When you activate the VMware Aria Operations for Logs integrated load balancer (ILB) on a VMware Aria Operations for Logs cluster, you must configure one or more virtual IP addresses.

The Integrated Load Balancer supports one or more virtual IP addresses (vIPs). Each vIP balances incoming ingestion and query traffic among available VMware Aria Operations for Logs nodes. It is a best practice to connect all VMware Aria Operations for Logs clients through a vIP and not directly to a node.

To simplify future changes and upgrades, you can have clients point to an FQDN that resolves to the ILB IP address, instead of pointing directly to the ILB IP address. VMware vSphere, VMware Aria Operations integrations, and alert messages use the FQDN if provided. Otherwise, they use the ILB IP address. VMware Aria Operations for Logs can resolve the FQDN to the given IP address, which means that the FQDN value you provide should match what is defined in DNS.

Prerequisites

  • Verify that all VMware Aria Operations for Logs nodes and the specified Integrated Load Balancer IP address are on the same network.
  • If you are using VMware Aria Operations for Logs with NSX, verify that the Enable IP Discovery option is deactivated on the NSX logical switch.
  • The VMware Aria Operations for Logs primary and worker nodes must have the same certificates. Otherwise, the VMware Aria Operations for Logs Agents configured to connect through SSL reject the connection. When uploading a CA-signed certificate to VMware Aria Operations for Logs primary and worker nodes, set the Common Name to the ILB FQDN (or IP address) during the certificate generation request. See Generate a Certificate Signing Request.
  • You must synchronize the time on the VMware Aria Operations for Logs virtual appliance with an NTP server. See Synchronize the Time on the Log Insight Virtual Appliance.

Procedure

  1. Expand the main menu and navigate to Management > Cluster.
  2. In the Integrated Load Balancer section, select New Virtual IP Address and enter the virtual IP (vIP) address to use for integrated load balancing.
  3. (Optional) To configure multiple virtual IP addresses, click New Virtual IP Address and enter the IP address. You can choose to enter the FQDN and tags.
    • Each vIP should be in the same subnet as at least one network interface on each node and the vIP must be available (not used by any other machine).
    • Tags let you add fields with predefined values to events for easier querying. You can add multiple comma-separated tags. All events coming into the system through a vIP are marked with the vIP's tags.
    • You can configure a list of static tags (key=value) for an ILB vIP, so that each log message received from the vIP is annotated with the configured tags.
  4. (Optional) To activate VMware Aria Operations for Logs users to access the cluster through FQDN, point the clients to the FQDN instead of directly to the configured ILB IP address.
    You might want to have clients point to an FQDN that resolves to an ILB IP address to simplify future changes and upgrades. You can have clients point to the FQDN instead of pointing directly to the ILB IP address.
  5. Click Save.
    The Integrated Load Balancer is managed by one node in the VMware Aria Operations for Logs cluster, declared the leader for that service. The current leader is denoted by the text (ILB) next to the node.