Inventory configuration for VMware

Base configuration

1. Click Resources -> Inventories

2. Click Add -> Add inventory

3. Enter the following parameters

   • Name: SAP Demo
   • Organization: Your Organization

4. Add the following variables:

   # These variables are valid for all hosts in the VMware environment
   vcenter_validate_certs: no  ## if you use a self signed certificate
   vmware_cluster: _Name of VMware Cluster_
   vmware_datacenter: _Name of VMware Datacenter_
   vmware_datastore: _Name of VMware Datastore_
   vmware_folder: _Name of folder for the VMs_
   vmware_template: Name of the VMware template to clone from (has to be in the VMware datastore for the module to work)
   vmware_network: _VMware Network Name_
   
   # NFS Share with installation Software
   nfs_software_archive_srv: 1.2.3.4:/SapInst  # NFS Server with SAP Software
   nfs_software_archive_dir: /sapinst  # local mountpoint
   

   This demo assumes that you have downloaded the SAP software installation bundles to a fileserver that can be accessed via NFS from the nodes. As the fileserver is used by all host in the inventory you can define it here

5. Click Save

If you do not know the name of cluster, datacenter, datastore, folder now, just enter a dummy name and continue. In the next sections we define some templates to figure out these names.

Configure dynamic inventories

In the just created inventory click on:

1. Click on Sources
2. Click Add
3. Enter the following:

   • Name: SAP Server

   • Source: VMware vCenter

   • Credential: your VCenter Credential

   • Host Filter: sapdemo.* - I recommend adding a unique prefix to your servers, e.g. sapdemo, in case there are more servers on the environment, and you only want to pick the demo servers

   • Update Options: overwrite

   • Source Variables:

     ---
     with_path: false
     properties:
     - "name"
     - "config.hardware.numCPU"
     - "config.name"
     - "config.uuid"
     - "guest.ipAddress"
     - "runtime.maxMemoryUsage"
     - "guest.guestId"
     - "config.annotation"
     hostnames:
     - config.name
     compose:
       ansible_host: 'guest.ipAddress'
     groups:
       sap: true
     keyed_groups:
     - key: config.annotation
       separator: ''
     

4. Click Save

With that configuration the hosts are added to the inventory with their names. They are reached through their ip addresses (ansible_host), They are all added to the group sap and to the group that is set in the annotation field of the VM. Tags may also be an option and if you set with_path to true the machines are grouped by their VMware path

The playbooks in this demo are written to use the annotation field for grouping. If you want or need to change that, please raise an issue in GitHub and make a suggestion.

Question to reader: If you happen to know how to create tags to VMs when creating VMs with ansible, please leave a comment here