Holodeck: Adding Additional Hosts

Overview

This guide demonstrates using VCF Lab Constructor Expansion pack capability to deploy additional nested ESXi hosts. The holodeck-standard-main package includes json files to add 3 or 4 hosts, with different host sizing and host numbering per file. The json files with “_big_” in filename generate ESXi hosts large enough for typical application lab work.  The json files without “_big_” create smaller hosts suitable for use in VCF scaling lab exercises. The files also provide a choice between hosts numbered 10 and up (esxi-10, esxi-11, etc) and hosts numbered 5-8.  This guide uses hosts esxi-5 through esxi-8 as an example to provide capacity for the VCF Core Automation lab.

[Step 1] Review add-hosts json

1. Open c:\VLC\VLC-Holo-Site-1\ add_4_hosts_ESXi5-8.json with Notepad++

2. This file will generate hosts 5-8 with minimum CPU, Memory and Disk needed for the VCF Core Automation lab. The info for esxi-5.vcf.sddc.lab is shown. You can close the file when finished reviewing.

[Step 2] Add nested hosts with VLC Expansion Pack

1. Right click C:\VLC\VLC-Holo-Site-1\VLCGui.ps1 and select Run with PowerShell 

2. Click Expansion Pack

1. Set Main VLAN to 10
2. Click on ESXi ISO Location

3. Select the VMware-VMvisor-Installer file under C:\VLC\VLC-Holo-Site-1\cb_esx_iso (This file was extracted from VCF Cloud Builder at install time by VLC)

4. Add prefix to match other hosts in the pod. This example uses Holo-A
5. Enter VMware123! For Host/CB password (this is Cloud Builder and the nested ESXi hosts, not the physical host)
6. Set NTP and DNS to 10.0.0.221
7. Enter vcf.sddc.lab for Full Domain

8. Click on Addtl Hosts JSON
9. Select the add_4_hosts_ESXi5-8.json file

10. Enter the IP address or FQDN of your physical host
11. Enter physical host username
12. Enter physical host password
13. Click connect

14. After successful connect, select Network port group to match the rest of the pod. This example uses VLC-A-PG
15. Select appropriate storage (match with rest of pod)
16. Click Validate

17. When everything validates, click Construct

18. VLC will kick off creating nested hosts. This will take approximately 12 minutes

[Step 3] Commission hosts into VCF

1. Log in to SDDC Manager administrator@vsphere.local password VMware123!
2. Select Inventory-> Hosts
3. Select Commission hosts

4. Select All in the checklist and click Proceed  (the VLC deployed environment meets all of the commissioning criteria)

5. Select Import then click Browse

6. Select Import and choose the bulk_commission json corresponding to the hosts you generated.  In our case, this is C:\VLC\VLC-Holo-Site-1\add_4_hosts_ESXi5-8_bulk_commission VSAN.json then click Open

7. Click Upload

8. Click the Confirm Fingerprint checkmark in the header to accept all thumbprints
9. Click Validate all

10. Click Next
11. On successful validation click next

12. Click Commission

13. Open the commissioning task in the task pane progress in Tasks pane

14. Maximize the task pane

15. SDDC Manager automates a large number of tasks needed to bring 4 brand new vSAN ready nodes into inventory and make them ready for deployment.

16. When complete the hosts will be unassigned, and Active