Introduction to public cloud integrations

This section introduces the key concepts of the integrations with vCloud Director, AWS, and Azure.

Virtual datacenters

The platform offers user access to virtual datacenters (VDCs) that are separate groups of virtual resources. A VDC has equivalents in each cloud provider, so it gives you a common interface and API to all the providers - see the table below. For example, the platform’s concept of the VDC is equivalent to  the VPC in AWS (Amazon). In vCloud Director (vCloud), the VDC is equivalent to a vApp. In ARM Compute (Azure), the VDC is equivalent to a Virtual Network and its associated resources. 

Virtual appliances

Within its VDCs, the platform groups VMs into virtual appliances (VApps). The purpose of the VApp is to enable you to manage a group of VMs together, which means that you can deploy them in one click, or view their metrics together, or create custom metrics for the VApp, for example. You can move VMs from one VApp to another within the same VDC. A VApp is not equivalent to any specific concept in vCloud or public cloud.

Networks

In vCloud, the platform supports the onboarding of the following networks:

• External networks outside the OrgVDC but connected to the Edge are external networks in the platform, for use by load balancers but not VM vNICs
• External networks outside the OrgVDC with a direct connection to OrgVDC as OrgVDCNetwork are external networks
• Org networks inside the Org VDC and routed through the Edge are external networks
• Isolated Org networks are external networks, for use by VM vNICs but not load balancers
• vApp networks are private networks.

Configure your user account

All users should configure their user accounts before starting work with the cloud platform.

Edit user details

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Create public cloud regions

Create tenants

Control tenant resources

You can control the resources that an enterprise may consume. This will help prevent resource over allocation, enterprises using resources from other enterprises, and even DoS attacks. Allocation limits will also help system administrators to anticipate user needs and forecast resource demand. Hard and soft limits are used by the resource scheduler to decide if a user can deploy a virtual appliance or not.

• Hard Limit: the maximum amount of resources (CPU, RAM, Hard Disk, etc.) that an enterprise may consume.
• Soft Limit: triggers a warning for users that they nearing the hard limits for their enterprise.

Enterprise allocation limits are checked during configuration or deploy, or before operations as described in the above table.

When creating allocation limits, you cannot have a hard limit only.  And soft limits must always be less than or equal to hard limits. In addition, if the limits are equal to 0, then this means there is  no limit to resource usage at this level.  See  Allocation limit rules. 

Allow the tenant to access regions

To set the public cloud regions and datacenters that an enterprise is allowed to access, edit the Enterprise and click the Datacenters tab.

Drag and drop one or more public cloud regions or providers, or datacenters from the left pane into the "Allowed Datacenters" pane on the right.

An enterprise needs access to at least one public cloud region or datacenter so that its users can deploy VMs.

Note: when you create a public cloud region or a datacenter, the platform allows it for your own enterprise automatically. For all other enterprise, the platform adds it to the list in the left pane, which contains "Prohibited datacenters".

Allowed datacenters are working datacenters where users can deploy. This is different to an admin user having administration Scope to administer the infrastructure of datacenter. 

Limit tenant resources in the region

You can set resource allocation limits for this enterprise in each allowed datacenter or public cloud region. To set allocation limits, select one of the Allowed Datacenters in the right pane and click the edit button. Set these limit values in the pop-up that opens.

Manage cloud provider credentials

Each tenant should have its own set of API credentials for each provider.

Obtain cloud provider credentials

If the tenant does not have cloud provider credentials, they should follow their cloud provider's instructions on how to obtain access to the provider's API.

Abiquo provides basic guides to obtaining credentials, but the tenant should always consult the cloud provider for the most up-to-date information.

• Obtain AWS credentials

• Obtain Azure ARM credentials

• Obtain Azure Credentials

• Obtain GCE credentials

• Obtain Packet credentials

• Obtain Rackspace credentials

Add tenant credentials for each provider

Before you enter public cloud credentials, there must be an existing public cloud region for the provider.

To add credentials for a public cloud provider

1. Check in Infrastructure view or with your Administrator, that the public cloud region is already created
2. Edit the enterprise and select the Credentials tab
3. From the Provider pull down list, select the public cloud provider
4. Enter your Access key ID, which may be a Username, a specific API access key ID or other account identifier
5. Enter your Secret access key, which may be an API key or other API credential
6. Click Validate account
7. After the account has been validated, click Save

Prepare foundation template library

In the Abiquo Apps Library you can compile a selection of certified public cloud templates for your users to deploy by self-service.

Abiquo will store the details of these templates but not their disks.

Onboard from public cloud

Create virtual datacenters

Manage Networks

This section describes how to manage networks in private datacenters and public cloud providers. 

Manage virtual machines

This section describes the tasks that may be performed by the cloud user. 

Edit your user account details

After you log in, you may need to edit your user account to update your details:

1. Click on the user icon in top right-hand corner of the screen and select Edit user from the pull-down menu
   
2. Change your password and edit your user details. Check you have the correct email and phone number to receive passwords and authentication

3. Add your public key that that the platform will use to launch VMs so that you can access them with SSH

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   Edit user general information Edit user advanced

   
   

Alarms

Alerts

Scaling groups

Automation

Introduction to action plans

Automate VM first boot with a configuration or script

To automate the configuration of your VM, edit the VM and on the Bootstrap tab, add a configuration or script that will run with cloud-init. Remember that your VM template must be compatible with cloud-init version 0.7.9 or above, and for Windows systems this will be a Cloudbase-Init template.

Add variables for the configuration of your VM

To add variables for use by cloud-init configurations or scripts, edit the VM and on the Variables tab, add the key and value for each variable that will be sent to the VM at deploy time. Remember that your VM template must be compatible with cloud-init version 0.7.9 or above, and for Windows system this will be a Cloudbase-Init template.

Configure Chef Recipes and Roles to automate VM configuration

Chef is an infrastructure automation product that uses configuration recipes. You can use Abiquo Chef Integration to deploy a VM that will then configure itself using Chef recipes and roles on Linux VMs.

The Chef tab will display if your tenant has a Chef configuration and your VM template is compatible with cloud-init.

To add Chef roles and recipes for your VM:

1. Edit the VM and go to the Chef tab. 
2. By default on this tab you can select roles. In order to select recipes too, select the Mark the "Select individual components" checkbox
3. Select the appropriate roles and recipes in order to add to the VM's runlist. When the VM is deployed it will download the roles and recipes, and run them in order.
4. Run a Chef-client recipe to keep your VM up to date with the Chef server.

To change the order of the runlist, click on the pencil button beside a role or recipe, then edit the order number, then click OK.

If you change the runlist after deploy, Abiquo will update the Chef server, and your Chef-client recipe can obtain these changes from the Chef server.

See also Configuring and Using Abiquo Chef Integration in the Abiquo HOWTOs and Troubleshooting Abiquo Chef Integration in the Administrator's Guide.