With the release of VCF version 5.2 there are some major enhancements made to VCF, one of which is if a customer is running a standalone vSphere/VVF environment they can now import that environment into their VCF environment. This feature will benefit customers by centralizing management and optimizing resources without needing a full rebuild.
This article has been pending from me since this feature was released so decided to use the import tool and update the blog with the steps and my experience during the import to help the community who plan to use this tool.
Before starting with the brownfield import you need to familiarise yourself with these essential considerations. Which helps you in preparing your environment for import.
Below is my VCF and VVF/vSphere lab setup which I used for brownfield import:
VCF 5.2
vCenter 8.0 u3a
vSphere 8.0 u3
NSX 4.2
Aria Suite Lifecycle 8.18
VCF management domain which consists of 4 management nodes with vSAN storage
VCF management domain/cluster is backed by NSX segments for the Aria suite along with a single distributed switch:
Standalone VVF/vSphere setup consists of 3 ESXi node clusters with VMFS-FC storage shared across all 3 ESXi hosts.
Shared Datastores across all 3 hosts:
Pre-Requisites:
Post, familiarizing yourself with the above considerations, here are some of the prereqs that you need to prepare in your environment before starting the import activity:
NSX deployment requires a minimum of 3 hosts which will be deployed during the import of the VVF/vSphere setup into VCF so we require the below info:
4 IP addresses in the same subnet as the associated vCenter Server with corresponding DNS entries for both forward and reverse lookup.
3 x NSX Manager nodes
1 x NSX Manager VIP
Both DRS and HA need to be configured as fully automated on the VVF/vSphere environment
Download the VCF import tool Software from the Broadcom Support Portal.
Note: There are multiple tools available on the portal so download the required tool. In my case, I downloaded the VCF Import tool (vcf-brownfield-import-5.2.0.0-24108578.tar.gz) build number - 24108578 same tool can also be used for conversion. Copy the tool to both target vCenter (VVF/vSphere) and SDDC Manager
Note: To copy the tool to vCenter you need to change the shell mode to bash by using this command (chsh -s /bin/bash)
Download the NSX install bundle (VMware Software Install Bundle - NSX_T_MANAGER 4.2.0.0 - bundle-124941.zip) from the Broadcom Support Portal and upload (using WinSCP/FileZilla) the NSX install bundle into the VCF SDDC manager under this (/nfs/vmware/vcf/nfs-mount/bundle) location.
Prepare the NSX deployment Specification sheet which will be used for importing the existing vSphere environment. You can use the spec sheet available on the VMware docs.
Once you have completed the above prereqs successfully, extract the tool using the command (tar -xvf filename)
Pre-Checks:
Once the files are extracted you need to navigate to the tool folder under the extracted folder (/vcf-brownfield-import-5.2.0.0-24108578/vcf-brownfield-toolset).
Then run the VCF Import tool to complete the pre-checks on the target vCenter (VVF/vSphere) to check if any issues need to be addressed.
I did run the prechecks and was successful:
Import Command:
We should be good to run the VCF import tool and start importing the existing brownfield vSphere / VVF instance into the management workload domain in VCF.
Login to the SSH of the SDDC manager with ‘vcf’ and navigate to the folder where you have copied the import tool. In my case, I have copied the tool into /home/vcf/ folder and run the tool.
Finally, the import was completed successfully.
In the SDDC manager under workloads, I can see the imported VVF environment as the VI workload environment
During the import below 4 guardrail warnings related to upgrade config mismatch between VVF vCenter and SDDC manager were seen, which can be fixed or ignored. You can refer to this document which explains these warnings.
"cluster","VVF-Cluster","ESX Upgrade","WARNING","VALIDATION_FAILED","ESXi upgrade policy validation across vCenter and SDDC Manager","Checks if upgrade policy configured for cluster VVF-Cluster on vCenter match default SDDC Manager ESXi upgrade policy","Pre Remediation Power Action upgrade policy configured for cluster VVF-Cluster on vCenter does not match default SDDC Manager ESXi upgrade policy. It has value DoNotChangeVMsPowerState in vCenter, and default value null in SDDC Manager.","Review and apply the desired upgrade policy options from the ""Upgrade Options"" page during ""ESX Configure Update""."
"cluster","VVF-Cluster","ESX Upgrade","WARNING","VALIDATION_FAILED","ESXi upgrade policy validation across vCenter and SDDC Manager","Checks if upgrade policy configured for cluster VVF-Cluster on vCenter match default SDDC Manager ESXi upgrade policy","Failure Action Retry Delay upgrade policy configured for cluster VVF-Cluster on vCenter does not match default SDDC Manager ESXi upgrade policy. It has value 1 in vCenter, and default value null in SDDC Manager.","Review and apply the desired upgrade policy options from the ""Upgrade Options"" page during ""ESX Configure Update""."
"cluster","VVF-Cluster","ESX Upgrade","WARNING","VALIDATION_FAILED","ESXi upgrade policy validation across vCenter and SDDC Manager","Checks if upgrade policy configured for cluster VVF-Cluster on vCenter match default SDDC Manager ESXi upgrade policy","Failure Action Retry Count upgrade policy configured for cluster VVF-Cluster on vCenter does not match default SDDC Manager ESXi upgrade policy. It has value 1 in vCenter, and default value 0 in SDDC Manager.","Review and apply the desired upgrade policy options from the ""Upgrade Options"" page during ""ESX Configure Update""."
"cluster","VVF-Cluster","ESX Upgrade","WARNING","VALIDATION_FAILED","ESXi upgrade policy validation across vCenter and SDDC Manager","Checks if upgrade policy configured for cluster VVF-Cluster on vCenter match default SDDC Manager ESXi upgrade policy","Evacuate Offline VMs upgrade policy configured for cluster VVF-Cluster on vCenter does not match default SDDC Manager ESXi upgrade policy. It has value false in vCenter, and default value null in SDDC Manager.","Review and apply the desired upgrade policy options from the ""Upgrade Options"" page during ""ESX Configure Update"".
"Cluster","VVF-Cluster","ESX Upgrade","WARNING","VALIDATION_FAILED","ESXi upgrade policy validation across vCenter and SDDC Manager","Checks if upgrade policy configured for cluster VVF-Cluster on vCenter match default SDDC Manager ESXi upgrade policy","Enable Load ESX upgrade policy configured for cluster VVF-Cluster on vCenter does not match default SDDC Manager ESXi upgrade policy. It has value false in vCenter, and default value null in SDDC Manager.","Review and apply the desired upgrade policy options from the ""Upgrade Options"" page during ""ESX Configure Update""."I hope this was helpful and Happy Learning!
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