[vRA 7 Installation] Part 06: Management Agent, Installation Wizard

Installing The IaaS Management Agent And Running The Installation Wizard

This article will demonstrate how to install the IaaS Management Agent on the IaaS host, which is responsible for registering the host with the vRA 7 Appliance. You will also be guided through the new Installation Wizard of the Appliance.
As a prerequisite, we expect that you have configured the network settings of both the IaaS host and the vRA 7 Appliance in such a manner, that they are able to resolve each other by their FQDN.

7. Installing IaaS Management Agent

7.1 On your Windows Server, open up a browser and navigate to your vRA 7 Appliance IP or hostname, in my case that’s vra7.rbs.local

7.2 Follow the link vRealize Automation IaaS installation page, download the Management Agent Installer and run it

7.3 On the Management Site Service page, provide the FQDN of your vRA 7 Appliance including port 5480 and provide the root user’s credentials which you have defined during the deployment of your Appliance. Load the SHA1 fingerprint and confirm it:

7.4 Provide the credentials of the user which you have created for installing the IaaS components:
(You should currently be logged in with that user)

7.5 Finish the installation

8. Running The Installation Wizard

Please note: Don’t cancel the installation by clicking Cancel. You won’t have a chance to bring the wizard up again and you will have to install everything manually. Instead, you have to click Logout at the top right corner.

8.1 Open a browser and navigate to the management console of your vRA 7 Appliance – in my case vra7.rbs.local:5480 – and login as root. The Wizard should start automatically.

8.2 As Deployment Type, select Minimal deployment and check Install Infrastructure as a Service

8.3 On the Installation Prerequisites page, make sure to provide the same time server (ADDNS.rbs.local in my case) as for the Windows Server. The host name of your Windows server should be listed as IaaS host

8.4 Run the Prerequisite Checker. If you should see any warnings you have the option to fix them automatically

8.5 Provide the FQDN of your vRA 7 Appliance

8.6 Enter a password for the System Administrator

8.7 Provide your IaaS host’s information along with your user’s Windows domain account. You also have to enter an encryption passphrase for the database:

8.8 Input your SQL Server’s name (see 6.2) and choose a name for the new database. Make sure Default Settings and Windows Authentication are enabled:

8.9 The default values which are presented on the Distributed Execution Managers page should be correct

8.10 The default contents on the Agents page should be fine as well. Just make sure to note down the name of the Endpoint, which is “vCenter” by default. Optionally, you can install additional agents by using the green plus icon

8.11 In the following steps regarding certificates, proceed as it fits your requirements and infrastructure

8.12 Validate:

8.13 Optionally, you can take snapshots of the VMs being used in case of a failed installation

8.14 Start the installation and grab some coffee, this could take some time:

8.15 Provide your license key

8.16 Optionally enable the Customer Experience Improvement Program

8.17 Initial Content Configuration is optional, but you really don’t want to miss that step. This action will create the user “configurationadmin” and the catalog item “vSphere Initial Setup”, which will guide you through the basic configuration of vRA, will be added to the catalog. So provide a password for the user “configurationadmin” and click Create Initial Content:

8.18 Finish the installation

The next part describes how to perform the basic configuration of vRA 7 by requesting the catalog item, which has been generated in step 8.17.