VMware vRealize Log Insight v3.6 Deployment

This post is about deploying VMware vRealize Log Insight v3.6.

To start with log into my.vmware.com and download the VMware-vRealize-Log-Insight-3.6.0-4202923.ova. Its 863MB in size.

Log into your vCenter Server via the Web Client.

Click on the cluster or host that you want to deploy the appliance to and select ‘Deploy OVF Template’, click ‘Local File’ and then ‘Browse’ and browse to the location you saved the OVA file you downloaded from my.vmware.com.

The OVA file will be validated and then present you with the following window, click ‘NEXT’

Click ‘ACCEPT’ to accept the licence agreements and then click ‘NEXT’

On this window you can choose the name of the appliance and the data center or folder to deploy to. I have chosen to name the appliance ‘lablog01.lab.local’. Click ‘NEXT’. Note the name here is what’s displayed in vCenter and does not need to be a DNS name.

You now get to choose from a selection of preset deployment sizes based on your environment.

From the VMware documentation the following configuration sizes are available

I select the default ‘small’ configuration and click ‘NEXT’

On this window you get to select the virtual disk format, a storage policy and the datastore for the disks to reside. As this is a lab I will select ‘thin provision’, will leave the datastore policy as ‘default’ and select the ‘BRONZE2’ datastore. Click ‘NEXT’

In production environments VMware recommends provisioning Log Insight with Eager Zeroed Thick Provisioned disks for higher performance. You also want to make sure the LUN backing the datastore has sufficient IO capacity for Log Insight.

You now get to select the port group the appliance will be connected to and the IP protocol (IPv4 or IPv6). In production deployments you may have a separate network segment that such monitoring and logging appliances and devices are deployed to. As this is a lab environment I am simply deploying to my management port group which resides on my management vDS. Click ‘NEXT’

Here you get to enter all networking related information: hostname, IP address, mask, gateway, DNS, and DNS domain and root password. Note: make sure you have a DNS entry for your appliance. Click ‘NEXT’

Check the settings are correct on this screen, tick the box to power on after deployment and then click ‘FINISH’. The deployment of the appliance then begins.

The deployment of the appliance then begins.

Once the deployment has completed, give it a few minutes and then hit the URL. In my case the URL is https://lablog01.lab.local. The self-signed certificate will be untrusted. This can be replaced later with a CA signed certificate.

The supported browsers are:

Google Chrome 43.0 and above
Safari 6.0 and above
Internet Explorer 11.0 and above
Mozilla Firefox 38.0 and above

On the home page of your vRealize Log Insight appliance click the ‘NEXT’ button

Choose your deployment type. Here you get to choose if this is a new deployment or you are joining an existing deployment (adding a cluster node). As this is the first node I will select ‘START NEW DEPLOYMENT’

After a few minutes you are able to add the password for the admin user and email address, once entered click ‘SAVE AND CONTINUE’

You now need to enter the licence key for vRealize Log Insight. Once added click ‘ADD LICENSE KEY’, then ‘SAVE AND CONTINUE’

On this screen you are able to select how to sync time either via ESXi host or NTP. I am using NTP, I add the NTP server address and click ‘TEST’ to confirm access to the NTP server. Click ‘SAVE AND CONTINUE’

You can now enter your SMTP configuration. Enter details and click ‘SAVE AND CONTINUE’

And your finished with the deployment. Click ‘FINISH’

Some additional tasks you want to complete would be the vSphere integration for ESXi hosts and also configuring Log Insight server as the syslog destination. Additionally you will want to integrate with Active Directory for login authentication etc. I suggest you update the appliance to a CA signed certificate first.

That’s pretty much it, if you want to build a Log Insight cluster just repeat this process but select the option to join an existing deployment.