VMware Cloud Director

The main articles are:

• Virtualization. Classification and applications
• Cloud computing

VMware Cloud Director (formerly VMware vCloud Director) is a delivery and consumption model for IT services in hybrid clouds.

2022

Clouder Service Availability

Clouder's cloud and private IT infrastructure management service has become available to VMware vCloud Director users. It can now be used by Softline Cloud customers and customers of other cloud providers. Softline announced this on September 5, 2022. Read more here.

VMware Cloud Director 10.4

Exactly one year has passed since the release of version 10.3, and on July 15, 2022, VMware announced the release of the next version of Cloud Director 10.4. It is a platform for service providers that rent virtual machines that need an integrated cloud management platform.

The updated VCD 10.4 features are divided into 3 categories:

• Networking & Load Balancing
• Operational Improvements
• Core Platform

In the Network and Load Balancing section, VCD administrators have the following features:

• Means of configuring static routes on the client data-center side (tenant) and determining the next address (hop). The peculiarity of this innovation is that now virtual applications the vApps traffic using the routed organization's network is better controlled by administrators who can segment it for purposes. safety
• Now there is no option to install Basic and Enterprise for the NSX Advanced Load Balancer solution, only Enterprise remains, which is deployed by default. A network administrator can cut features for clients to the former Basic, now called the Standard variant. Well, the maximum version of all available functionality is called Premium.
• NSX Advanced Load Balancer users can now create multiple services on the same Virtual IP (VIP) with different back-end pools and configure multiple ports on the same virtual service.
• IPv6 support - a pool member can also have an IPv4 address, and mixed IP addressing sets are also supported.

Updates in the VCD 10.4 Operating Enhancements section:

• A better representation of directory synchronization between primary and subscriber, which gives more understanding of what is happening in terms of file operations.
• Also, a tenant with the appropriate rights can view the IOPS settings for storage policies defined on the vCenter Server. This allows the administrator to avoid I/O oversubscribing, as well as calculate the required values ​ ​ for better storage performance.
• A special service account has appeared that tenants can use for API tokens when developing automation scripts. You can create these accounts for each data center client. These accounts do not have access to the console interface, but API call activity tracking is available for them. Also, for tenants, they expanded the ability to work with a centralized proxy.

There is support for Terraform 3.7, which allows you to automate the configuration of the CSE (Container Service Extension) environment in a few clicks, which reduces the deployment time and the number of possible configuration errors. Then, in their environment, tenants can deploy the Tanzu Kubernetes Grid infrastructure.

The following updates have appeared for the Core Platform:

• The vApp virtual application template can now be deployed to instances between different organizations that are managed by different vCenter servers (only shared NFS storage is needed). That is, you do not need to export and import these objects in OVA format between environments. This feature also allows you to simulate workloads between data centers of the service provider.
• VCD 10.4 now better collects information about free space on storage and its loading, which provides more opportunities for smarter and faster placement of virtual machines.
• Now, through the API, you can merge the vApp template for NSX-V (NSX for vSphere) to the NSX-T platform.
• The Cloud Director virtual module now has Photo OS 3.0 on board, which provides more security and includes many library updates.
• Console proxy was merged with HTTP proxy, which allows you to use a single console for HTTP traffic and virtual machines. This simplifies the management of balancers and certificates^[1].

Object Storage Extension 2.1.1

On March 16, 2022, VMware announced the release of the Object Storage Extension 2.1.1 update, which is already available for download on the VMware Customer Connect portal. This is a freemwork to support S3 storage in the service provider infrastructure that runs on VMware Cloud Director.

Major Changes to Object Storage Extension 2.1.1

Support for current operating systems

OSE 2.1.1 now supports a large range of Linux distributions, including systems such as Photo OS 3 +, Ubuntu 18 + and Debian 10 +.

Object Lock Features and Object Tagging for Dell ECS 3.6 Users

Clients in the cloud running VMware Cloud Director can be mapped to ECS Identity and Account Access Management (IAM) entities instead of remaining users of ECS objects. This allows you to independently control the functionality of object lock and tagging. Object lock is a function to prevent objects from being overwritten or deleted for a fixed time that can be activated when a bucket is created. And tagging allows you to categorize buckets by assigning tags to individual objects using a key-value pair.

User mappings can be obtained after a simple upgrade to the cloud provider portal, but this remains optional.

Additional support

In a last release, VMware released Object Storage Interoperability Services (OSIS), allowing the integration of any third-party S3-compliant object storage with VMware Cloud Director that is managed through the REST API. Now the compatibility services functions have been significantly improved, and cloud providers can use OSIS stub, OSIS verifier and Common Test Suites to determine compatibility and readiness of components for OSIS implementation.

Bug fixes

Many small improvements and bug fixes have been made, a complete list of which is given in release notes.

Cloud providers can use the upgrade guide page to update the infrastructure on Object Storage Extension 2.1.1.^[2]

2021

Object Storage Extension 2.1

On September 27, 2021, it became known that VMware announced the release of the next version of Object Storage Extension 2.1 (OSE). This is a freemwork to support S3 storage in the service provider infrastructure that runs on VMware Cloud Director.

Optimized features of Object Storage Extension 2.1:

1. Backup and recovery on demand for Kubernetes (same K8s B&R)

VMware Cloud Director Object Storage Extension now has built-in Kubernetes Backup & Restore (K8s B&R) capabilities available directly in VMware Cloud Director. Now cloud providers can protect not only virtual machines, but also workloads of containerized applications. B&R K8s capabilities are built on Velero, which uses the S3 protocol to store backup copies to protect data on persistent volumes.

Backup initially supports the infrastructure of a large number of clients (multi-tenancy) who work with TKG clusters, CSE clusters and individual K8s installations running Container Service Extension 3.0. Also, the backup uses end-to-end encryption.

2. Access cloud storage policies Cloudian

Cloudian object storage policies enable storage protection and distribution to consumers within an organization. With simple rules, cloud providers can give users the ability to create their own buckets and objects. Starting with OSE 2.1, customers who use Cloudian can create custom storage policies directly from OSE.

3. Optimized bucket synchronization and object output

For customers with multiple sites, buckets are now aggregated within a single view in the VMware Cloud Director console. Cloud providers can monitor the synchronization status of their customers' buckets. Also, at the global level, an option for synchronizing buckets is available, which can be enabled by administrators of the service provider to make sure that all multi-site buckets are synchronized (the inclusion of this feature can also be put in the scheduler).

4. AWS S3 Archived Object Restoration

Amazon S3 requires each object to be associated with a storage class depending on the use case. Of the four classes available, cloud provider users and administrators could access Standard and Intelligent classes. Now customers can access the Glacier and Glacier Deep classes (but first you need to enable restore for objects).

5. Role-based Access Control (RBAC)

You can now use custom roles to assign them to client users to manage vApps, Catalogs, and Kubernetes B & R. In version 2.1, there is a built-in list of convenient user rights selection, with which cloud provider administrators (or customer administrators) can simply limit the capabilities of individual users.

6. Management Optimization for VMware Cloud Director Resources - vApps, VM, Catalogs

In a previous version of OSE, administrators had limited visibility when importing and exporting vApp history. Now the whole story is available in the form of a complete list of events that took place. There have also been several changes to the interface - the menu for creating and restoring virtual vApp applications is now seamlessly integrated into the Cloud Director console. ^[3]

VMware Cloud Director 10.3

On July 20, 2021, VMware announced the download availability of VMware Cloud Director 10.3, a solution for service providers that provide leased virtual machines that need an integrated cloud management platform.

VCD 10.3 Features:

• Support for Kubernetes - such innovations as support for Tanzu Kubernetes clusters for NSX-T Data Center group networking have appeared here. You can now enable external access within the data center group for individual services.
• Service providers and customers can upgrade Tanzu Kubernetes clusters using the GUI, as well as use vRealize Operations Tenant App to account for Kubernetes resource consumption.
• Customers can use a single API access point for all Tanzu Kubernetes Grid Service, Tanzu Kubernetes Grid, and Kubernetes solutions lifecycle operations.
• FIPS-compliant interface enhancements.
• Supports vApp application APIs when they move between vCenters.
• Interface enhancements when working with the directory.
• VMware Cloud Director Service Library support for vRealize Orchestrator 8.x (there is a vRealize Orchestrator plug-in for this, which allows you to implement vRO workflows for VCD clients).
• Improved Quick Search and Global Search in the interface.
• Auto Scaling enhancements.
• Support for vApp network services in an NSX-T environment - You can use NAT, firewall, and static routing for vApp virtual application networks.
• Support for Distributed Firewall Dynamic Group Membership in an NSX-T environment - you can create VM security groups with dynamic membership, which is based on various VM parameters (for example, a name template or tags). For such groups, you can create firewall rules, which allows you to microsegment network traffic and effectively protect VM groups.
• Service providers can create external networks based on VLANs and overlays of NSX-T Data Center segments.
• Service providers can import DVPG-based networks. The administrator can import a distributed portgroup from the Distributed Switch and share these networks between the data center groups.
• Supports VLANs and port-group network pools for NSX-T Data Center-based VDCs.
• Support for creating VDCs without association with NSX Data Center for vSphere, NSX-T Data Center Update port groups, or external networks.
• Support for Avi versions 20.1.3 and 20.1.4.
• Supports the DHCPv6 and SLAAC configuration and the primary IP address assignment to the NSX-T edge gateway on the interface.
• Support for creating and managing static IPv6 pools.
• View the list of VDC group networks in the interface.
• Assignment enhancements for Edge Cluster.
• Supports DHCP management for isolated networks in NSX-T Data Center-based VDCs.
• Service providers can change the basic settings of Avi SEG.
• The Tier-0 Gateway Networking section of the Service Provider Portal.
• Allocated DHCP IP addresses are visible on the VM details screen.
• You can modify and remove DHCP pools from NSX-T Data Center-based networks.
• Reject action for NSX-T Data Center edge gateway rules (you can also notify the client of blocked traffic).
• You can change the priority of NAT rules.
• Reflexive NAT support.
• Support for imported VMware Cloud on AWS networks.
• Advertising services with route advertisement are supported for internal subnets.
• Supports/32 networks as external to the NSX-T Data Center.
• Support for Guest VLAN Tagging for NSX-T Data Center network segments.
• Alpha API Availability - Administrators can now use the default API, which allows you to manage Kubernetes Container Cluster, and also provides Legacy API Login capabilities.

2020: VMware Cloud Director 10.1

On May 6, 2020, VMware announced the next version of Cloud Director 10.1, designed to create an integrated platform for service providers that lease virtual machines. The letter "v" has disappeared from the word vCloud, and now the product is called Cloud Director.

VMware Cloud Director 10.1 Updates:

• App Launchpad is a tool based on the solution of the purchased company. Bitnami It allows service providers to deploy various, applications including custom, to users in order to give them a single solution for the full cycle of service provision. IaaS<>SaaS
• Container Service Extension (CSE) 2.6 - Cloud users will now have even more useful tools to deploy applications in Kubernetes containers. This version provides not only console tools, but also visualizes some things about the container infrastructure in the interface.
• Object Storage Extension (OSE) 1.5 - Through this extension, users get an S3-compatible API that can use Cloudian S3 storage, including on the Dell ECS EX platform.
• Terraform VMware Cloud Director Provider 2.8 - With this plugin, cloud providers can deploy infrastructure from pre-scripted scripts for virtual data centers (Infrastructure-as-code).
• Tenant App 2.4 - the means of this virtual module can be used to consume resources by cloud clients and the cost of their maintenance (pricing and billing). In the next version of this tool, there is now more detailed support for the NSX network stack to take into account the consumption of network resources by clients and, for example, charge them based on the provided bandwidth.
• The NSX-T Migration Tool is a means to relocate from the NSX-V platform. For virtual machines, vMotion is used during migration, so the move process is possible without downtime of services.
• NSX-T improvements - a lot of improvements have appeared here. Now the deployment process does not require work in several screens, improvements to IPSec have appeared, and much has been done in terms of security and improvement of work in various network topologies.
• Encryption as a service - service providers can now use enciphering vSphere Encryption. To do this, you need to deploy the key management server (KMS) infrastructure based on partner solutions such as Fortanix or Dell CloudLink.^[4]

2019

VMware vCloud Director 10

On September 4, 2019, VMware announced an updated version of the integrated platform for service providers that lease virtual machines - VMware vCloud Director 10 (vCD).

According to the developer, vCloud Director is the main tool for VMware Cloud Providers partners who work with many customers who consume services virtual data center from clouds to create a single hybrid environment for their enterprise.

The release of vCD 10 focuses on 3 main aspects:

• Improved mechanisms for delivering virtual services and serving cloud clients.
• Multidisciplinary loads. vCloud Director is not only about virtual machines, it supports integration with services such as PKS to provide customers with the most convenient way to use [[mobile application 'applications] in a virtual data center.
• Improve the workflow in the interface and simplify it for customers.

Changes and additions to VMware vCloud Director 10, marked by the developer:

• Complete transition to the Clarity interface. vCD 10 is fully powered by the Clarity HTML5 framework, which presents the interface simply and clearly, within the framework of the overall concept of other VMware products (vSphere, Horizon, NSX).

The Flex interface is still preserved as a backup, but it will be absent in the next version.

• New Object Creation wizards have been redesigned. VMware paid great attention to how service providers create entities and gave explanations for them:

Creating a pool looks clearer:

The menu contains convenient help on resources for both the vCD itself and the vSphere platform:

• VMware NSX-T support. The vCD 10 release focuses on creating functional network services in the NSX-T environment. As of September 2019, the work has not yet been completed (as was done with the NSX-V), but there is already a movement forward.

Creation Workflow looks simpler and clearer:

When you add oVDC, you can see NSX-T Overlay pool:

The following features are available for NSX-T:

Creating Edge Gateways

Configuring Edge Firewall Rules

NAT Configuration

IP Allocation and Management Features

There is also a simple IP destination window:

Configuring DNS Forwarding

Creating and Configuring OrgVDC Network

After creation, it will be available in the list:

The following features are not yet available for NSX-T:

1. IPsec VPN - this can be done through. API
2. L2VPN - not yet supported.
3. Dynamic Routing.

Through NSX-T CloudAPI, you can create IPSecVPN and more:

You can see the made GET call in Postman:

• Improvements to centralized management tools.

Central Point of Management (CPoM) features in vCD 10 have been significantly improved. In the presented version, you can add a dedicated vCenter to the client, while continuing to control it from the service provider:

vCenter can have only one of the roles - IaaS (represented for pVDC and oVDC objects), or CPoM. When adding vCenter, there is a corresponding radio button:

The appearance of the console has also changed a little:

By clicking on Dedicated vSphere Datacenters, the user can see all the vCenter servers presented to him with instructions for their configuration:

• Configure proxy configuration. A user-friendly Proxy Configuration wizard has appeared:

In one window, you can manage proxy servers and certificates:

For vCenter servers, you can see which clients they are allocated and which proxies are presented there:

• vCloud Director Appliance updates and migration paths. For the vCD 10 Appliance with the base PostgreSQL , a seamless upgrade from vCD 9.7 is possible.

Migration and upgrade paths are available for vCDs with DBMS QL Server or External PgSQL.

SQL Server is no longer supported for vCD 10.

• Placement and sizing policies. For service providers and their clients, 2 policies have appeared - VM Placement Policy and VM Sizing Policy.

VM Placement Policy allows you to create a host group that is combined at the pVDC level according to the following criteria:

• Performance
• Resource Requirements
• License Restrictions
• Assigning them to provider customers.

This allows service providers to control the placement of customer machines in the context of various demands.

VM Sizing Policy allows you to set provisioning/resource restriction settings for virtual machine-level workloads:

You can create this policy and apply it to an organization or other available object:

Such policies are typically used with FlexVDC data center models. If the user tries to apply such a policy for another model, and a conflict arises, he will be asked to convert such a data center:

By default, the service provider does not have to set these policies, but can apply them at the customer level:

For the selected oVDC, apply the policy and assign it as the default policy:

• Backup ecosystem certification. For September 2019, vCD 10 is officially certified to work with Cohesity, Commvault, Dell EMC, Rubrik and, of course, Veeam Software products :

The provider can publish these plugins via the vCD interface:

In the plugin section, you can publish them for specific customers of the service provider on demand:

• Other improvements.

Terraform Provider 2.4 Support:

Ability to integrate vCloud Director and Cloudian:

Native support for Pivotal Container Services has appeared:

You can import Bitnami Apps into the vCD catalog^[5]:

VMware vCloud Director 9.7

On May 21, 2019, VMware announced the addition of VMware Cloud solutions in line with a strategy aimed at creating a unified digital platform to support the process of digital transformation of customers and partners of the company.

The next version of VMware vCloud Director 9.7 will allow to providers cloudy services to offer even more differentiated hybrid solutions and run services through a centralized cloud management interface, with improved scalability and the ability to use software platform extensions. The vCloud Director platform will simplify monitoring and unify management of both private clouds infrastructure-based and vSphere multi-cloud provider environments.

The updated functionality of the vCloud Director software platform extensions will allow cloud service providers to easily add emerging services to their portfolio by offering solutions to leading virtualization ecosystem partners on their platform, including Cohesity, Dell EMC, and Rubrik.

2018

VMware vCloud Director 9.5

On September 3, 2018, VMware announced the release of VMware vCloud Director 9.5.

Changes implemented in VMware vCloud Director 9.5:

1. Deeper integration with the solution. VMware NSX-T vCloud Director allows you to ensure security across multiple sites at the channel level of Layer-2 interaction. With NSX, you can create and use networking monitoring features such as Universal Transport Zone, Universal Logical Switch, Universal Logical Router and Local Egress, which allows you to reconfigure connections data center without the need for a large number of manual operations as before. Services -providers can stretch the network into several under the data centers control of different servers vCenter vCloud Director instances.
2. Cross-platform networking with NSX-T. Support for initial deployment and integration with NSX-T improves application performance and predictability, especially with greater channel width and response time (NFV) requirements. NSX supports the ability to place NSX-T and NSX-V controls on the same vCD server, and place isolated L2 logical networks on a direct connected network under the control of the NSX-T logical switch. This allows service providers to deploy virtual data centers both with and without VMware Enhanced Networking Stack.
3. Intuitive control functions in the HTML5-based interface. For end users of the vCloud Director console, the entire interface has been migrated to HTML5, there have been significantly redesigned portlets to be more consistent with the running workflows. For service providers, the interface of centralized monitoring and control over customers and their tasks has been improved.
4. Redesigned Role-Based Access Control (RBAC). The RBAC framework has been completely redesigned to reduce the time to complete tasks for assigning and delegating access by service providers. RBAC implements a more realistic rights assignment model, is easy to operate and has a good level of resolution granularity.
5. Self-Service Data Protection features for Dell EMC Avamar. Through the vCD interface, service providers can manage Dell EMC Avamar data protection features. This provides support for cloud environments, multiple clients, and storage deduplication when performing backup operations on virtual machines.
6. Deploy vCloud Director as a Virtual Appliance. This allows you to integrate the vCloud Director solution with other virtual data center management products (for example, vRealize Operations), as well as simplify the procedure for deploying, updating and maintaining the lifecycle of vCD servers in general.^[6]

VMware vCloud Director 9.1

On March 13, 2018, VMware introduced vCloud Director 9.1.

Continue the transition to HTML5 technology

The main emphasis was on improving the means of the web interface for customers. The following improvements have been made:

• Client Integration Plugin (CIP) for managing downloads, including OVF/OVA virtual modules:

• Multi-site navigation portal (virtual data centers):

• Simple workflows for creating a virtual machine and a virtual vApp service:

VM Remote Console (VMRC) Support for Connection to VM Console

Now, in the context menu of the VM, you can download VMRC and launch it separately to access the VM console (there is no need to use vSphere CIP on the HTML5 portal).

Integration with vRealize Orchestrator

Now, through Content or Service Library, you can embed, configure, and execute the basic workflows of vRealize Orchestrator.

Python SDK and vCD-CLI support

Now vCloud Director has even more Python-based automation tools for both customer and service provider operations. You can find out more about this here.

Container Service Extension

vCloud Director now provides K8s cluster container lifecycle management through the Container Service Extension (CSE). Cluster nodes are K8s handled in the same way as virtual machines. Therefore, now the process of managing containers and VMs is unified.

Support for SR-IOV/NFV requests

vCloud Director for clients using virtual machines with critical low latency requirements. Support for Large Page VM also appeared.

FIPS Mode for NSX

FIPS support was introduced in NSX 6.3.0, but now integration has appeared in the vCloud Director GUI (at the edge gateway level).

Other changes

Also, vCD administrators should consider the following changes:

• Switch to Cassandra 3.x for metric mechanism.
• Discontinuation of support for Oracle Database (9.1 is the latest release that supports Oracle databases).
• Termination of support for vCloud API 1.5 and 5.1 is already in this release.
• The admin interface is still built on the basis of Flex, the transition to HTML5 will be made later (while only vRO registration and the content library wizard are built on the basis of this technology).
• Patches for Usage Meter and vCloud Director Extender will be released very soon, which will support this vCD release. Stay tuned.

2015: VMware to release vCloud Director 8.0 beta

On May 21, 2015, VMware announced the near-time release of the beta version of vCloud Director 8.0.

The company announced the abandonment of further product development on September 30, 2013.

VMware vCloud Director Framework, 2015

Declared capabilities of the software solution:

• vSphere 6.0 support and compatibility with NSX 6.1 network virtualization solution.

• Virtual Data Center (VDC) templates to enable users to use the self-service portal themselves.

• improving the usability of virtual services (vApp). Support for applications in containers is expected.

• restrictions on VM parameters (resource utilization) to flexibly manage physical resource consumption in a multi-user cloud environment.

• OAuth Authentication Provider Support

• Improve deployment and automation processes by supporting the new vRealize Orchestrator Plugin.

The product will be available for download on June 1, 2015.

2013

VMware vCloud Director 5.5

(Data current as of September 2013)

• Official support for vCloud Director in the form of a virtual module (VCD 5.5 Virtual Appliance), but still not for the production environment.
• The ability to share a directory and synchronize.
• Object version support.
• Enhanced deployment and lifecycle support for vApp virtual services.
• Support for vApp cloning and their memory status.
• OVF import/export improvements.

Veeam integration with VMware

Veeam Software, a provider of innovative data protection and recovery solutions and management of VMware vSpher and Microsoft Hyper-V virtual environments, announced in February 2013 that it was expanding support for VMware vCloud Director.

As an Elite VMware partner under the VMware Technology Alliance Partner Program, Veeam is always actively involved in the development of solutions for the vSphere platform. Enhanced support for vCloud Director is another example of a policy aimed at integrating with innovative VMware technologies.

The new integration will extend Veeam's capabilities to support vCloud Director, which currently includes the ability to back up, restore, and replicate virtual machines (VMs) managed by vCloud Director.

The vCloud Director API will allow you to map the vCloud Director infrastructure directly to Veeam Backup & Replication™, back up all components and attributes, and restore vApps and virtual machines directly to the vCloud Director infrastructure, including support for recovering virtual machines deployed using fast cloning technology.

The new features leverage the existing Veeam backup infrastructure and are integrated directly into the backup console. This is an off-the-shelf solution that is fully supported by Veeam and can also be expanded by customers and partners.

The powerful, easy-to-use, affordable Veeam Backup & Replication solution has enabled organizations to take full advantage of virtualization over the years, providing reliable backup and fast virtual machine recovery.

Veeam's launch in 2010 of vPower® technology accelerated the process of virtualizing critical applications by offering capabilities such as Instant File-Level Recovery (VM), SureBackup, and Universal Application-Item Recovery (U-AIR). Previously, these tasks were too complex or simply impossible to perform in a physical environment. By expanding support for vCloud Director, Veeam's backup and recovery solution is becoming more efficient at a new stage in the development of virtualization technologies, when companies, primarily large and medium-sized businesses, are increasingly using cloud computing.

Enhanced support for vCloud Director will also enable customers to streamline backup and recovery systems for Managed Service Providers (MSPs) that use vCloud Director to maintain and manage their clients' cloud environments.

2012: VMware vCloud Director 5.1

2011: VMware vCloud Director 1.5

By supporting the principle of self-service when providing infrastructure services from internal and external sources, VMware vCloud Director 1.5 will enable IT professionals to significantly reduce the commissioning time of new servers. Linked Clone cloning capabilities will reduce server creation time by up to five seconds, while reducing storage costs by 60 percent and providing the ability to manage resources from a single center.

Notes