Holodeck: SDDC Manager Overview

Module 1: Introducing SDDC Manager Dashboard and Inventory

This module is designed to familiarize the user with the overall SDDC Manager User Interface

[Step 1] Logging in to the environment

1. Open a new tab in the Chrome browser
2. Click the Managed bookmarks folder in the bookmark bar then select SDDC Manager

3. Click advanced / proceed to sddc-manager.vcf.sddc.lab, if required to accept the certificate
4. Log into SDDC Manager as user: administrator@vsphere.local with the password: VMware123!  (Note: Initial login to SDDC Manager connects you to the management domain vCenter for authentication to SSO)

5. Click Login
6. If this is the first time logging in you will land on a Guided Setup screen. Select Don’t launch guides setup after login and Close Page.

7. Guided setup is available any time later by clicking the Circle question mark next to the username. Click done to clear

[Step 2] Guided Tour

If this is the first time accessing the dashboard you can clear the Backup and Subscription banners. By taking a guided tour you will be able to identify where to go to access important sections of VCF for configuration and troubleshooting

 

1. Click Take a Quick Tour (If this banner is not available click the circle-question mark and select Guided Tour)

 

 

2. The first stop shows where to manage License inventory

 

 

3. Stop two shows where to find VCF specific Network Settings

 

4. Stop three shows VCF Host Management. This will be visited later in the lab.

 

 

5. The fourth stop shows VCF Workload Domain management, including where to Create a Virtual Infrastructure Workload Domain

 

 

 

6. The last stop shows how to relaunch the tour

 

[Step 3] View the SDDC Manager Dashboard

1. Click on the Dashboard link on the left navigation

The Dashboard page is the home page that provides the overall administrative view of your system. The Dashboard page provides a top-level view of the Cloud Foundation environment. The dashboard includes:

• VMware solutions enabled. Workload Management shows this is a VMware Cloud Foundation with Tanzu enabled instance. VCF with Tanzu functionality is explored in another volume in the VCF Labs series.
• Workload Domains shows a snapshot of configured domains including Management and any Virtual Infrastructure workload domains. This lab starts with a Management Domain only and will add addition resources later.
• Host types and usage shows the total inventory of Hybrid (Flash plus spinning media) and All Flash hosts. VCF does not allow mixing the two types of hosts within a workload domain.
• Available CPU, memory, and storage capacity is shown for the VCF instance as well as percentages for the largest domain consuming resources. Since this lab is configured with the management domain only, it is the only domain shown.

• Click the X to close tasks pane at the bottom of the page to view the remainder of the dashboard.

• The lower section of the dashboard shows Updates and Update history

[Step 4] Customizing the Dashboard

1. Widgets can be moved around by clicking in the title bar and dragging. Try dragging CPU, Memory and Storage usage left

 

 

2. Your result should look like this:

 

3. Drag CPU, Memory, Storage back to the middle column
4. It also possible to remove widgets you do not need. Try closing Recent tasks

 

 

7. Click the three dots on upper right of the dashboard then Add New Widgets to restore

 

 

8. Select Recent tasks to add that widget back in the dashboard

 

9. You are free to customize the dashboard to your liking. The lab guide shows the default layout for consistency

 

 

[Step 5] Exploring the Management Domain

1. From the left navigation panel select Inventory -> Workload Domains

 

From the Workload Domains view we can see the available CPU, Memory, and Storage capacity. We are also able to see the Workload Domain(s) and the type of workload domains that have been created within the environment. This environment has the management workload domain only. The Management Domain is responsible for the overall VMware Cloud Foundation environment. 

We will provision a Virtual Infrastructure (VI) workload domain later in this lab. VI Workload domains are used to provide resources for virtual server workloads and applications.  VMware best practices recommend that management servers be physically separated from user workloads.

 

2. Click on the mgmt-domain link

If this is your first time accessing this page, you can clear the information notices on changes to SSH policy in VCF and NSX-T upgrade guidance.

3. From the Summary Tab on the landing page of the mgmt-domain you can see the following

• Resource consumption by this workload domain. Details include capacity allocated, capacity used and Capacity free
• Network Information specific to the domain
• Configuration of Application Virtual Networks (AVN).  AVN is a specific configuration of VMware NSX in the management domain to support VMware vRealize products
• Certificates status

4. Click on the Services tab

• Displays the FQDN and IP address of all associated components that have been deployed to support the specific Workload Domain. This includes vCenter Server and NSX Manager.

5. Click on the Update/Patches tab:

• Shows the pre-check workflow, as well as any updates that have been made available that apply to this specific Workload Domain. Also listed are the specific versions of software for the deployed components within the Workload Domain. Selecting a version number will take you to the Update history for that component. (Scroll down for all)

6. Click the Update History tab:

• Shows all updates that have already been applied to the system. You have the option to filter the time period over which you'd like results displayed.
• Since this is a fresh lab, Previous Updates will be blank

7. Click on the Hosts tab:

• Displays all the hosts that are part of this specific Workload Domain including the Cluster that the host belongs to, the FQDN of the host, the Management IP address, Network Pool, Host Status, Resource Usage, and Storage Type (Hybrid or All Flash)

8. Click on the Clusters tab:

• Lists out all available clusters under a given Workload Domain
• Cuirrently there is only one cluster in the Mangement domain. Another cluster will be added later in this guide

9. Click on the Edge Clusters tab:

• Shows available NSX Edge Cluster(s) for this domain
• The default VLC Holodeck configuration deploys edge cluster EC-01 in the management domain

10. Click on the Certificates tab:

• Displays the certificate information for all components of the VMware Cloud Foundation environment. This interface can also automate the replacement of a certificate for all component inside of VMware Cloud Foundation. We will explore certificate management in a later Exercise.

[Step 6] Explore Hosts Inventory

1. From the left navigation panel select Inventory -> Hosts
2. From the hosts page we get an immediate picture of the status of CPU, Memory and Storage consumption across all hosts in this VCF instance

3. Notice you can also break out the view by All hosts, as well as Assigned Hosts and Unassigned Hosts
4. This screen is also where you add additional hosts to the environment via the Commission Hosts button. This will be explored in a later module