Usage

Notes

If you plan to use the SovLabs IPAM module to automate IP address reservations, be sure to turn off the internal vRA Network Profile.

If this is a brand new vRA installation and you’ve not yet set up any network profiles with IP ranges, skip this step.

Steps for disabling the internal vRA IP reservations in your Reservation(s)

  1. Login to the vRA tenant (Be sure your login has Infrastructure Architect role enabled.)
  2. Click on the Infrastructure tab and go to Reservations
  3. Edit the reservation associated with the builds you’ll be managing
    1. Click on the Network tab
    2. Clear the Network Profile dropdown value so it’s empty
    3. Click OK

Attach vRA Property Group to vRA Blueprint

The vRA Property Group can also be attached at the vRA Business Group or Reservation level
  1. Login to the vRA tenant
  2. Click on the Design tab > Blueprints
  3. Hover over the desired blueprint name and click Edit
    1. Click on the vSphere machine component on the Blueprint Design Canvas
    2. Click on the Properties tab
    3. In the Property Groups section, add the vRA property group for BT Diamond IPAM:
      • Starts with SovLabs-IPAMProfile-[tenant]_[profile_shortname]
Do not attach more than 1 IPAM vRA Property Group to a blueprint with the same NIC number

Repeat for all desired vRA blueprints and provision!

Skip IP in Use

As part of the process, the SovLabs IPAM workflow checks to make sure the reserved IP address is not in use by doing a ping check and a reverse DNS lookup. By default, if either of those tests reports back as true, the IPAM integration will fail and the build will roll back.

Enable the Skip IP in Use feature to skip IP addresses that are marked free on IPAM, but are actually found to pingable or resolving to DNS entries.

Note: when the IP is "skipped" the workflow will mark that IP as in use on the IPAM. The SovLabs Custom Naming integration will get a new hostname, and the IPAM integration will try to get another IP address. This loop will continue until a reservation passes the ping and reverse lookup tests. Optionally, you can configure an email notification to go out when this happens so an administrator can be made aware of the conflict.

Prerequisites

  1. The Skip IP in Use option requires SovLabs Custom Naming module to be licensed and included on the build. (Either the Custom Naming property group is attached to the blueprint, or the SovLabs_NamingStandard custom property is otherwise set to a SovLabs Naming Standard)
  2. Optionally, to send the email notification in case of a skipped IP, the SovLabs Notifications module must be licensed and configured to send warning emails.
    • Set up a Notification Configuration with type SovLabs IPAM
A Notification Group does not need to be added for this type of Notification

Usage

  1. Login to the vRA tenant
  2. Click on the Design tab > Blueprints
  3. Hover over the desired blueprint name and click Edit
    1. Click on the vSphere machine component on the Blueprint Design Canvas
    2. Click on the Properties tab
    3. In the Custom Properties section, add the vRA property definition:
      • Name: SovLabs_IPAMSkipInUseIPs
      • Value: true
      • *Note: Changing the value to false will not disable this feature
    4. Verify Custom Naming module is attached via vRA Property Group or via SovLabs Lifecycle Components Toolkit Lifecycle Profile

Repeat Step 3 for all desired blueprints

Advanced - Enable Locking for IPAM

If performing multiple concurrent builds and facing issues with obtaining IP Addresses, a vRA Property can be set to only allow 1 SovLabs IPAM machineBuilding to run at a time.

Setup
  1. Login to the vRA tenant
  2. Click on the Design tab > Blueprints
  3. Hover over the desired blueprint name and click Edit
    1. Click on the vSphere machine component on the Blueprint Design Canvas
    2. Click on the Properties tab
    3. In the Custom Properties section, add the vRA property definition:
      • Name: SovLabs_IPAMEnableLocking
      • Value: true
      • *Note: Changing the value to false will not disable this feature

Repeat Step 3 for all desired blueprints

Disable

Unpublish the Event Broker Subscriptions for that integration. (Recommended)

Unpublishing the Event Broker Subscriptions is non-destructive and is a simple way to disable the integration from running for all builds. The EBS will go to “Draft” mode and will not execute until you click “Publish” to publish it again.

Steps:

  1. Login to the vRA tenant
  2. Click on the Administration tab -> Events -> Subscriptions
  3. Highlight the Event Broker subscription and click Unpublish

Or, remove the custom property or property group for the IPAM configuration

Steps:

  1. Login to the vRA tenant
  2. Click on the Design tab > Blueprints
  3. Hover over the desired blueprint name and click Edit
    1. Click on the vSphere machine component on the Blueprint Design Canvas
    2. Click on the Properties tab
    3. In the Property Groups section, remove the vRA property group for BT Diamond IPAM:
      • Starts with SovLabs-IPAMProfile-[tenant]_[profile_shortname]

Repeat Step 3 for all desired blueprints