Setup

No spaces, periods or special characters except underscore (_) and dash (-)

Unique label

DO NOT prepend with your tenant name and an underscore, e.g. mytenant_

Choose a sequence type: - Decimal (Base 10): 0-9 for each digit - Hexadecimal (Base 16): 0-F for each digit - Octal (Base 8): 0-7 for each digit - Pattern (Mixed bases and static text ): a flexible pattern that allows for unique naming sequences

Check the checkbox to reuse a previous sequence number if it is available.

For example, host001, host002, and host003 exist. host001 is deleted. For the next provision, host001 will be chosen.

In general, it's better to leave this turned off unless you have a specific need, or if you're configuring an environment that does not include a CMDB.

Shown when 'Sequence type' is: Decimal, Hexadecimal or Octal

Maximum number of characters this sequence will contain. For example, if the first server should have 001 as the sequence number, set this field to 3 for a three digit sequence length.

Do NOT pad this initial value number. Just type 1 if you want to start with 01 or 001 for example.

Initial number for the sequence (normally 1 but you can start with any value)

Shown when 'Sequence type' is: Decimal, Hexadecimal or Octal

The module will pad the sequence with this character or number if the required sequence length is not met. Defaults to 0

Shown when 'Sequence type' is: Pattern

Optional but recommended

The Unique Key defines the elements of the name that should be evaluated to determine when the sequence number should start over.

For example, if your naming standard combines vRA properties for Environment, Location and serverType, you could create a Unique key of

{{Environment}}{{Location}}{{serverType}}

This would cause each unique combination of those 3 items to generate a new sequence starting at the beginning, e.g. start over at 001

Now let's say that you only want to store unique sequence groupings for your Environment. You could create a unique key consisting of only that property.

If the values for run #1 are:

Resulting Hostname: prodnordb001

The sequence number is 001 (Again, assumes Sequence Type of decimal, with a max sequence length of 3, Sequence Padding as 0, and an Initial Value of 1)

If the values for run #2 are:

Resulting Hostname: devnordb001

The sequence number is 001 because dev is a new Unique key.

If the values for run #3 are:

Resulting Hostname: devdenweb002

The sequence number is 002 because dev is an existing key and the last number used was 1.

If the values for run #4 are:

Resulting Hostname: devtexapp003.

The sequence number is 003 because dev is an existing key and the last number used was 2.

The key values can be edited using the Update action on the SovLabs Custom Naming Sequence item to start at a higher or lower number if needed

In the Naming Sequence Unique Key, DO NOT include the references to {{ sequence.SEQUENCENAME }} from your Naming Standard Template field.

This field is templatable. Click the link below to view documentation on the SovLabs Template Engine

No spaces, periods or special characters except underscore (_) and dash (-)

Unique label

DO NOT prepend with your tenant name and an underscore, e.g. mytenant_

Select the checkbox(es) for the sequence(s) that will be used as a part of this naming standard (can be more than one)

Define the naming standard template that will generate the hostname

The Naming template will include the elements that make up the non-sequence part of the name, and the placeholder(s) for the sequence(s): {{ sequence.SEQUENCENAME }}

The Naming template can contain any combination of references to templated vRA properties, literal characters and the reference to the sequence(s) as described above.

The items with the double curly braces, e.g. {{ Environment }} , are references to vRA properties. The SovLabs Template engine transforms the vRA properties referred to inside the double curly braces and replaces the entire object with the resulting value. See the information at the bottom of this page for more on the SovLabs Template Engine.

If the item name for the Naming Sequence is threedigit, refer to it in the Naming template as {{ sequence.threedigit }}. If you check more than one Sequence in the Select sequence(s) field, you'll need one reference to a {{ sequence.SEQUENCENAME }} per sequence in the Naming Template.

If your hostname should be

{{Environment}}{{Location}}{{serverType}}

and you want to put the threedigit sequence definition at the end, the Naming template would look like this:

{{Environment}}{{Location}}{{serverType}}{{ sequence.threedigit }}

Resulting Hostname: prodnordb001

If your hostname should be prefixed by a literal prefix such as v:

Naming Template: v{{Environment}}{{Location}}{{serverType}}{{ sequence.threedigit }}

v{{Environment}}{{Location}}{{serverType}}{{ sequence.threedigit }}

If you want your hostname to be in uppercase letters, you could use the upcase filter on your templated properties:

Naming Template: V{{Environment| upcase }}{{Location| upcase }}{{serverType| upcase }}{{ sequence.threedigit }}

V{{Environment| upcase }}{{Location| upcase }}{{serverType| upcase }}{{ sequence.threedigit }}

If you want the uppercase hostname, and also want to use only the first character of the Environment property, add the substring filter to the Environment templated property:

Naming Template: V{{Environment| upcase|substring:0,1 }}{{Location| upcase }}{{serverType| upcase }}{{ sequence.threedigit }}

V{{Environment| upcase|substring:0,1 }}{{Location| upcase }}{{serverType| upcase }}{{ sequence.threedigit }}

If you want a 'dr' to appear at the beginning of the hostname only if a vRA property called disaster_recovery is set to true:

Naming Template: {% if disaster_recovery == true %}DR{% endif %}{{Environment| upcase|substring:0,1 }}{{Location| upcase }}{{serverType| upcase }}{{ sequence.threedigit }}

{% if disaster_recovery == true %}DR{% endif %}{{Environment| upcase|substring:0,1 }}{{Location| upcase }}{{serverType| upcase }}{{ sequence.threedigit }}

This is very simple. If you want to put the threedigit Naming Sequence definition in the middle of the name after the Location:

Naming Template: {{Environment}}{{Location}}{{ sequence.threedigit }}{{serverType}}

{{Environment}}{{Location}}{{ sequence.threedigit }}{{serverType}}

You MUST include at least one {{ sequence.SEQUENCENAME }} in the Naming Template definition.

In most cases, you want the Unique Key in the Naming Sequence to match the Naming Template in the Naming Standard.
Simply copy the Template from the Template field in the Naming Standard, remove the references to the {{ sequence.SEQUENCENAME }} and paste that into your Unique Key field in the Naming Sequence.

The SovLabs Template Engine allows injection of values for VM Properties into the SovLabs profiles, not just for Custom Naming, but for all SovLabs integrations. This is an extremly powerful feature. When you see a reference to a property enclosed in double curly brackets, e.g. {{ my_propertyname }}, that implies use of the SovLabs Template engine to transform that property and use its resulting value in that place. In SovLabs Endpoints and profile configurations in general, many fields are "templatable", which means you can substitute a valid Template Engine template in place of a hard-coded value.

If substitution of vRA properties into the SovLabs profiles sounds powerful, this next bit is a game changer!
The Template engine syntax contains filters such as substring, upcase, join, replace and Tags for logic operations such as if/else, case statements, for loops and many more to transform properties for use in SovLabs modules.

This field is templatable. Click the link below to view documentation on the SovLabs Template Engine