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This repository is intended to provide code samples to help you build immutable VMware Patterns. See the Table of Contents for details.
❗ WARNING: the contents of this wiki are not intended for production networks. In most cases, best practices for operational compliance are not followed. The intended use of this wiki is for home labs only.
Think of a "Pattern" like a Docker Image. A Docker Image might be very generic or it might be fully baked with specific packages. Similarly, a Pattern is a set of packages (from this repo) designed to function on a PhotonOS virtual machine. The result of a Pattern (a Docker Container using the Docker analogy) is the VMware environment that the Pattern creates. For example: a Workload Domain Pattern might consist of a vCenter Server, an NSX Manager, and a few nested ESXi hosts. The Pattern in this example would contain all code from this repo to automate the build of a workload domain, formatted to run on PhotonOS.
All VMware software in this lab must be downloaded manually prior to running the pattern. Each pattern will contain instructions for obtaining the proper packages. It is recommended you download an SFTP tool such as FileZilla or WinSCP to make it easier to drop software bundles onto a given photon machine, although this is not mandatory.
To run these patterns you will need a physical ESXi host and a /24 subnet. Development and testing of these labs were facilitated using:
- 1x Ubiquiti Edgerouter 4 uplinked to home wifi
- 1x Cisco Catalyst 2950 uplinked to the Edgerouter
- 1x PowerEdge R710 with 8 CPU (Intel Xeon E5620 @ 2.40GHz), 192 GB of RAM, and 2.72 TB of storage uplinked to the Cisco switch
It is not mandatory to have these exact specs in your home lab. In fact its not even mandatory that you use a server (a beefy laptop will suffice) or a switch. The more resources the better the experience, but build with what is available. The following ESXi version was used on the PowerEdge:
- ESXi version 6.7.0 (build 8169922)
All Patterns are designed to be immutable. Licensing is not required. If a VMware environment has been running longer than the duration of the evaluation, you may choose to buy the appropriate licenses from VMware or you may choose to destroy and rebuild the environment.
There is one PhotonOS server used as the master control plane for all Patterns. This PhotonOS server will be referred to as the Master Photon Controller. The steps to deploy the Master Photon Controller are outlined in the Quick Start README.md page. If you haven't already, the following are the steps to configure the Master Photon Controller.
Step 1: Deploy Photon (photon-ova-4.0-ca7c9e9330.ova) For downloads visit: https://github.com/vmware/photon/wiki/Downloading-Photon-OS
The default password is changeme. For all labs, use /usr/local/ as the working directory.
cd /usr/local/
Step 2: Download controller prep script
curl https://raw.githubusercontent.com/boconnor2017/e2e-patterns/main/prep-photon.sh >> prep-photon.sh
Step 3: Download refresher script
curl https://raw.githubusercontent.com/boconnor2017/e2e-patterns/main/refresh-e2e-patterns.sh >> refresh-e2e-patterns.sh
Step 4: Run E2E lab PhotonOS prep script
sh prep-photon.sh >> _prep_photon.log
Step 5: Refresh local repo (as needed)
sh refresh-e2e-patterns.sh
The configuration file contains all environment specific information. The configuration file is located at:
/usr/local/e2e-patterns/config.py
Note: its obviously a bad practice to store sensitive information in a code repository. The configuration file in this repo contains sample data so that you understand the proper syntax when creating your own config.py file. Its recommended to store your config file in the master controller within the /usr/local directory. Once saved to this location, it will not be impacted by a refresh.
Optional: add the below line to the /usr/local/refresh-e2e-patterns.sh script to automate copy of the static config file in your master controller to the e2e-patterns directory:
cp config.py e2e-patterns/config.py
Alternative: for simplest use, build your physical environment using these parameters:
- Lab Subnet: 172.16.0.0 /24
- Lab Default Gateway: 172.16.0.1
- Lab Subnet Mask: 255.255.255.0
- ESXi Host IP: 172.16.0.201