Is it possible to use a Single Reservation which dynamically enables the Compute, Network and Storage resources?

[Sasidhar1234]

My customer's requirement is to use single reservation which should dynamically enable the Compute, Network and Storage resources whenever there is an addition of resources in vCenter endpoint. The customer submits the build sheet in excel, which will be converted to JSON format in ITSM tool and given as an input to vRO endpoint which invokes the VM build selecting a catalog item(we have used REST services and workflows in place for this). The build sheet will be pre validated before raising a request in ITSM tool. Customer requires the automation to centralize from ITSM tool.

The sheet basically consists of Static IP with VLAN info, Disk details with Datastore name, cluster and location. We have created multiple catalog items based on location and OS type. So selecting catalog item will be based on location and OS type.

My idea is to create a single fabric and enable all the clusters from different locations, single Business group and Single Reservation.

Please let me know the options. daphnissov​jasnyder​GrantOrchardVMware​

[daphnissov]

Sasidhar1234​

What you're describing is a number of complex processes for what sounds like automating the deployment of a vRA catalog item front-ended by an ITSM tool. I'm not sure what your question is in all this: if the entire process is possible and how you'd go about doing it, or just a piece thereof. No matter the answer, I can tell you that, yes, it'd almost certainly be possible, but you would be responsible for creating some very elaborate and complex automation within vRO (possibly elsewhere) to enable this process you envision.

[Sasidhar1234]

Apologies for the confusion caused and thanks for your quick reply.

Currenly, one vCenter endpoint with a Reservation is in place, expecting more endpoints in due course.

Customer will be adding the resources(Compute, Storage and Network) on demand and vRA team will not be having any heads up on it, that is, no task will be assigned to vRA team to enable the resources in reservations after addition. Only option is to schedule the data collection and enable the newly added resources to reservation automatically. As you said, it will be a complex automation procedure.

I know we need Reservations for Machine provisioning in vRA, but curious to know whether it is possible to provision VMs without Reservations.daphnissov​

[daphnissov · Accepted solution]

The TL;DR version of my answer is: That isn't going to work that way.

vRA must have a reservation to provision VMs to a given set of infrastructure, and a data collection only works on the infra that vRA knows about through its endpoints. So the only option is for you to automate the process of dynamically creating new reservations (and possibly new vCenter endpoints if non-existent) in vRA based upon whatever input method your customer provides. The APIs should be there and (probably) the methods are available in the two vRA plugins for vRO, but this is going to be a significant level of effort on you/your customer's part. Good luck