1.0 Installation Checklist

To ensure that you successfully install and configure NetIQ Cloud Manager, you should follow the installation checklist provided below. Each task provides brief information and a reference to where you can find more complete details.

Task

Details

Review Cloud Manager concepts and terminology

NetIQ Cloud Manager includes functionality and components you need to understand to successfully install, configure, maintain, and use the product. Cloud Manager also interacts with other products such as hypervisors and directory services.

If you are not already familiar with Novell Cloud Manager concepts and its interaction with these other products, see NetIQ Cloud Manager 2.1.5 Introduction.

Virtualize your physical datacenter

If you have not already applied a virtualization infrastructure to your physical datacenter, you need to implement a hypervisor technology. NetIQ Cloud Manager supports SUSE Linux Xen, Citrix Xen, VMware vSphere (vCenter), and Microsoft Hyper-V hypervisorsand the Amazon EC2 virtual environment.

Review the supported Cloud Manager environments and software installation requirements

See Section 3.0, Cloud Manager System Requirements and Section 4.0, Requirements and Cloud Manager Support for the Virtual Environment.

Prepare for Orchestration components installation.

Some security certificate and licensing tasks must take place before you begin installing Orchestration components.

See Orchestration Components Preinstallation Tasks in the NetIQ Cloud Manager 2.1.5 Orchestration Installation Guide.

Install the Cloud Manager Orchestration Server, the Orchestration Console, and the Orchestration Agent

The Cloud Manager Orchestration Server communicates with its Orchestration Agents. These agents establish communication with your virtualization infrastructure (hypervisor technology). With this link in place, the Cloud Manager Orchestration Server utilizes specialized povisioning adapter jobs to automate the provisioning, management, and deprovisioning of virtual machines.

There are some alternative methods you can use for installing these components. See Installing Cloud Manager Orchestration Components in the NetIQ Cloud Manager 2.1.5 Orchestration Installation Guide.

Configure the Cloud Manager Orchestration components

Although you could install the Cloud Manager Application components while you have the installation media mounted on the SUSE server, it’s not likely that Application and Orchestration components will be installed on the same server. For this reason, you should configure the packages you have installed for the Orchestration components. These configuration tasks include:

  • configuring the Orchestration Server

  • configuring the Orchestration Agent

  • creating a resource account in the Orchestration Console

  • getting provisioning adapters running for VM discovery

  • configuring the Orchestration Web service to connect to the Cloud Manager Application Server

See Configuring Cloud Manager Orchestration Components, Creating a Resource Account, Configuring Orchestration Provisioning Adaptersand Configuring Connections to the Cloud Manager Application Server in the NetIQ Cloud Manager 2.1.5 Orchestration Installation Guide.

NOTE:Although you might not need some of the advanced functionality in Orchestration components, you might be interested in the advanced configuration tasks detailed in Advanced Agent Installation Methods in the NetIQ Cloud Manager 2.1.5 Orchestration Installation Guide.

Prepare for Cloud Manager installation

Before installing and configuring Cloud Manager, you need to prepare a remote database for storing Cloud Manager data. See Configuring the PostgreSQL Database Connection and Credentials in the NetIQ Cloud Manager 2.1.5 Application Server Installation Guide.

You also need to decide which method you want to use to authenticate your users in the Cloud Manager system. The authentication method you use depends on the external authentication source or sources you have already implemented in your data center environment. The sources supported by NetIQ Cloud Manager include:

  • LDAP (Active Directory or eDirectory)

  • Novell Cloud Security Services (NCSS)

  • LDAP and NCSS combined

  • Novell Access Manager (NAM)

There are required tasks you need to perform and information you need to gather for to prepare your chosen authentication source to support Cloud Manager authentication and configuration.

See Using the Cloud Manager Application Server Configuration Tool in the NetIQ Cloud Manager 2.1.5 Application Server Installation Guide.

Install the Cloud Manager Application Server and its console.

The Cloud Manager Application Server provides the interface through which users request virtual resources. Requests are communicated to the Orchestration Server, which performs the required virtualization operations in conjunction with your hypervisor techonology.

See Installing Cloud Manager Application Server Components in the NetIQ Cloud Manager 2.1.5 Application Server Installation Guide.

Configure the Cloud Manager system

After installation, you must complete several configuration tasks before Cloud Manager can be used, including

  • configuring the Cloud Manager Application Server authentication source connections

  • configuring the Cloud Manager Application Server database connection

See Using the Cloud Manager Application Server Configuration Tool in the NetIQ Cloud Manager 2.1.5 Application Server Installation Guide.

After you’ve completed the installation and configuration of both the Orchestration components and the Cloud Manager system, continue with Cloud Setup in the NetIQ Cloud Manager 2.1.5 Cloud Administrator Guide to start populating your Cloud Manager Application Server and Application Console with components to enable users to provision their own business services.