VMware Cloud Director - The Fundamentals of vCD

Learn about the fundamentals of VMware Cloud Director at OVHcloud.

Fundamental concepts

In this section, we will detail the essential foundations of VMware Cloud Director (vCD).

By defining these principles clearly and concisely, we will provide the necessary foundation for effective and successful vCD use. Whether it’s for administrators looking to deploy complex infrastructures, or for users looking to access resources seamlessly, this exploration of vCD basics is a vital starting point.

Organizations

An organization is an administrative entity that groups specific users, groups, and IT resources.

Users authenticate at the organization level by providing credentials established by an organization administrator when they are created or imported.

System administrators are responsible for creating and provisioning organizations, while organization administrators are responsible for managing users, groups, and catalogs specific to the organization.

Users and Groups

An organization can have a variable number of users and groups. Users can be created directly by the organization administrator or imported from a directory service.

Groups must be imported from the directory service. Within an organization, permissions are managed by assigning specific rights and roles to users and groups.

Virtual Data Centers (vDC)

A virtual data center offers resources to an organization, creating an environment where virtual systems can be stored, deployed, and operated.

It also provides storage space for virtual CDs and DVDs. It is important to note that an organization may have multiple virtual data centers to meet its specific IT resource requirements.

Organization Virtual Data Center Networks

An organization’s virtual data center network is encapsulated in a specific virtual data center, created with VMware Cloud Director, and is accessible to all of that organization’s vApps. This network allows an organization's different vApps to communicate with each other seamlessly. It can be configured to be connected to an external network or kept isolated and internal to the organization.

Only system administrators have the privilege to create such networks, but organization administrators can manage the configurations of the organization's virtual data center networks, including the network services they offer.

vApp Networks

A vApp network is included in a vApp and facilitates communication between the vApp’s various virtual machines.

It is possible to connect a vApp network to an organization's virtual data center network, which allows the vApp to communicate with other vApps within the organization.

Furthermore, if the organization’s virtual data center network is connected to an external network, this allows the vApp to communicate outside the organization as well.

Catalogs

Organizations use catalogs to store vApp templates and media files.

Authorized members within an organization can access these catalogs to use the vApp templates and the media files contained within them to create their own vApps.

In addition, organization administrators can copy items from public catalogs into their organization-specific catalog.

Features of VMware Cloud Director at OVHcloud

Below is a comparison of the features provided by OVHcloud on its 3 VMware Cloud Director solutions.

Cluster Management

The following cluster management services are fully managed by OVHcloud:

• ESXi management / capacity planning
• Hosts Failover / Proactive HA
• DRS / Storage DRS
• vMotion / Storage vMotion

Virtual Machine Management

Organization / Virtual Data Center Management

Networking

Security

Data protection

Storage

Monitoring

Go further

For more information and tutorials, please see our other VMware Cloud Director support guides or explore the guides for other OVHcloud products and services.