VMware Cloud Director features table

Configure and remove VMs

Using CPU and RAM values or Abiquo hardware profiles.

Reconfigure VMs

For VMs deployed in VMware Cloud Director, you can always change the configuration when the VM is powered off.

Hot reconfigure VMs

If your OS supports hot-reconfigure and if it is enabled for your VM template on VMware Cloud Director.
Edit the template and select the hot-reconfigure option. You can use this feature without redeploying your VMs.
The platform supports hot-reconfigure of CPU, RAM, SCSI disks, and NICs.

Power on VM

Power off VM

Reset VM

Pause and resume VM

Take a VM snapshot

Storage

• The platform supports auxiliary hard disks for VMware Cloud Director

• Users can add and remove hard disks (and hot reconfigure SCSI disks)

• Users cannot change the boot sequence or the bus/unit number

• VMware Cloud Director does not support storage reconfigure for organization virtual datacenters that use fast provisioning

Remote access

Click on the Abiquo console icon to open a remote console

Reset guest password

Manage networks

Manage VDCs

Synchronize VCD regions and and manage VDCs.
When you remove a virtual datacenter from VCD and it still exists in platform, when synchronizing, an error is displayed that the resource no longer exists.
The user can then manually delete the VDC from the platform.

Classic firewalls and firewall policies

• Create and manage Edge firewalls in VCD as classic firewalls

• Create and manage security groups for VMs at Edge level or vApp level (and for fenced vApps (see Network section)) as firewall policies

Use Chef

Use Chef attributes

VM bootstrap scripts

Using cloud-init, see Guest setup

VM variables

Using cloud-init, see Guest setup

Load balancing

Create load balancers in the platform. Use public addresses that are on an available external network in VCD

• Known issue: Cannot create load balancing rules between VCD vApps, which are VDCs in the platform

Import and synchronize VMs

When you onboard a VM, the platform creates a placeholder template. In the Catalogue, this template will be marked as Unavailable because it cannot be used to create a VM.
Before you undeploy the VM you MUST create an Instance template, which will clone the VM disks. Otherwise, you will not be able to recreate the VM.
When you undeploy an onboarded VM, the platform will destroy the VM and the placeholder template.
After you create an instance template, the platform will update the VM template in the Catalogue to point to this template and put it in the Available state.
The platform will correctly save VMs with multiple disks as templates in the VCD registry, but they will appear to have a single disk.
If you undeploy a VM with a saved instance template, when you deploy the VM again, the platform will use the saved instance template.
Remember to check your VM configuration

VM monitoring and metrics

Abiquo retrieves the built-in metrics. You can also use Abiquo collectd plugin, which can be installed using the Abiquo Chef cookbook. See Collectd plugin documentation

Manage VM templates

• Abiquo uses VCD template repository and obtains the operating system type from the template. If the template has no vCPU and RAM values, the platform sets a default of 1 CPU and 1024 MB of RAM.

• Abiquo requires VMware tools installed on the template in order to specify the administrator password and for the guest to recognize the IPs assigned to the NICs.

  • Users cannot deploy VMs without VMware tools installed

  • The platform will not import templates without tools.
    After upgrade, users cannot deploy templates without tools and the platform will eventually classify them as unavailable templates

Abiquo autoscaling

Driven by action plans, triggered by schedules or alarms

Abiquo alarms and alerts

Abiquo action plans

Create vertical and horizontal auto-scaling

Abiquo hardware profiles

You can use Abiquo hardware profiles or CPU and RAM values

Abiquo VApp spec blueprints

Save configurations and share them with users in appropriate locations