Provision Service Point on Nutanix - BlueCat Edge - Service Point v4.x.x

BlueCat Edge User Guide
ft:locale
en-US
Product name
BlueCat Edge
Version
Service Point v4.x.x

This section gives detailed instructions for provisioning a Service Point instance on Nutanix.

Before you begin:

  • You must be running Nutanix Acropolis v6.5.3.6 LTS or greater.
  • You must have the configuration file from when you created the Service Point instance in the Edge CI. For more information, refer to Provision Service Point on cloud environments.
Downloading the Service Point VMDK image:
  1. Log in to the Edge Cloud Instance.
  2. In the top navigation bar, click and select Service points.
  3. Click on the Service points page. The Download service point image window appears.

  4. From the Version menu, select the version of service point that you would like to deploy.
    Attention: Before selecting a service point version, ensure that the services that you are deploying to the service point are compatible with that version. For more information on compatibility, refer to Software support matrix.
    Note: If your Edge Cloud is deployed in an EU region, you can only provision Service Point v4.6.2 or greater.
  5. From the Images table, select name of the Nutanix image to download the Service Point VMDK image.
  6. Under SHA256 checksum, click to download the Service Point VMDK image checksum file or click to copy the image checksum value to your clipboard.
  7. Click Close to close the window.
Important: The VMDK file does not expire and can be used to provision a service point instance at a later point in time.

You must decode the configuration file downloaded from the BlueCat Edge console to successfully provision the service point VM. The configuration file is base64 encoded and compressed with gzip. The decoded file contains plain text, which must be copied and pasted in the Nutanix Acropolis UI when configuring the service point VM.

Configuring Service Point configuration details:

  1. To add a new Service Point, click New on the Service points page.
  2. Under Setup, enter the following information:
    • Name: enter the name of the new service point.
    • Description: add a description. This is optional.
  3. Under Platform, select Nutanix from the drop-down menu.
  4. Under Network, enter the following information:
    • Enter the hostname of the service point.
    • (Optional) Enter the IP address or FQDN of any NTP servers that the Service Point will use. If you do not configure any NTP servers, the Service Point will use the following default Debian NTP servers:
      • 0.debian.pool.ntp.org
      • 1.debian.pool.ntp.org
      • 2.debian.pool.ntp.org
      • 3.debian.pool.ntp.org
      Note: BlueCat recommends testing the connection between the service point and NTP servers for reachability, as some networks do not allow NTP traffic by default.
  5. Under Access, enter the following information:
    Note:
    • The SSH Public Key and VM Console Password fields are mandatory and must be filled out to provision the Service Point.
    • The SSH Public Key and VM Console Password are applied to the operations user account.
    • SSH Public Key: Enter the SSH public key of the service point. You can use an existing key pair by entering the content of the public key in the field, or generate a new key pair and enter the content of the newly created public key in the field.

      This adds the public key to the .ssh directory of the Service Point and allows you to SSH into the service point. Once you have provisioned the service point, you can access the service point using SSH and the associated private key to log into the operations user account.

    • VM Console Password: Enter the console password for the service point. The password must meet the following requirements:
      • It must contain lowercase characters.
      • It must contain uppercase characters.
      • It must contain numbers.
      • It must contain symbols.
      • It must not contain spaces.
      • It must contain at least 12 characters.
    • Confirm Password: Confirm the console password for the service point entered in the VM Console Password field.
  6. (Optional) Under HTTP Proxy, enter the following information:
    • Enter the hostname of the proxy that the Service Point will use.
    • (Optional) Add the port number used to connect to the proxy server. By default, the value is 443.
    • (Optional) Enter the username and password that will be used to authenticate against the proxy server.
    Note:
    • Currently, HTTP is the only supported proxy type.
    • SOCKS proxy servers are not supported.
    • Basic authentication is supported.
    • The proxy server must be configured to allow HTTP POST traffic.
    • The proxy server must be able to resolve all BlueCat Edge Cloud addresses.
    • For proxy servers and firewalls that do SSL interception:
      • mTLS must exclude/except *.bluec.at.
      • You can't install certificates as a workaround.
    • The only tested and supported authorization is Basic authorization with username and password provided.
  7. Click Save and Download. A window appears where you can download the configuration file.
  8. Click Download to download the service point configuration file for the appliance or click Copy to copy the service point configuration information to the clipboard.
Provisioning the service point on Nutanix
  1. Log in to Nutanix Acropolis.
  2. Click the Gears icon and select Image Configuration.
  3. From the Image Configuration page, click Upload Image.
  4. Import the edge-service-point-<version_identifier>.vmdk file.
    Important: When importing the service point file, the Image Type must be Disk for the VMDK file.
  5. From the Settings menu, select VM > Create VM.
  6. Under Configuration, set the following parameters:
    • Name: enter the name of your service point VM.
    • Description: enter a description of your service point VM. This is optional.
    • Under Compute Details, set the following:
      • When configuring the vCPUs, select 4 vCPUs.
      • When configuring the number of cores per vCPU, select 1 core.
      • When configuring the memory, select 8GB.
  7. Under Disks, delete the default CD-ROM.
  8. Click Add New Disk and set the following parameters:
    • Type: Disk
    • Operation: Clone from Image Service
    • Image: select the service point VMDK image
    • Click Add.
  9. Configure the Network Adapter settings based on your environment.
  10. Select the Custom Script option.
  11. Select Type or Paste Script.
  12. Paste the contents of the decoded configuration file.
    Note: If you selected the Copy configuration to clipboard button after creating the service point in the Edge Cloud Instance, paste the content from the clipboard directly into the field.
  13. Click Create VM.
Attention: To ensure that your service point successfully resolves domains, you must configure DHCP option 5 so that service points can obtain the required name servers.

Once the VM has been created, you can power on the service point VM. The service point can take several minutes to come online and connect to the Edge Cloud Instance.

To assign a static IP address to the service point, refer to Modifying Service Point network configurations.

Once you have provisioned the VM, you can deploy DNS resolver service. For more information, refer to DNS resolver services.

Attention: You can use the Service Point telemetry APIs to verify that the Service Point VM has successfully registered. The registrationStatus field within the Service Point telemetry API response returns a value of REGISTERED when the Service Point VM has successfully registered with the BlueCat Edge Cloud. If the value is not REGISTERED, this may indicate that there is an issue with the service point provisioning and the service point may not operate as intended.

For more information on the Service Point telemetry APIs, refer to Service Point telemetry APIs.