Installing view when virtual center server is not a member of the domain

[aring]

We are just getting started with our view installation and are have some planning issues. Our exisiting server infrastructure is managed by a virtual center machine that is not a member of our active directory. We can install the connection server in the active directory, but the virtual center server and composer (since it needs to be installed on the vcenter server) cannot be in the active directory. I can find no documentation either way that this will or will not work. Can anybody answer this and if so provide some configuration guidance?

[npeter]

I think it works without domain too.I never tried myselff   I believe you can add viewcomposer domain admin eventhough VC/composer machine is not part of domain. you may just need correct DNS settings.

However the recomendation is to use Domain for VC and therefore Viewcomposer.

View architecture planning guide recomends to setup vSphere as per vSphere documentation. And vSphere documenation recomends to install vCenter on a machine which is part of Domain. ( http://kb.vmware.com/kb/1009080 )

-Noble

[aring]

our vcenter server does not use the dns servers of the active directory , do you think it would be as simple as changing them to do so?

[npeter]

Its not necessary to change DNS to another one, you can have a forwader configured in DNS. Whichever DNS configured in VC should be able to resolve domains added for viewcomposer.

I don't think anywhere else in a view setup VC or Viewcomposer makes use of Domain.

[patrickds]

You are aware that Active Directory is a prerequisite for Vcenter and View?

Even if you get it running, it will be an unsupported configuration.

[aring]

Support confirmed that we do need to have composer in an active directory, if we didn't want composer we would have been fine. We decided to join our vcenter server to the domain, but eliminate access to the server from domain admins and domain users and only allow the ad controllers to communicate with it. That way it is part of the domain but just enough to allow the composer to do its thing. thanks for the input.