Deploying VCF 9 starts with the VCF Installer. If you’re not familiar with it, it have been said the VCF Installer “introduces a more flexible set of deployment workflows to suit an extended set of use cases.“
Deployment
During the installation process, a few architectural decisions must be made, such as where the installer will be deployed and how the software depot will be configured. These choices directly impact how the platform will be installed and managed.
Deploy outside the management infrastructure allow us to use the appliance o deploy multiple VCF or VVF platforms. On the other hand, if we deploy the VCF Installer on one of the ESX hosts that will compose the cluster, the appliance can be used to deploy only a single VCF platform.
Note: The VCF Installer appliance will become the SDDC Manager if it is deployed on one of the ESX hosts that will form the management domain. If the VCF Installer is outside the management infrastructure, a new SDDC Manager will be deployed.
Note: The password must be at least 15 characters and include at least one uppercase, one lowercase, one digit, and one special character. The problem is: the installation will follow even if you don’t meet the requirements. As a result, you won’t be able to login to the appliance with the vcf or root user.
After the appliance is deployed, you should have access to it.
Next, we need to configure the software depot. We have two options for this one
- Online depot – Connect directly to Broadcom portal and requires a download token.
- Offline depot – Connect to a depot within your own environment.
If you have a the Broadcom Support Entitlement you will be able to generate the download token. However, if you don’t have internet access in your VCF Installer, then you must create an offline depot. I explained how to do it in my article VCF 9.0 – How to Set Up a VCF Offline Depot.
Once you map your offline depot to the VCF installer, you can start the VCF 9 deployment.
I will cover the VCF 9 deployment step-by-step in another article.