations for Networks Post Install Check
	Check Deployment Status
	Check Services status
	Check Reconfiguration status
	VMware Aria Operations for Networks Init License
	VMware Aria Operations for Networks Platform License
	Get License VMware Aria Operations
	Activate Telemetry Config
	VMware Aria Operations for Networks Certificate Init
	Apply VMware Aria Operations for Networks Certificate
	Change VMware Aria Operations for Networks Password 
	Check VIDM Registered
	Register VMware Aria Operations for Networks O-Auth client
	Configure VIDM details
	Create VIDM user
	Create VMware Aria Operations for Networks app catalog
	VIDM Create Web Link App
	Finish

Deploys others platform nodes and collectors

VMware Aria Operations for Networks Create Cluster

VMware Aria Operations for Networks collect FQDN
	
Update environment details

Schedule Notifications

Toggle fips mode of VMware Aria Operations for Networks

Let’s explore Day-2 Actions which are available on the product once deployed


Action	Description
Change Admin Password	Provides ability to change password for local account in VMware Aria Operations for Networks called “admin@local”
Vertical Scale Up	Provides ability to change sizing of the cluster. Selec the nodes which are part of the cluster , select the sizing and some advance settings as needed and submit the request to scale up.


Trigger Inventory Sync	Fetches latest data of the product and updates Suite Lifecycle’s inventory. Recomended during Upgrades , Patches, Vertical Scale-up and Licensing changes
Replace Certificate	Replaces Certificate on the Product
Logs	Generate& Download log bundles
Add Data Sources	Ability to add data sources in VMware Aria Operations for Networks
Snapshot	Take snapshot on the whole cluster
Patches	Install Patches when released by the product team. Check the history as well
Power Off	Powers Off VMware Operations for Networks product in a systematic manner
Power On	Powers On VMware Operations for Networks product in a systematic manner
Toggle FIPS mode compliance	Change FIPS mode on and off on the product
Change Data Sources Password	This is specific to VMware Aria Operations for Networks. Suite Lifecycle provides ability to change the data sources password
Add License	Provides ability to change license
View Compatiblity Matrix	Check Interop between all VMware Aria Products
Delete Product	Remove the deployed product from VMware Aria Suite Lifecycle’s environment
Update NTP	Updates NTP configuration on the product
Configure Networks Management Pack	If a management pack for VMware Aria Operations for Networks is dowloaded from Marketplace then it can be installed using this option
Re-Trust with VMware Identity Manager	Fetches VMware Identity Manager certificate and then ensure it’s updated in the product
Re-register with VMware Identity Manager	Perform re-registration of the product, incase there is a broken integration

Add Components allows you to add more nodes to an existing cluster of VMware Aria Operations for Netowrks

In the product’s pane you can add addiitonal platform and collector nodes as per guidelines

Hope you have got clarity on what options VMware Aria Suite Lifecycle provides for VMware Aria Operations for Networks