Log Insight ships as a virtual appliance. Given its single packaging model, automated deployment is easy thanks to the freely available OVF Tool. OVF Tool is a command-line utility available for Windows, Linux, and Mac that allows you to deploy OVA/OVF files. For the list of options available with OVF Tool run ovftool –help or see check the documentation. I would like to walk you through how to automate the deployment of Log Insight via ovftool.
Log Insight OVA options
The easiest way to see what options are available as part of an OVA/OVF is to run ovftool without any flags, but specifying the OVA/OVF to be deployed (e.g. ovftool </path/to/loginsight.ova>). In the case of Log Insight, the important options are:
- Networks
Networks: Name: Network 1 Description: The "Network 1" network
- Properties
Properties: ClassId: vami Key: hostname InstanceId: VMware_vCenter_Log_Insight Category: Networking Properties Label: Hostname Type: string(0..65535) Description: The hostname or the fully qualified domain name for this VM. Leave blank if DHCP is desired. ClassId: vami Key: ip0 InstanceId: VMware_vCenter_Log_Insight Category: Networking Properties Label: Network 1 IP Address Type: string Description: The IP address for this interface. Leave blank if DHCP is desired. ClassId: vami Key: netmask0 InstanceId: VMware_vCenter_Log_Insight Category: Networking Properties Label: Network 1 Netmask Type: string Description: The netmask or prefix for this interface. Leave blank if DHCP is desired. ClassId: vami Key: gateway InstanceId: VMware_vCenter_Log_Insight Category: Networking Properties Label: Default Gateway Type: string Description: The default gateway address for this VM. Leave blank if DHCP is desired. ClassId: vami Key: DNS InstanceId: VMware_vCenter_Log_Insight Category: Networking Properties Label: DNS Type: string Description: The domain name servers for this VM (comma separated). Leave blank if DHCP is desired. WARNING: Do not specify more than two DNS entries or no DNS entries will be configured! # NOTE - available starting with Log Insight 2.0 ClassId: vm Key: rootpw Label: Root Password Type: string Description: By default the root password is blank and SSH is disabled. A root password can be set during deployment time if desired. For security reasons, it is recommended to use a password that is a minimum of eight characters and contains a minimum of one upper, one lower, one digit, and one special character.
- Deployment Options
Deployment Options: Id: xsmall Label: Extra Small Description: IMPORTANT: This configuration is intended for proof-of-concept or test environments and should not be used in a production environment. This configuration supports up to 20 ESXi hosts (~200 events/second or ~3GB/day) and requires the following: * 2 CPUs (minimum 2.0GHz) * 4GB RAM * 132GB of storage (100GB for event storage) - thick provisioned, eager zeroed highly recommended * VM hardware version 7 or greater (vSphere 4.0 or greater) Id: small Label: Small Description: This configuration supports up to 100 ESXi hosts (~1000 events/second or ~15GB/day) and requires the following: * 4 CPU (minimum 2.0GHz) * 8GB RAM * 132GB of storage (100GB for event storage) - thick provisioned, eager zeroed highly recommended * VM hardware version 7 or greater (vSphere 4.0 or greater) Id: medium Label: Medium Description: This configuration supports up to 250 ESXi hosts (~2500 events/second or ~37.5GB/day) and requires the following: * 8 CPU (minimum 2.0GHz) * 16GB RAM * 282GB of storage (250GB for event storage) - thick provisioned, eager zeroed highly recommended * VM hardware version 7 or greater (vSphere 4.0 or greater) Id: large Label: Large Description: IMPORTANT: This configuration requires vSphere 5.0 or greater. This configuration supports up to 750 ESXi hosts (~7500 events/second or ~112.5GB/day) and requires the following: * 16 CPU (minimum 2.0GHz) * 32GB RAM * 282GB of storage (250GB for event storage) - thick provisioned, eager zeroed highly recommended * VM hardware version 8 or greater (vSphere 5.0 or greater)
Additional OVF Tool information
In addition to the Log Insight OVA options, a few additional pieces of information are needed:
- Name – what do you want to call the OVA/OVF in vSphere/vCD?
- Datastore – to which datastore do you wish to deploy the OVA/OVF?
- Power on – do you wish to power on the OVA/OVF post-deployment?
- Where – where exactly do you want to deploy the OVA/OVF?
- vSphere – requires information such as username, password, FQDN/IP of vCS, datacenter name, and cluster/host name
- vCD – requires information such as username, password, FQDN/IP of vCD, organization name, vdc name, and catalog name
OVF Tool command gotchas
With all of this information, all you need to do is construct an ovftool command. The two places where this can be difficult are:
- Specifying the desired properties in the correct format – In the case of properties, the format is: –prop:<ClassId>.<Key>.<InstanceId>=”<yourInfoHere>”. Most people, myself included, make the mistake of trying to use –prop:<Key>=”<yourInfoHere>”, which does not work.
- Specifying the destination in the correct format – be sure to check the documentation if you are running into issues here
- For vSphere, the format is: vi://<username>:<password>@<host>:<port>/<search-term>
- For vCD, the format is: vcloud://username:password@host:port?org=name_of_org&vapp=name_of_deployed_vapp&catalog=name_of_catalog &vappTemplate=name_of_vapp_template_in_catalog&vdc=name_of_vdc
Deploying Log Insight with OVF Tool
So how do you use ovftool to deploy Log Insight?
- For production environments a static IP address should be used, in which case the following ovftool command will work to deploy to vSphere:
# # NOTES # - Replace everything like <this> with your environment specific details # - Everything like [this] is optional # - For DNS, do not specify more than two entries or no entries will be set # - For production environments, the deploymentOption should be at least small # </path/to/ovftool> \ -n="<loginsight15.local>" \ --acceptAllEulas --skipManifestCheck --allowExtraConfig [--powerOn] \ --prop:vami.hostname.VMware_vCenter_Log_Insight="<loginsight15.local>" \ --prop:vami.ip0.VMware_vCenter_Log_Insight="<192.168.1.100>" \ --prop:vami.netmask0.VMware_vCenter_Log_Insight="<255.255.255.0>" \ --prop:vami.gateway.VMware_vCenter_Log_Insight="<192.1681.253>" \ --prop:vami.DNS.VMware_vCenter_Log_Insight="<192.168.1.253,192.168.1.252>" \ [--prop:vm.rootpw="<rootPassword>" \] --deploymentOption=<large> --ipAllocationPolicy=fixedPolicy \ --net:\"Network 1\"="<VM Network>" \ -ds="<datastore1>" \ "</path/to/loginsight.ova>" \ "vi://<username>:<password>@<vcenterFQDN>/<dcName>/host/<clusterName|hostName>"
- For demo/POC environments you may be okay with DHCP network settings, in which case the following ovftool command will work to deploy to vSphere:
# # NOTES # - Replace everything like <this> with your environment specific details # - Everything like [this] is optional # </path/to/ovftool> \ -n="<loginsight15.local>" \ --acceptAllEulas --skipManifestCheck --allowExtraConfig [--powerOn] \ [--prop:vm.rootpw.VMware_vCenter_Log_Insight="<rootPassword>" \] --deploymentOption=<small> \ --net:\"Network 1\"="<VM Network>" \ -ds="<datastore1>" \ "</path/to/loginsight.ova>" \ "vi://<username>:<password>@<vcenterFQDN>/<dcName>/host/<clusterName|hostName>"
UPDATE: Added allow extra config flag and root password information introduced in Log Insight 2.0.
© 2014 – 2021, Steve Flanders. All rights reserved.
