VMware Aria: what, when, and why?

Rafał Lechoniewicz
31. October 2023
Reading time: 6 min
VMware Aria: what, when, and why?

Handling incoming images is a very central topic for many companies active in the media industry. Managing these images is a key process day in and day out. 

According to VMware announcement, we can describe VMware Aria as “an intelligent multi-cloud management solution that enables you to consistently deploy and operate your apps, infrastructure, and platform services across private, hybrid, and multiple clouds from a single platform with a common data model”. Let’s try to decipher this marketing jargon.

VMware Aria logo

How VMware Aria can us help?

First of all, how VMware Aria can help? Is it able to simplify our daily tasks related to multi-cloud?

If we examine the cloud management from several different perspectives:

  • Deployment: How do customers decide which apps to deploy to which cloud?
  • Security: Are policies being consistently applied across clusters and clouds?
  • Performance: How do businesses make decisions around improving performance and optimizing cost?
  • Cost: How do you get a global view of cost, security, and performance around platforms and clouds?

If you managed several public clouds, it’s a cumbersome task to answer these questions. This is where VMware Aria shines and makes your admin life much easier.

What is VMware Aria?

Certainly, it’s undoubtedly not a new product. Instead, it’s built upon the tried-and-true VMware vRealize Cloud Management foundation. The platform primarily consists of three components:

  • VMware Aria Cost, which leverages the power of CloudHealth
  • VMware Aria Operations, formerly recognized as VMware vRealize Operations
  • VMware Aria Automation, previously identified as VMware vRealize Automation
VMware Aria HUB

VMware Aria Cost powered by CloudHealth, allow us effectively administer and optimize the costs, usage, and performance of both their public and private clouds, as well as their physical and virtual infrastructures.

CloudHealth provides organizations with a methodology for managing their cloud resources that are driven by policy. The platform is equipped with capabilities for managing costs, optimizing resources, and executing automated governance, to name a few. It aids enterprises in regulating their cloud expenditures, enhancing visibility and control within their cloud landscapes, and boosting their operational effectiveness.

VMware Aria Operations also known as vROps, is a key part of the VMware vRealize Suite. It’s an operations management tool that offers intelligent operations from applications to infrastructure across physical, virtual, and cloud environments.

Aria Operations provides full-stack visibility from infrastructure to applications in real-time and predictive analytics, enabling proactive identification and remediation of performance, capacity, and configuration issues. It also allows for efficient capacity and cost management to optimize performance and compliance in both on-premise and cloud environments.

VMware Aria Automation aka vRealize Automation is a component of the VMware vRealize Suite and is designed to automate the delivery and ongoing management of personalized IT services. This tool offers a secure, policy-based multi-tenant self-service portal where users can request and manage applications and infrastructure

VMware Aria Graph

At the heart of VMware Aria is the Aria Hub

At the heart of VMware Aria is the Aria Hub, providing consolidated views and control mechanisms for managing an entire multi-cloud landscape. It utilizes VMware Aria Graph to offer a unified definition of applications, resources, roles, and accounts.

VMware Aria Graph is a graph-oriented datastore, architected to manage resources and their relationships in a multi-cloud setup. The technology is highly scalable and adept at handling intricate many-to-many relationships for dependency mapping. It features an event-based collection and accommodates high rates of change, capturing them at a granular level.

Aria Graph’s federated architecture allows for data aggregation from various sources. It collects inventory data from each provider service and forms a uniform model of the cloud inventory. Additionally, it offers a unified GraphQL API, simplifying data consumption for developers and IT operations teams, and enabling rapid and efficient access to data.

Aria Graph

New Era of Cloud Management with Innovative Solutions

The rise of the multi-cloud environment presents complex management challenges. To meet these, VMware has launched VMware Aria. This innovative solution delivers an extensive set of features and functions for multi-cloud governance, cross-cloud migration, and business insights.

This new launch includes three unique end-to-end management services built on VMware Aria Hub and VMware Aria Graph:

  • VMware Aria Guardrails,
  • VMware Aria Migration,
  • VMware Aria Business Insights.
Cloud Management with Innovative Solutions

VMware Aria Guardrails, which employ an “everything-as-code” approach, enable businesses to automate the enforcement of cloud guardrails. This feature covers various crucial parameters, including networking, security, cost, performance, and configuration. As a result, businesses can scale their multi-cloud environments more efficiently and securely.

VMware Aria Migration is another part of the new launch that accelerates and simplifies the multi-cloud migration journey. It streamlines the entire process, from assessment and planning to execution, thereby drastically reducing the time and effort required for cloud migration. Paired with VMware HCX, it offers a deeper understanding of the environment, application topology, and the costs involved, making the migration process much smoother.

The third new service, VMware Aria Business Insights, leverages AI and machine learning analytics to offer actionable business insights. By correlating information from full-stack events, it transforms raw data into meaningful, business-relevant insights.

What sets the VMware Aria suite apart is its ability to provide end-to-end multi-cloud management solutions. From the integrated approach of VMware Aria Guardrails, offering enhanced cloud governance, to VMware Aria Migration’s simplified cloud migration process, and finally, the AI-powered insights of VMware Aria Business Insights, VMware Aria addresses every facet of multi-cloud management.

Summary

In summary, VMware Aria emerges as an intelligent multi-cloud management solution, engineered to simplify and streamline the complexities that today’s businesses face in multi-cloud environments. By leveraging the strong foundation of VMware’s vRealize Cloud Management, Aria offers an integrated, comprehensive suite of services, including Aria Guardrails, Aria Migration, and Aria Business Insights.

Aria Guardrails allow for automation and enforcement of cloud guardrails, ensuring efficient, secure scalability. Aria Migration simplifies the multi-cloud migration journey, providing in-depth insights into the environment, application topology, and associated costs. Aria Business Insights offers AI and ML-powered analytics, converting complex data sets into actionable, business-relevant insights.

VMware Aria also brings forth its unique Aria Hub and Aria Graph, offering unified control and a granular understanding of cloud inventories.

Altogether, VMware Aria promises to take multi-cloud management to new heights, addressing governance, migration, and business insights in a seamlessly integrated manner. As businesses continue to navigate their multi-cloud strategies, VMware Aria stands as a powerful ally, easing the journey and ensuring successful, efficient outcomes.

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