Launching virtual appliances using the GCP interface - BlueCat Integrity

This task assumes that you are already familiar with Google Cloud-related settings including Address Manager and DNS Server operations.

Prerequisites for launching virtual appliances on Google Cloud:

You must have a valid Google Cloud account.
You must have a valid license from BlueCat.
Note: BlueCat GCP Virtual Appliances are BYOL (Bring Your Own License). The Google Marketplace deploys the appliances, but you are responsible for purchasing and managing the license directly from BlueCat. A valid client ID and license key are required to successfully deploy a VM using this solution. Contact your BlueCat sales representative with your GCP email ID(s) to obtain your client ID and license key.
The following APIs must be enabled to deploy a VM product from Google Cloud Marketplace:
- Compute Engine API
- Cloud Deployment Manager V2 API
- Cloud Runtime Configuration API

You must create the VPC network(s) that will be used when configuring the network interfaces of your BlueCat GCP Virtual Appliance, and ensure that the network(s) have the appropriate firewall rules configured.

The following minimum set of firewall rules are recommended for BlueCat GCP Virtual Appliances:


HTTP port 80 HTTPS port 443 SSH port 22 Custom UDP Rule with port number 10045 for notifications	SSH port 22 Custom UDP Rule with port number 123 for NTP (inbound only) and 161 for SNMP (inbound only) Custom TCP Rule with port number 10042 for secure management and connectivity between DNS/DHCP Servers and Address Manager Custom TCP and UDP Rule with port number 53 for DNS

Note: For more information about BlueCat appliance service ports, refer to Network requirements in the Address Manager Administration Guide.

When configuring multiple network interfaces on BlueCat DNS for GCP Virtual Appliances (for dedicated management), each interface must attach to a subnet of a different VPC network. You can't attach mutiple network interfaces to the same VPC network, even if you select different subnets of the network. For more information, refer to https://cloud.google.com/vpc/docs/create-use-multiple-interfaces.

Attention:

If you create an Address Manager or DNS/DHCP Server instance on GCP with a custom hostname, the hostname cannot be modified after the VM has been created. For more information, refer to https://cloud.google.com/compute/docs/instances/custom-hostname-vm#limitations.
BlueCat strongly recommends connecting to your VPC using a VPN connection when working in a mixed environment where part of your DNS, DHCP and IPAM (DDI) infrastructure is on the premises and part of it is on the Google Cloud. For more information, refer to https://cloud.google.com/vpc/docs/vpc.

Note: Due to limitations with the cloud provider, you cannot change the IP address of BlueCat GCP Virtual Appliances network interfaces after installation. To change the IP address for BlueCat GCP Virtual Appliances, you must re-install BlueCat GCP Virtual Appliances on a new instance with the desired IP address changes and migrate your configuration to the new instance.

Launch BlueCat GCP Virtual Appliances from the GCP Marketplace.

Navigate to the Google Cloud Platform Marketplace.
Click Explore Marketplace.
Enter BlueCat in the search bar labelled Search for solutions.
Select BlueCat DNS and DHCP Server for GCP or BlueCat Address Manager for GCP from the results page.
Click Launch to open the new platform deployment page.
In the Deployment name field, choose a name for your instance.
In the Image version field, select the version of the BlueCat GCP Virtual Appliance you purchased.
Select your deployment area from the Zone drop-down menu.

Under Machine type:

Select the Machine family for the instance machine type. BlueCat recommends using machine types within the COMPUTE-OPTIMIZED family for BlueCat GCP Virtual Appliances.
Select the Machine type for the instance based on the SKU for the BlueCat GCP Virtual Appliance that you selected. Refer to the table below for recommended machine types:

BlueCat Address Manager for GCP

Product SKU	Machine type	vCPUs	Memory (GB)
cBAM-1000	c2-standard-4	4	16
cBAM-6500	c2-standard-16	16	64
cBAM-8500	c2-standard-30	30	120

BlueCat DNS and DHCP for GCP

Product SKU	Machine type	vCPUs	Memory (GB)
cBDDS-2500	c2-standard-4	4	16
cBDDS-4500	c2-standard-8	8	32
cBDDS-6500	c2-standard-16	16	64
cBDDS-8500	c2-standard-30	30	120

For detailed information about GCP VM sizes, refer to https://cloud.google.com/compute/docs/compute-optimized-machines#c2_machine_types.

Under Boot Disk, select Standard Persistent Disk or SSD Persistent from the Boot disk type drop-down menu.
Under Network interfaces:
1. Select a network from the Network drop-down menu.
2. Select a subnetwork from the Subnetwork drop-down menu.
3. Select Ephemeral or None from the External IP drop-down menu.
4. Enter the administrator's SSH public key in the SSH public key field.
For BlueCat DNS and DHCP Server for GCP virtual appliances (optional): Under Dedicated Management:
1. Check Create a second network interface for dedicated management.
  
  Note: BlueCat recommends that customers create a second interface for dedicated management regardless of the current need for Dedicated Management in their environment.
2. Select a network from the Network drop-down menu.
3. Select a subnetwork from the Subnetwork drop-down menu.
Under License Information:
1. Enter your client ID provided by BlueCat in the Client ID field.
2. Enter your license key provided by BlueCat in the License key field.
Note: If you prefer to configure your client ID and license key through the Administration Console, you can proceed to deploy the solution without entering this information through the user interface. See Updating BlueCat licenses from the Administration Console for instructions.
Click Deploy.

After completing these steps, your new instance displays in the instance list.