12.1 Creating Workload Templates

Business service workloads are created from workload templates. Each workload template identifies a VM template and the customizations (such as increased CPUs or decreased memory) that you want applied when you create a workload from the template.

The VM templates you can use come from your Cloud Manager zones, Amazon EC2 zones, and OpenStack zones. A single VM template can be used in multiple workload templates.

  1. On the main navigation bar, click Getting Started, then click Create Workload Templates (in the Set Up Your Cloud Environment list).

    or

    On the main navigation bar, click Catalog, click the Workload Templates tab, then click Create.

  2. If your Cloud Manager system has multiple zones, the Select Zone dialog is displayed. Select the zone that contains the VM template you want, then click Select to display the Create Workload Template dialog.

  3. On the General tab, provide the following information for the workload template:

    General:

    • Name: Specify a unique name for the workload template. Users see this name (along with the description, zone, and operating system) when selecting the workload template they use to create their business service workload.

      You can use letters, numbers, and the following special characters: space, hyphen, underscore, apostrophe, percent, ampersand, and period. The maximum length is 110 characters.

    • Use VM Template: Select this check box to verify that you want to associate the workload template with an existing VM template from Cloud Manager Orchestrate.

      Deselect this check box to deactivate the association between a VM template and an existing workload template. Deactivating initiates the following:

      • Removes any disks associated with the VM template.

      • Removes the workload template as an option when you create a new workload.

      • Requires manual configuration of the hypervisor and the operating system.

      • Displays the workload template as having No Template in its VM Template status. You must select the VM template from a list again to activate the workload template.

      NOTE:If the check box displays a dimmed selection, this indicates that the VM template association cannot be cleared because the workload template is currently involved in a business service transaction.

    • VM Template: Select a VM template.

      After you select a VM template, the template’s operating system, hypervisor, and primary disk information is displayed. You cannot change these settings.

    • OS Type: Displays the workload’s operating system. You cannot change this setting.

    • Hypervisor: Displays the hypervisor running the workload. You cannot change this setting.

    • Zone: Displays the zone you selected for the workload template. You cannot change this setting.

    • Creation Date: Displays the current date. You cannot change this setting.

    • Image: You can upload an image file for the organization. Three formats are supported: PNG, JPG, and GIF. Any size is acceptable. Cloud Manager resizes the image to a maximum of 192x192 pixels (for dialogs), and to a minimum of 72x72 pixels (for display in organization lists), maintaining the width-to-height proportions. For example, a 432x225 image would be resized to 192x100. The image file is stored on the Cloud Manager Server.

    • Description: Provide any additional information to identify the workload template. Users see this description (along with the name, zone, and operating system) when selecting the workload template from which to create business service workload.

    • Tags: Specify a list (comma-delimited) of one or more keywords or categories that business service requestors can later choose as keyword filters when searching the catalog. You can create any tag you want, and as many as you want, but to be useful, the tag should be descriptive of the template in some way.

      To upload a file, mouse over No Image, then click Upload New Image. Browse for and select the image, then click OK to upload it to the Cloud Manager Application Server.

    Costs:

    • Setup Cost: Specify the cost associated with setting up the workload. This is a one-time fee.

    • License Cost: Specify the license costs associated with the workload’s software. This cost is per month.

    Retirement:

    Select the Retire this workload template option when you create a workload template in order to hide it from being used at this time. You can import retired workload templates or make change requests for them. However, the template is no longer available for creating new workloads. New workloads based on retired templates will fail to provision.

    Resources:

    The VM Template’s resource information (CPUs, memory, network interface cards, and total storage) is displayed. You can customize the following settings to increase or decrease the workload resources. Specify the minimum, default, and maximum values allowed for workloads that are created from this template.

    • Number of CPUs: Select the number of CPUs for a workload. The maximum allowed vCPUs cannot exceed the number supported by the hypervisor.

      Each resource group includes a vCPUs per Host setting that defines the number of available vCPUs per host in the group. You should makes sure the number you select here does not exceed the per host number for any resource group that might service the workload. Otherwise, the workload will not be able to run.

    • Memory: Select the megabytes (MB) of RAM to allocate to a workload.

    • Number of NICs: Select the number of network interface cards (NICs) to allocate to the workload.

    • Total Storage: Displays the maximum amount of total disk storage available for this template.

      You can add disks and define their storage minimums and defaults on the Disks page. The disk information is then displayed in these fields.

  4. Click Disks if you want to add disks to the workload template, or if you want to specify whether or not the current disks should be included when calculating the cost of the workload. You can also modify the setting for maximum total storage if needed.

    The template can include up to 10 additional disks. The disk information is automatically updated in the Total Storage option on the General tab as you allocate space to disks.

    As you add new disks, keep in mind the actual amount space available in the hypervisor environment for this future VM and the amount of “cost-able” space you want to allocate.

    • Click Add to add a disk to the list, select the new disk, then complete the following settings:

      Name: Specify the name you want to use for this new disk.

      Size: Specify the size in GB, up to the maximum allowed space for the template.

      or

      Leave the size set to 0 to make the disk optional.

      The maximum size per disk is 1024 GB (1 TB). If you specify the size when adding a disk, the disk becomes mandatory. Users cannot remove or change a mandatory disk. If you add a disk with the size set to 0, the disk becomes optional. Users can leave the size at 0, in which case the disk is not created with the workload, or they can specify a size and create the disk.

      Cost: Select the check box if you want to charge money for the new disk.

      If you don’t enable the Cost option, the disk becomes a free disk and is not included when calculating the cost of a business service.

      Source: The Source field is read-only. It is populated with data from the Orchestration Server after the workload template is cloned and the virtual disk is actually created in a repository.

      Allow users to change disk size: Select this option if you want to enable users to change the size of the disk when they configure a workload to create a business service.

    • Select any disk in the list, then modify its settings.

    • Next to Total Storage, use Maximum to set the maximum about of storage allowed for the workload template.

  5. (Conditional; available only for EC2 or OpenStack zones) Click Firewalls if you want to add or remove firewall bundles to a workload, then complete the following tasks as appropriate:

    • Add: Click Add, select one or more Firewall Rule Bundles, then click OK.

    • Remove: Click Remove, select one or more Firewall Rule Bundles then click OK.

    • View Firewall Rules: Select the Firewall Rule Bundles, then view the ingress/egress, port, and protocol settings in the Firewall Rules panel.

  6. Click Windows Settings if the template is a Windows-based template and you want to pre-populate some of the Windows settings, then complete the following steps.

    You might not want to pre-populate some settings, such as Computer Name, if the template will be used to create multiple workloads. Any settings that you do not pre-populate must be filled in when the user requests a new business service or when an administrator performs the pre-build configuration.

    CMOS zone: Complete the following settings:

    • Domain Settings:

      Computer Name: Specify the computer name for the virtual machine. Ensure that you specify only the computer name setting (windows) or host name setting (Linux) that is assigned to the machine, and not its fully qualified domain name.

      Domain or Workgroup: Select Domain or Workgroup, then specify the name of the domain or workgroup to which you want the virtual machine added.

      Domain Administrator User ID: This applies only if you are adding the virtual machine to a domain. Specify a domain administrator user ID that can be used to add the virtual machine to the domain specified in the Domain field.

      Domain Administrator Password: This applies only if you are adding the virtual machine to a domain. Specify the password for the domain administrator user ID.

    • Installation Settings:

      Run Once Commands: Specify any Windows Run Once commands that you want run during the first log in to the virtual machine. For information about Windows Run Once commands, see the Microsoft Windows documentation.

      If the administrator user adds a run once command for a workload template, only administrator users can view and modify the option, and the Installation Settings section is hidden from organization users. If the administrator leaves the field empty, organization users can view and use the field.

    EC2 zone: Complete the Installation Settings:

    • Cloud-init Configuration: Specify the appropriate settings.

    OpenStack zone: Complete the Installation Settings:

    • Cloud-init Configuration: Specify the appropriate settings.

  7. Click Windows Licensing if the template is a Windows-based template and you want to pre-populate some of the Windows licensing information, then complete the following settings:

    Windows Product Key: Specify the product key for the workload’s Windows operating system.

    If you pre-populate this field in the template, the data is masked from users and cannot be copied.

    Registered to Name: Specify an individual, department, company or so forth to whom the Windows operating system software is registered.

    You might not want to pre-populate some settings, such as Windows Product Key, if the template will be used to create multiple workloads and the key does not cover multiple installations. Any settings that you do not pre-populate must be filled in when a user requests a new business service or when an administrator performs the pre-build configuration.

  8. Click Linux Settings if the template is a Linux-based template and you want to pre-populate some of the Linux settings, then complete the following settings.

    You might not want to pre-populate some settings, such as Hostname, if the template will be used to create multiple workloads. Any settings that you do not pre-populate must be filled in when a user requests a new business service or when an administrator performs the pre-build configuration.

    CMOS zone: Complete the Domain Settings:

    • Hostname: Specify the host name to assign to the virtual machine.

    • Domain Name: Specify the domain for the virtual machine (for example, netiq.com or provo.netiq.com).

    • Root Password: Specify the Linux Root password to assign to the virtual machine.

    EC2 zone: Complete the Installation Settings:

    • Cloud-init Configuration: Specify the appropriate settings.

    OpenStack zone: Complete the Installation Settings:

    • Cloud-init Configuration: Specify the appropriate settings.

  9. If you have already created organizations and business groups that support workload templates, you can associate the workload template with them as appropriate, but their resource groups must support the type of hypervisor (and VM template) compatible with the workload template.

    1. Click Associations, then select either the Organizations tab or the Business Groups tab to open a list.

    2. Select (that is, click) the organization or business group you want to associate with this workload template, then click OK.

      or

      Select (that is, Ctrl+click) the organizations or business groups you want to associate with this workload template, then click OK.

      NOTE:The Workload Templates list displays only the workload templates from the organization where your business group resides. You must assign workload templates at the organization level before they become available for selection at the business group level.

  10. Click Add-ons if you want to add applications or services to the workloads based on this template, then complete the following steps:

    1. Click either the Applications tab or the Services tab.

      The process of adding either an application or a service is the same. Build administrators provide these applications or services during the post-configuration phase of the request workflow, then Business Service Owners can select from the listed add-ons when they request new services or edit existing services.

    2. Click Add to add an application or a service to the list.

    3. (Optional) Select the application or service in the list, then click Lock if you want to define this application or service as required for the template. You can multi-select items in the list for locking.

    4. Click OK to save the association of the application or service to the template.

      There are other things you can do as you edit add-ons in the template:

      • If you want to remove the association of the legal agreement from the workload template, select the legal agreement from the list (you can also multi-select) then click Remove.

      • If you want to see the configuration of a legal agreement, select it from the list, then click View.

  11. Click Packages if you want to associate a resource pricing package to a workload template, select the workload template you want to use, then follow these steps:

    1. On the Resource Pricing Packages page, click Add to display a list of the available packages.

    2. From the list, select one or more packages, then click OK to transfer your selections to the Resource Pricing Packages page.

      Warning text is displayed with any resource pricing package that is not compatible with the workload template.

  12. Click the Legal Agreements if you want to add legal agreement to a workload template, select the workload template you want to use, then follow these steps:

    1. Click Add to add a legal agreement to the list.

    2. Select the legal agreement in the list, then click OK.

  13. Click OK on the Create Workload Template dialog to save the workload template.