VMware vCenter Orchestrator - 4.1.1, vCenter Orchestrator - 4.1, vCenter Orchestrator - 4.1.2 Administrator’s Guide

vCenter Orchestrator Administration

Guide

vCenter Orchestrator 4.1

This document supports the version of each product listed and supports all subsequent versions until the document is replaced by a new edition. To check for more recent editions of this document, see http://www.vmware.com/support/pubs.

EN-000322-03

vCenter Orchestrator Administration Guide

You can find the most up-to-date technical documentation on the VMware Web site at:

http://www.vmware.com/support/

The VMware Web site also provides the latest product updates.

If you have comments about this documentation, submit your feedback to:

docfeedback@vmware.com

Copyright © 2008–2010 VMware, Inc. All rights reserved. This product is protected by U.S. and international copyright and intellectual property laws. VMware products are covered by one or more patents listed at

http://www.vmware.com/go/patents.

VMware is a registered trademark or trademark of VMware, Inc. in the United States and/or other jurisdictions. All other marks and names mentioned herein may be trademarks of their respective companies.

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3401 Hillview Ave. Palo Alto, CA 94304 www.vmware.com

2 VMware, Inc.

Updated Information 7

About This Book 9

Introduction to VMware vCenter Orchestrator 11

Key Features of the Orchestrator Platform 11

Orchestrator User Roles and Related Tasks 12

Orchestrator Architecture 13

Deprecated Features in Orchestrator 4.1 14

The Orchestrator Client 15

Access the Orchestrator API Explorer 16

User Preferences 16

My Orchestrator View 18

Configurations View 19

Packages View 19

Scheduler View 20

Workflows View 20

Components of the Workflows View 20

Actions View 21

Resources View 21

Inventory View 22

Web Views View 22

Weboperator Web View 22

Start the Weboperator Web View 22

Policies 23

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Managing Workflows 25

Standard Workflows in the Workflow Library 25

Workflow Library Additions 26

Key Concepts of Workflows 29

Workflow User Permissions 30

Workflow Credentials 31

Workflow Attributes 31

Workflow Parameters 31

Workflow Schema 32

View Workflow Schema 32

Workflow Tokens 32

Workflow Token States 33

Locking Mechanism 33

Set User Permissions on a Workflow 34

vCenter Orchestrator Administration Guide

Run a Workflow 34

Respond to a Request for a User Interaction 35

Scheduling Workflows 36

Schedule a Workflow 36

Edit the Workflow Recurrence Pattern 37

Creating Resource Elements 39

View a Resource Element 39

Import an External Object to Use as a Resource Element 40

Edit the Resource Element Information and Access Rights 40

Save a Resource Element to a File 41

Update a Resource Element 41

Add a Resource Element to a Workflow 42

Add a Resource Element to a Web View 42

Using Plug-Ins 45

Default Orchestrator Plug-Ins 46

Using the SSH Plug-In 48

Generate a Key Pair 48

Change the Key Pair Passphrase 48

Run an SSH Command 49

Copy a File from an SSH Host 50

Copy a File to an SSH Host 50

Using the XML Plug-In 51

Running the XML Plug-In Sample Workflows 51

Managing Actions 55

Create an Action 55

Duplicate an Action 56

Export an Action 56

Import an Action 57

Move an Action 57

Find Elements That Implement an Action 57

Using Packages 59

Create a Package 59

Set User Permissions on a Package 60

Export a Package 61

Import a Package 62

Get and Synchronize a Remote Package 62

Remove a Package 63

Setting System Properties 65

Disable Access to the Orchestrator Client By Nonadministrators 65

Disable Access to Workflows from Web Service Clients 66

Setting Server File System Access from Workflows and JavaScript 66

Set Server File System Access for Workflows and JavaScript 67

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Set JavaScript Access to Operating System Commands 68

Set JavaScript Access to Java Classes 69

Set Custom Timeout Property 70

Modify the Number of Objects a Plug-In Search Obtains 70

Modify the Number of Concurrent and Pending Workflows 71

Contents

Maintenance and Recovery 73

Orchestrator Server Fails to Start 74

Revert to the Default Password for Orchestrator Configuration 74

Change the Web View SSL Certificate 75

Orchestrator Log Files 76

Logging Persistence 77

Define the Server Log Level 78

Change the Size of Server Logs 79

Export Orchestrator Log Files 79

Loss of Server Logs 80

Maintaining the Orchestrator Database 80

Index 81

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vCenter Orchestrator Administration Guide

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Updated Information

This vCenter Orchestrator Administration Guide is updated with each release of the product or when necessary.

This table provides the update history of the vCenter Orchestrator Administration Guide.

Revision Description

EN-000322-03

EN-000322-02

EN-000322-01

EN-000322-00 Initial release of Orchestrator 4.1.

Removed reference to unsupported VMware Infrastructure 3.5 plug-in in “Default Orchestrator Plug-

Ins,” on page 46.

Clarified the relation between the com.vmware.js.allow-local-process system property and the js-io-conf file in “Set JavaScript Access to Operating System Commands,” on page 68.

Updated section “Workflow Credentials,” on page 31.

Updated section Chapter 6, “Managing Actions,” on page 55.

Added troubleshooting information in “Orchestrator Server Fails to Start,” on page 74.

Added instructions about changing the server log level in “Define the Server Log Level,” on page 78.

Corrected description of Execute permission in “Set User Permissions on a Package,” on page 60.

Removed Web views from “Deprecated Features in Orchestrator 4.1,” on page 14.

Removed cross-references before tables and figures.

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vCenter Orchestrator Administration Guide

8 VMware, Inc.

About This Book

The VMware vCenter Orchestrator Administration Guide provides information and instructions about using and maintaining VMware® vCenter Orchestrator. It also describes how to manage workflows, plug-ins, packages, inventory and policies.

Intended Audience

This book is intended for advanced vCenter administrators and experienced system administrators who are familiar with virtual machine technology and datacenter operations, as well as anyone who wants to:

Automate frequently repeated processes related to the management of the virtual environment.

Manage multiple automated processes across and among heterogeneous systems.

Provide transparency in IT processes by centralizing automated scripts.

React faster to unplanned changes in the virtual environment.

VMware Technical Publications Glossary

VMware Technical Publications provides a glossary of terms that might be unfamiliar to you. For definitions of the terms as they are used in VMware technical documentation, go to

http://www.vmware.com/support/pubs.

Document Feedback

VMware welcomes your suggestions for improving our documentation. If you have comments, send your feedback to docfeedback@vmware.com.

Technical Support and Education Resources

The following technical support resources are available to you. To access the current version of this book and other books, go to http://www.vmware.com/support/pubs.

Online and Telephone Support

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To use online support to submit technical support requests, view your product and contract information, and register your products, go to

http://www.vmware.com/support.

vCenter Orchestrator Administration Guide

Customers with appropriate support contracts should use telephone support for the fastest response on priority 1 issues. Go to

http://www.vmware.com/support/phone_support.html.

Support Offerings

VMware Professional Services

To find out how VMware support offerings can help meet your business needs, go to http://www.vmware.com/support/services.

VMware Education Services courses offer extensive hands-on labs, case study examples, and course materials designed to be used as on-the-job reference tools. Courses are available onsite, in the classroom, and live online. For onsite pilot programs and implementation best practices, VMware Consulting Services provides offerings to help you assess, plan, build, and manage your virtual environment. To access information about education classes, certification programs, and consulting services, go to

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Introduction to VMware vCenter

Orchestrator 1

VMware vCenter Orchestrator is a development and process-automation platform that provides a library of extensible workflows to allow you to create and run automated, configurable processes to manage the VMware vCenter infrastructure as well as other VMware and third-party technologies.

Orchestrator exposes every operation in the vCenter Server API, allowing you to integrate all of these operations into your automated processes. Orchestrator also allows you to integrate with other management and administration solutions through its open plug-in architecture.

This chapter includes the following topics:

“Key Features of the Orchestrator Platform,” on page 11

“Orchestrator User Roles and Related Tasks,” on page 12

“Orchestrator Architecture,” on page 13

“Deprecated Features in Orchestrator 4.1,” on page 14

Key Features of the Orchestrator Platform

Orchestrator is composed of three distinct layers: an orchestration platform that provides the common features required for an orchestration tool, a plug-in architecture to integrate control of subsystems, and a library of workflows. Orchestrator is an open platform that can be extended with new plug-ins and libraries, and can be integrated into larger architectures through a SOAP API.

The following list presents the key Orchestrator features.

Persistence

Central management

Check-pointing

Versioning

Production grade external databases are used to store relevant information, such as processes, workflow states, and configuration information.

Orchestrator provides a central way to manage your processes. The application server-based platform, with full version history, allows you to have scripts and process-related primitives in one place. This way, you can avoid scripts without versioning and proper change control spread on your servers.

Every step of a workflow is saved in the database, which allows you to restart the server without losing state and context. This feature is especially useful for long-running processes.

All Orchestrator Platform objects have an associated version history. This feature allows basic change management when distributing processes to different project stages or locations.

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vCenter Orchestrator Administration Guide

Scripting engine

Workflow engine

Policy engine

Web 2.0 front end

The Mozilla Rhino JavaScript engine provides a way to create new building blocks for Orchestrator Platform. The scripting engine is enhanced with basic version control, variable type checking, name space management and exception handling. It can be used in the following building blocks:

Actions

Workflows

Policies

The workflow engine allows you to capture business processes. It uses the following objects to create a step-by-step process automation in workflows:

Workflows and actions that Orchestrator provides.

Custom building blocks created by the customer

Objects that plug-ins add to Orchestrator

Users, other workflows, a schedule, or a policy can start workflows.

The policy engine allows monitoring and event generation to react to changing conditions in the Orchestrator server or plugged-in technology. Policies can aggregate events from the platform or any of the plug-ins, which allows you to handle changing conditions on any of the integrated technologies.

The Web 2.0 front end allows you to integrate Orchestrator functions into Webbased interfaces, using Web views. For example, you can create Web views that add buttons to start workflows from a page in your company's Intranet. It provides a library of user customizable components to access vCO orchestrated objects and uses Ajax technology to dynamically update content without reloading complete pages.

Security

Orchestrator provides the following advanced security functions:

Public Key Infrastructure (PKI) to sign and encrypt content imported and exported between servers

Digital Rights Management (DRM) to control how exported content might be viewed, edited and redistributed

Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) encrypted communications between the desktop client and the server and HTTPS access to the Web front end.

Advanced access rights management to provide control over access to processes and the objects manipulated by these processes.

Orchestrator User Roles and Related Tasks

vCenter Orchestrator provides different tools and interfaces based on the specific responsibilities of the two global user roles: Administrators and End Users.

Administrators

This role has full access to all of the Orchestrator platform capabilities. Basic administrative tasks include the following items:

Installing and configuring Orchestrator

Managing access rights for Orchestrator and applications

Importing and exporting packages

Enabling and disabling Web views

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Orchestrator

database

vCenter

Orchestrator

Client application

vCenter

Server

browser access web service

workflow library

vCenter VI3 WMI XML SSH JDBC SMTP

3rd-party

plug-in

Orchestrator Architecture

Orchestrator contains a workflow library and workflow engine to allow you to create and run workflows that automate orchestration processes. You run workflows on the objects of different technologies that Orchestrator accesses through a series of plug-ins.

Orchestrator provides a standard set of plug-ins, including a plug-in to VMware vCenter Server, to allow you to orchestrate tasks in the different environments that the plug-ins expose.

Orchestrator also presents an open architecture to allow you to plug in external third-party applications to the orchestration platform. You can run workflows on the objects of the plugged-in technologies that you define yourself. Orchestrator connects to a directory services server to manage user accounts, and to a database to store information from the workflows that it runs. You can access Orchestrator and the workflows and objects it exposes through the Orchestrator client interface, through a Web browser, or through Web services.

Creating applications to extend the Orchestrator platform functionality

Automating processes by customizing existing workflows and creating new workflows and plug-ins

Customizing Web front ends for these processes, using Web 2.0

Figure 1-1 shows the architecture of Orchestrator.

Figure 1-1. VMware vCenter Orchestrator Architecture

NOTE The VMware Infrastructure 3 and Microsoft plug-ins are not installed by default.

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vCenter Orchestrator Administration Guide

Deprecated Features in Orchestrator 4.1

The following features are deprecated as of Orchestrator 4.1. Development of these features is not supported in releases of Orchestrator later than 4.1.

Authorizations

OGNL expressions in workflow presentations

Policies

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The Orchestrator Client 2

The Orchestrator client is an easy-to-use desktop application that allows you to perform daily administration tasks such as importing packages, running and scheduling workflows, and managing user permissions. The Orchestrator client also serves as an IDE for creating or customizing workflows.

This chapter includes the following topics:

“Log in to the Orchestrator Client,” on page 15

“Access the Orchestrator API Explorer,” on page 16

“User Preferences,” on page 16

“My Orchestrator View,” on page 18

“Configurations View,” on page 19

“Packages View,” on page 19

“Scheduler View,” on page 20

“Workflows View,” on page 20

“Actions View,” on page 21

“Resources View,” on page 21

“Inventory View,” on page 22

“Web Views View,” on page 22

“Weboperator Web View,” on page 22

“Policies,” on page 23

Log in to the Orchestrator Client

To perform general administration tasks or to edit and create workflows, you must log in to the Orchestrator client interface.

Prerequisites

All components of the Orchestrator server must be configured and the VMware vCenter Orchestrator Server service must be running.

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vCenter Orchestrator Administration Guide

Procedure

1 Select Start > Programs > VMware > vCenter Orchestrator Client or run the

vCenter Orchestrator Client.exe file that is located in

2 In the Host name field, type the IP address to which Orchestrator server is bound.

To check the IP address, log in to the Orchestrator configuration interface and check the Network tab.

3 Log in using the Orchestrator user name and password.

To check the credentials, log in to the Orchestrator configuration interface and check the LDAP tab.

The My Orchestrator view appears. This view summarizes the recent activities on the server, shows pending and running workflows, running policies, scheduled tasks, completed workflows, and elements you recently edited.

What to do next

You can import a package, start a workflow, or set root access rights on the system.

Access the Orchestrator API Explorer

Orchestrator provides an API Explorer to allow you to search the Orchestrator API and see the documentation for JavaScript objects that you can use in scripted elements.

install_directory

\Orchestrator\apps.

You can consult an online version of the Scripting API for the vCenter server plug-in on the Orchestrator documentation home page.

Procedure

Access the API Explorer from either the Orchestrator client or from the Scripting tabs of the workflow, policy, and action editors.

To access the API Explorer from the Orchestrator client, click Tools > API Explorer in the Orchestrator client tool bar.

To access the API Explorer from the Scripting tabs of the workflow, policy, and action editors, click Search API on the left.

The API Explorer appears, allowing you to search all the objects and functions of the Orchestrator API.

What to do next

Use the API Explorer to write scripts for scriptable elements.

User Preferences

You can customize aspects of Orchestrator by using the User preferences tool in the Orchestrator client.

Your preferences are saved on the client side in the C:\Documents and

Settings\

a running Orchestrator server.

To access User preferences, select Tools > User preferences in the Orchestrator client tool bar.

Current_User

\.vmware\vmware-vmo.cfg file. The .vmware folder is created when you first connect to

The User preferences tool presents the following tabs.

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Chapter 2 The Orchestrator Client

General Tab

Table 2-1. Orchestrator Client Customization Options

Option Description

Auto-edit new inserted The new elements that you add automatically open in an editor.

Script compilation delay The frequency of the background task that compiles the scripts and reports

errors in edit mode.

Show decision scripts You can see the decision script of the implemented decision functions.

Delete non empty folder permitted You can delete a folder together with its subfolders and contents.

Size of run logs (number of lines) The maximum number of lines in the system log that the application

displays when you select a workflow run in the Orchestrator client and click Logs on the Schema tab.

The value must be greater than 0.

Server log fetch limit The maximum number of lines in the server logs that the application

fetches from the database and displays when you click any of the Events tabs in the Orchestrator client.

The value must be greater than 0.

Finder maximum size The maximum number of results that the searches return when you search

for elements such as actions or workflows. The value must be greater than 0.

Check usage when deleting an element The application checks if the element you are trying to delete is referenced

by other elements. If the element is used by another workflow, policy, or action, a warning message appears.

Check OGNL expression The application validates the OGNL expressions in the workflow

presentations.

NOTE The use of OGNL expressions in workflow presentations is deprecated as of Orchestrator 4.1. Using OGNL expressions in workflow presentations is not supported in releases of Orchestrator later than 4.1.

Workflows Tab

Table 2-2. Workflow Editor Customization Options

Option Description

Check task/decision IN/OUT parameters The application checks if the input and output parameters of an activity

are correctly bound to the corresponding input or output attribute of the workflow.

Check error in task's scripts The application validates the script in scriptable task elements.

Check workflow termination The application checks if each terminal transition of a workflow with

different possible outcomes is connected to an End Workflow schema element.

Check unreachable items The application checks if all activities are reachable.

Check unused workflow's parameters/attributes

Check unknown types from plug-ins The application checks if all parameters and attributes of a workflow are

Check for legacy 'Action' scripting call (slow) The application detects legacy actions calls and displays a warning

Use direct lines as workflow diagram links The connector tool uses direct lines to link the workflow schema elements.

The application checks if all parameters and attributes of a workflow are used.

of a known type.

message.

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vCenter Orchestrator Administration Guide

Table 2-2. Workflow Editor Customization Options (Continued)

Option Description

Choose workflow in tree view The workflow selector displays a hierarchical tree viewer instead of the

Validate workflow before running it The application validates each workflow before allowing it to run.

Inventory Tab

You can enable the Use contextual menu in inventory option to display the workflows that are available for an inventory object. When the option is enabled and you right-click an object in the Orchestrator inventory, all available workflows for the object type are displayed.

Script Editor Tab

You can customize the scripting engine from the Script Editor tab of the User preferences menu. You can disable automatic completion of lines, and change the default code formatting options.

My Orchestrator View

The My Orchestrator view in the Orchestrator client interface summarizes the most recent activities on the Orchestrator server, such as recently modified elements, pending and running workflows, running policies, completed workflows, and workflows that are waiting for user interaction.

From the My Orchestrator view you can perform common administrative tasks, such as running a workflow, importing a package, and setting root access rights.

The My Orchestrator view presents the following tabs.

default list panel.

Today

Workflow Tokens

Waiting for Input

Tasks

Permissions

Displays the most recent workflow runs and modified elements.

Provides details about the different workflow runs. This information includes the workflow's running status, the user who started it, and the time and date when the workflow started and ended.

Displays a list of the workflows that are waiting for user inputs that you or members of your user group have permission to provide.

Displays information about the scheduled workflows, including name, running state, last run, and next run.

Displays the users and user groups who have root access rights to all published Web views and the workflows in the Orchestrator library. The possible permissions are View, Execute, Inspect, Edit, and Admin.

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Configurations View

The Configurations view in the Orchestrator client allows you to create configuration elements. Creating configuration elements allows you to define common attributes across an Orchestrator server.

The Configurations view consists of a set of tabs that show information about a particular configuration element.

Chapter 2 The Orchestrator Client

General

Attributes

Events

Permissions

Packages View

The Packages view in the Orchestrator client interface allows you to add, import, export, and synchronize packages.

The Packages view consists of a set of tabs that show different types of information about a particular package. In Edit Package mode, you can insert and remove elements on each tab.

General

Workflows

Policies

Actions

Displays general information about the configuration element, including its name and description, its version number, and the user permissions.

Displays the attributes that are added to the configuration element. All elements that are running in the server can call on the attributes that are set in a configuration element.

Displays all the events that are associated with this configuration element.

Displays which users and user groups have permission to access the configuration element.

Displays general information about the package, including its name, its legal owner, and a description.

Displays all the workflows that the selected package contains.

Displays the policy templates that the selected package contains.

Displays the actions that the selected package contains.

Web View

Configurations

Resources

Used Plug-Ins

Permissions

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Displays the Web views that the selected package contains.

Displays the configuration elements that the selected package contains.

Displays the external resources embedded in the selected package.

Displays information about the plug-ins associated with the selected package. Plug-ins can have one or more packages associated with them.

Displays the permissions accorded to users or groups of users to interact with the package. The possible permissions are View, Execute, Inspect, Edit, and Admin.

vCenter Orchestrator Administration Guide

Scheduler View

The Scheduler view in the Orchestrator client displays a list of all scheduled workflows in the system. The workflows are sorted by name or date, together with their status. You can use the Scheduler view to create, edit, suspend, resume, and cancel scheduled workflows.

When you select a scheduled workflow in the list, the Scheduler view presents the following tabs that display details about a particular workflow.

General

Recurrence

Workflow Runs

Permissions

Workflows View

The Orchestrator client interface features a Workflows view that provides access to the Orchestrator libraries of workflows.

The Workflows view allows you to view information about each workflow, create, edit, run workflows, and interact with the workflows.

The Orchestrator client uses the following icon to identify workflows:

Displays general information about the scheduled workflow, including name, start behavior, description, start date, startup user, the name of the scheduled workflow, and a list of the input values for the workflow.

Displays details about the recurrence pattern of the scheduled workflow.

Displays details about the different runs of a particular scheduled workflow. This information includes the workflow's running status, start and end date, and the user who started it. When you cancel a scheduled workflow, its log information is removed from the system. When you suspend a workflow, the log information is kept.

Displays the permissions accorded to users or groups of users to interact with the workflow. The possible permissions are View, Execute, Inspect, Edit, and Admin.

Components of the Workflows View

The Workflows view consists of a set of tabs that show information about the selected workflow.

General

Inputs

Outputs

Schema

Presentation

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Displays general information about the workflow, including its name, its version number, the permissions, a description, and a list of the workflow's global attributes.

Lists all the input parameters that the workflow needs when it runs.

Lists the types of values that the workflow returns when it runs.

Shows a graphical representation of the workflow. Clicking an element in the schema shows information about that element in the bottom half of the Workflows view.

Constructs the input parameters dialog box that users see when they run a workflow. You define the groups in which the input parameters appear in the dialog box and provide descriptions to help users provide the correct parameters. You also define any parameter properties or constraints.

Chapter 2 The Orchestrator Client

Parameters Reference

Workflow Tokens

Events

Permissions

Actions View

The Actions view in the Orchestrator client interface allows you to access the libraries of predefined actions. In the Actions view, you can duplicate actions, export them to a file, or move them to a different module in the actions hierarchical list.

By expanding the nodes of the actions hierarchical list, you can browse available actions. When you select an action in the list, the right pane displays details about that action.

Shows all the input and output parameters in a single view. The tab also identifies the schema element that consumes or generates a parameter. You can optionally view the workflow attributes in this tab by clicking Show

Attributes. When you right-click an attribute or a parameter and select Show in schema, the corresponding schema element is highlighted.

Provides details about the different runs of the selected workflow. This information includes the workflow's running status, the user who started it, and the time and date when the workflow started and ended.

Provides information about each event that occurs while the workflow is running. This information includes the event's running status, the user who started it, and the time and date when the event was issued. The information is stored in the VMO_LogEvent table in the Orchestrator database.

Lists the permissions accorded to users or groups of users to interact with the workflow. The possible permissions are View, Execute, Inspect, Edit, and Admin.

The Actions view presents the following tabs.

General

Scripting

Events

Permissions

Resources View

The Resources view in the Orchestrator client allows you to import external objects such as images, sysprep files, custom scripts, and HTML and XML templates and use them as resource elements in workflows and Web views.

The Resources view consists of a set of tabs that show information about a particular resource element.

General

Viewer

Events

Permissions

Displays general information about the action, including its name, its version number, the operations the user is allowed to perform, and a description.

Displays the action’s return type, input parameters, and the JavaScript code that defines the action's function.

Displays all of the events associated with this action.

Displays which users and user groups have permission to access the action.

Displays general information about the resource element, including its name, MIME type, description, version number, and the user permissions.

Displays the contents of the resource element.

Displays all of the events that are associated with this resource element.

Displays which users and user groups have permission to access the resource element.

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vCenter Orchestrator Administration Guide

Inventory View

The Inventory view in the Orchestrator client interface displays the objects of the plugged-in applications that are enabled in Orchestrator. You can use the Inventory view to run workflows on an inventory object.

If the Use contextual menu in inventory option is enabled, all of the workflows that you can run on the selected inventory object appear in a contextual menu.

Web Views View

The Web Views view in the Orchestrator client allows you to create, publish, and export Web views to a working folder for modification or as templates from which to create other Web views. You can use Web views to access Orchestrator functions from a Web browser.

The Web Views view consists of a set of tabs that show information about a particular Web view.

General

Elements

Attributes

Events

Displays general information about the Web view, including its name, description, version number, the URL on which the Web view is published, and the user permissions.

Displays the HTML files and Web view components associated with the selected Web view.

Displays the attributes that direct the Web view to the objects in the Orchestrator server on which it performs tasks.

Displays all of the events that are associated with the Web view.

Weboperator Web View

Orchestrator provides a standard Web view called weboperator that allows users to run workflows from a browser.

The weboperator Web view provides an example of the orchestration functions that Web views can provide to end users in browsers, without requiring that those users use the Orchestrator client.

Start the Weboperator Web View

You start the weboperator Web view from the Orchestrator client.

Procedure

1 Click the Web Views view in the Orchestrator client.

The weboperator Web view and any other Web views that you have imported into Orchestrator appear.

2 Right-click weboperator and select Publish.

3 Open a browser and go to http://

In the URL, orchestrator_server is the DNS name or IP address of the Orchestrator server, and 8280 is the default port number where Orchestrator publishes Web views.

4 On the Orchestrator home page, click Web View List.

5 Click weboperator.

6 Log in using your Orchestrator user name and password.

7 Expand the hierarchical list of workflows to navigate through the workflows in the Orchestrator library.

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orchestrator_server

:8280.

Chapter 2 The Orchestrator Client

8 Click a workflow in the hierarchical list to display information about the workflow in the right pane.

9 In the right pane, select whether to run the workflow now or at a later time.

Option Action

Run the workflow now

Run the workflow at a later time

a Click Start Workflow to run the workflow.

b Provide the required input parameters and click Submit to run the

workflow.

a Click Schedule Workflow to run the workflow at a later time.

b Provide the time, date, and recurrence information to set when and how

often to run the workflow and click Next.

c Provide the required input parameters and click Submit to schedule the

workflow.

You can use the weboperator Web view to run workflows on objects in your inventory from a Web browser rather than from the Orchestrator client.

What to do next

If you only need a Web view to access the inventory and run workflows, the standard weboperator Web view should meet your requirements. If you require more complex functionality from a Web view, you can use the Web components and default Web view template that Orchestrator provides to develop custom Web views.

Policies

Policies are event triggers that monitor the activity of the system. Policies respond to predefined events issued by changes in the status or performance of certain defined objects.

Policies are a series of rules, gauges, thresholds and event filters that run certain workflows or scripts when specific predefined events occur in Orchestrator or in the technologies that Orchestrator accesses through plugins. Orchestrator constantly evaluates the policy rules as long as the policy is running. For instance, you can implement policy gauges and thresholds that monitor the behavior of vCenter Server objects of the

VC:HostSystem and VC:VirtualMachine types.

NOTE Policies are deprecated as of Orchestrator 4.1. Policy development is not supported in releases of Orchestrator later than 4.1.

Orchestrator defines the following types of policy:

Policy Templates

Policies

You can organize policy templates into folders, for easier navigation.

Master policies. Policy templates are not linked to real objects. They are abstract sets of rules that define the behavior to implement if a certain abstract event occurs. You can see existing policy templates and create templates in the Policy Templates view in the Orchestrator client.

Policies are instances of a template or standalone event triggers that are linked to real objects, and that are triggered by real-life events. You can see existing policies and create policies in the Policies view in the Orchestrator client.

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vCenter Orchestrator Administration Guide

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Managing Workflows 3

A workflow is a succession of actions and decisions that are run sequentially until they arrive at a specific result. Orchestrator provides a library of workflows that perform common management tasks according to best practices. Orchestrator also provides libraries of the individual actions that the workflows perform.

Workflows combine actions, decisions, and results that, when performed in a particular order, complete a specific task or a specific process in a virtual environment. Workflows perform tasks such as provisioning virtual machines, backing up, performing regular maintenance, sending emails, performing SSH operations, managing the physical infrastructure, and other general utility operations. Workflows accept inputs according to their function. You can create workflows that run according to defined schedules, or that run if certain anticipated events occur. Information can be provided by you, by other users, by another workflow or action, or by an external process such as a Web service call from an application. Workflows perform some validation and filtering of information before they run.

Workflows can call upon other workflows. For example, you can reuse in several different workflows a workflow that starts a virtual machine.

You create workflows by using the Orchestrator client interface’s integrated development environment (IDE), that provides access to the workflow library and the ability to run workflows on the workflow engine. The workflow engine can also take objects from external libraries that you plug in to Orchestrator. This ability allows you to customize processes or implement functions that third-party applications provide.

This chapter includes the following topics:

“Standard Workflows in the Workflow Library,” on page 25

“Workflow Library Additions,” on page 26

“Key Concepts of Workflows,” on page 29

“Set User Permissions on a Workflow,” on page 34

“Run a Workflow,” on page 34

“Respond to a Request for a User Interaction,” on page 35

“Scheduling Workflows,” on page 36

Standard Workflows in the Workflow Library

Orchestrator provides a standard library of workflows that you can use to automate operations in the virtual infrastructure. The workflows in the standard library are locked in the read-only state. To customize a standard workflow, you must create a duplicate of that workflow. Duplicate workflows or custom workflows that you create are fully editable.

For information about the different access rights to the Orchestrator Server depending on the type of vCenter Server license that you apply, see vCenter Orchestrator Installation and Configuration Guide.

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