vCops 5.6 groups search criteria: Descendant of vs Child of? + Nested Groups...

[MattG]

What is the difference between Ascendant of and Parent of / Descendant of and Child of?

Also if I nest a group is there a way to add the child groups children to the parent group?

For example:

• Parent Group:  Rack1
• Child Group:  BladeChassis1

I can create a Search Criteria rule on Rack1 group that will add the children of BladeChassis1 to Rack1 as well.  This enables additional host level metrics at the Rack1 level.   I would like to go a step further and add the VM of the hosts in the BladeChassis1 to Rack1 as well.  This would enable the additional VM metrics to be viewed at the Rack1 level.   I know I can manually add the VMs,  but this wont work as the VMs can migrate between hosts.

Worst case I would create Super Metrics.   It just pains me to create Super Metrics if the summary data is available in the default UI.

Thanks,

-MattG

[jddias]

Ascendant - any object higher in the "tree", includes parent (and grandparent, great-grandparent, etc)

Parent - object directly above selected object (VM's parent is a host, for example.  Host parent is cluster, etc)

Descendant - any object lower in the "tree", include child, grandchild, great-grandchild etc

Child - object(s) directly below selected object in the "tree" (host child(ren) is any VM on host)

Basically, "ascendant" and "descendant" include ALL object above/below the selected objects relationship tree.  Child/Parent go only one level up/down.

I'm not sure about the child group referenced by a parent group... I'll have to play around with that.  My gut is that it won't work (i.e. what happens if you delete the child group?  The selection criteria in the parent group would be broken).

[MattG]

j,

Unfortunately it seems that the descendants of doesnt work as expected on groups.   For example,  if I have a group called BladeChassis1 with vSphere hosts manually added to it and create a dynmaic descendant rule to get the descendants of BladeChassis1 it just shows the hosts,  not the VM descendants on the host.

Again my goal is to be able to have the Groups show more metrics for VMs at the group level.   If I can do this in the Default UI,  it would require less Super Metrics.

-MattG

[MattG]

Is there any way to make have either:

• Group Search Criteria use an OR instead of the default AND when choosing multiple criteria
• Put multiple search critieria in a single criteria.  For example,  Descendant of, Contains, ESX100, ESX200

I am trying to get the descendant objects to appear in the groups so that I can view the data in the metrics,  which would also allow me to view data in the Heat Maps for the descendants.

-MattG

[Alexander_Dimi1]

You can use OR by defining a new Rule Set. Click "Add a new rule set" and specify the new rule there.

For example you can define 2 rule sets, each containing 1 criteria. In  this case the two criteria will be joined with OR operator.

[MattG]

That is not what I am seeing.  Search critieria says "An object must match all criteria in this rules set to become a group member"

If I go in a choose Descendants of Host1 and Descendant of Host 2 and hit preview, it does not show any VMs.

-MattG

[Alexander_Dimi1 · Accepted solution]

Hi Matt,

I guess I was not clear enough. "An object must match all criteria in this rules set to become a group member" - this is absolutely true. What I am proposing though is to create two "rule sets", each containing one criteria. individual rule sets are joined with logical OR. Just click on "Add a new rule set" link and you will figure it out.

Let me know if you still can't get the desired behavior and I will upload a screenshot tomorrow to illustrate it

[MattG]

Alex,

As per you instructions I got it to work.   I was confused with the new interface and didn't notice the new rule set link under the criteria link.

Thanks,

-MattG

[MattG]

Alex,

Any idea why the Descendants of does not appear to be working as expected?   A group with hosts using the Descendants of  rule I would expect that it would include VMs.   It doesn't  that is why I am adding the rule as per this thread.

-MattG

[Alexander_Dimi1]

It is an internal implementation limitation I guess. I will file a request to have it fixed.

[Alexander_Dimi1]

This is documented in the Release Notes for 5.6

Descendant equal to GROUP NAME creates a group that has only direct children members from GROUP NAME
If you create a group and select Descendant of = GROUP NAME, the new group includes only direct children members. The new group does not include indirect children members. This behavior is different from Descendent of = HOST, CLUSTER, DATACENTER, VC, or WORLD NAME, which causes the new group to include all descendants of the object, including direct and indirect children members.
Workaround: To choose the other hierarchy children, either select from the navigation tree to always include objects or add a rule set that makes descendants of direct child members.

https://www.vmware.com/support/vcops/doc/vcops-56-vapp-release-notes.html#knownissues

The defect is tracked internally.