I was pulling ESX Host metric values from the VCF Operations API this morning and wrote a script to get just what I wanted, basically just curl commands against the REST API surface. As I finished I thought to myself, this could be much more robust and would be cool if it had a GUI option. Here's what I came up with! Everything is documented in the README.md, but here's an example of running it CLI. python3 vcf_operations_metrics_picker.py --server 192.168.135.113 --user ad

While writing the previous blog regarding Logs Data Sets another idea came to me, what if I wanted to provide visibility into just Logs via the VCF Operations 9.1.1 UI and nothing else, how would I do that? Here's how! Open the VCF Operations UI and go to Operate - Administration - Control Panel - Access Control Click ADD. Give the new Role a Name and Description and you'll need two Permissions: Access Control - Login Interactively Logs - Manage and View Logging in with a us

We discussed Operations for Logs Data Sets a few years ago, but it's changed since then, so let's take another look. VCF 9.1 changed the Logs architecture significantly. Logs went from being its own Cluster of VMs to a service running on the VCF Management Services Cluster. It no longer has its own UI, but rather is accessed via the VCF Operations UI. This changed how Logs Data Sets are configured as well. Logs Data Sets are a construct used to filter what VCF Operations u

We've discussed the VCF Operations Fleet Manager API introduced in VCF 9.0 a few times. VCF Operations 9 Fleet Manager API Delete Certificates from the VCF Operations 9 Fleet Manager API Retrieving Passwords from the VCF Operations Fleet Manager I'd like to change a password via the the Fleet Manager API, here's how I did it. First, you can access the VCF Operations Fleet Manager API here. Once there you'll be presented with the Swagger UI, remember to authenticate with Base

You're building ESX Hosts and don't want to be Alerted on them until they go live, how to do it? Of course, you can log into VCF Operations and put the specific Host/s into Operations Maintenance Mode via the UI if you'd like. You can put them into Operations Maintenance Mode via API if you'd prefer. Both methods are covered in a previous blog. Another way to do it involves vSphere Custom Attributes, a Custom Group, a Custom Policy, and a Maintenance Schedule, here's how.

VCF 9.0.2 dropped several express patches recently, Release Notes can be found here: VCF Automation 9.0.2.0300 VCF Operations orchestrator 9.0.2.0300 VCF Operations fleet management 9.0.2.0300 VCF Identity Broker 9.0.2.0300 They can be downloaded here. In this blog, we'll update the VCF Operations Fleet Manager. I'm currently running VCF Operations Fleet Manager 9.0.2.0. I went to Fleet Management - Lifecycle - Binary Management - PATCH BINARIES (VCF Version 9.0) and downloa

We've discussed VCF Operations visibility into VM Snapshots several times: VMware Aria Operations and VM Snapshots VM Snapshots in Aria Operations 8.18 Everything you wanted to know about VM Snapshots in Aria Operations One piece of information that is missing is the VM Snapshots inclusion of the VMs Memory. Ideally we'd get this as a Property on the VM Snapshot in VCF Operations, but we don't today (I've opened a feature request for it). Until that happens we do have visibi

There are several vSphere Cluster Memory metrics in VCF Operations, formal documentation on these metrics can be found here. Not all of these definitions are as detailed as I'd like, so let's provide a summary. Total Capacity (KB) - total capacity in KB, API Key is mem|totalCapacity_average. Hover description is "Amount of physical capacity configured on descendant ESX Hosts". In reality this is the sum of descendant ESXi Hosts Memory as shown below. Usable Capacity (KB) -

VCF 9.1.1 dropped last week, Release Notes can be found here. I'm upgrading one of my stand-alone labs right away, here's how I did it via PAK file. This approach is recommended for stand-alone Operations instances only, not VCF Fleet managed ones. First, I took a Snapshot of my Primary Node VM (only a single Node in this lab). I then logged into the Operations Admin UI and went to Software Update. Click INSTALL A SOFTWARE UPDATE. Browse for the 9.1.1 pak file and click UP

We discussed how to capture AD Groups and Users brokered by vIDB into VCF Operations 9.1 a few weeks ago. In this blog we'll do the same, but against 9.0.2, which is a bit different. First, we need an API Client and Secret, which we can get in the VCF Operations 9.0.2 UI at Fleet Management - Identity & Access - VCF Other Components. Click REGENERATE to regenerate a new Client Secret for your Client ID. Once you have your Client Secret you need to take your client_id:client

If you've done any capacity planning in VCF Operations you've likely used the What-If Analysis planning tool. It can be used for all sorts of use cases: adding/remove VMs from a Cluster, adding/removing ESX Hosts from a Cluster, and more. It'll provide Scenario Results that look something like this. In this case I'm running a Scenario to determine Cluster Capacity should I remove 1 ESX Host from it. The graphs confuse people from time to time, so let's go through them. F

I was doing some work in VCF Operations 9.1 and came across this, what?! I don't recall seeing it called out in the Release Notes but it is documented formally here. Now when I'm troubleshooting a VM from the VCF Operations Workbench I can SSH directly into it from Operations itself. You'll notice we support both credential based access and SSH Key based access. Executing remote command is also supported. Uploading a script and running it is also supported! All sorts of use

Looking to recover a mistakenly deleted VCF Operations Dashboard I discovered Dashboard backups on my Analytics Nodes. Specifically, they can be found in the following directory on every Analytics Node in your Operations Cluster: /storage/db/vcops/dashboard_dump From within there will be a directory for each Dashboard Owning User, mine looked like this. root@vcfops-135-110 [ /storage/db/vcops/dashboard_dump ]# ls -latr total 16 drwxr-xr-x 4 admin admin 4096 Jul 14 15:50 . d

I was creating a VCF Operations Automation Central Job for deletion of VM Snapshots in my lab and noticed this! I don't recall these options before 9.1, so I checked the Release Notes and sure enough, it's new! There were several Capacity related enhancements in 9.1, this is taken directly from the Release Notes. Capacity Enhancements Enhanced Storage Capacity Visibility. Improved visibility into storage usage across vSAN, VMFS, NFS, and vVol datastore types on clusters, hos

If you read the VCF Operations 9.1 Release Notes carefully you noticed the following: The behavior of the ${SYMPTOMS} placeholder in webhook notification payload templates has changed In 9.1, the ${SYMPTOMS} placeholder was redesigned from a plain string to a structured JSON object representing symptom sets, conditions, and related context. As a result, ${SYMPTOMS} can no longer be embedded inline with other variables or text within the same JSON value. For correct usage, pla

I see this question a lot: what's the difference between VCF Operations Maintenance Mode and vSphere/ESX Maintenance Mode? In short: VCF Operations Maintenance Mode puts the Operations Object into Maintenance as indicated by the Collection State of the Object which can be found in Infrastructure Operations - Configurations - Inventory Management - Collection States. When an Operations Object goes into Maintenance, Operations stops collecting data from it and stops generatin

I've seen this question a few different places recently, so figured I'd post it. Does the VCF Operations "admin" account expire? The answer is no (as of 9.1). Regardless of what gets set in Administration - Global Settings - User Access, the local admin account will not expire. The settings here apply to non-admin local accounts only. Hope this helps!

I have a VCF Operations 9.1 deployment using vIDB 9.1 to broker Identity and Access Management with Active Directory. I wanted to list AD Groups and Users via API, here's how I did it. First, log into VCF Operations to create your API Client and Token. I detailed how to do this a couple different ways previously: Accessing the VCF Operations 9.1 API using vIDB Tokens Creating an API Token in VCF Operations 9.1 using SSO Account I've created my API Client and Token here. Now

We've discussed the vCommunity Management Pack a few times already, just so you have all the articles in one spot here's the list: vCommunity Management Pack for VCF Operations vCommunity Management Pack for VCF Operations Part 2 vCommunity Management Pack for VCF Operations Part 3 vCommunity Management Pack for VCF Operations Part 4 vCommunity Management Pack for VCF Operations Part 5 Onur Yuzseven dropped the latest version of the VCF Operations vCommunity Management v0.3.0

In our last blog we discussed how to create a general API Client/Token to be used to access the VCF Operations 9.1 API. This blog will detail how to create an API Token for an SSO User. First, log into VCF Operations using your SSO credentials. Once logged in click the user icon top right. Click Generate API Token. Click GENERATE. Give it a Name, TTL, Description and click GENERATE API TOKEN. You now have your token, OIDC Issuer URL, and Token Endpoint URL, which you will ne

We've discussed authenticating with the VCF Operations API a couple times before: Authenticating with the Aria Operations API Authenticating to the VCF Operations API using vIDM Credentials This blog will discuss how to authenticate with the VCF Operations 9.1 API using vIDB Tokens, assuming you're running an integrated instance of vIDB. First, log into VCF Operations and go to Manage - Fleet Management - Identity & Access - VCF Overview and select our Identity Broker. From

For years we've been trying to get the Datastore Device Backing Extent Name in VCF Operations, commonly referred to as the NAA ID. To that end, we've been working to capture this property with the vCommunity Management Pack, which we will have news on soon. Earlier today I was discussing this with a customer and he said "you can already get that". My response was "Really, how?!". And he showed me, here's how. To start, have a look at the Datastore Metrics provided OOTB, s

There are two "admin" accounts in VCF Operations, one for the application itself and another in the OS. The application admin account is the one you use to administer VCF Operations itself, this is the one you can log into the UI as well as the admin UI with. To reset the application admin password you can do it two different ways: via the admin UI located at https://your_ops_fqdn/admin, then Administrator Settings - Change Administrator Password. When changing the admin p

If you're running VCF Operations 9.0 or 9.0.x and collecting data from NSX Manager/s, you might have come across this two Metrics: Specifically, NSX Manager Node Health Score and Node Status. I couldn't find either of them in the documentation (I've submitted feedback asking for updates), so I dug into them a bit and here are the details. NSX Manager Node Status is being pulled directly from NSX Manager, it is capturing this Status. The NSX Manager Status options are: Up, De