Define an Intent

You can define and configure new user-defined intents in VMware Aria Operations for Networks. After defining an intent, you can edit, delete, duplicate, enable, or deactivate the intent at any time.

Note: VMware Aria Operations for Networks supports a maximum of 1,000 intents. If you have 1,000 intents in your environment, you cannot define any more intents. You must delete the existing intents to define any new intents.

Procedure

1. On the left navigation pane, click Manage Intents.
2. On the Intents page, click DEFINE INTENT.
3. Expand a category under Intent Type and click Select on the type of intent you want to create.
   Note: You cannot edit the intent type after creating the intent. However, you can use the Change Intent Type option to change the type while you are in the process of defining the intent.
4. Enter the intent parameters which includes the intent name, the intent severity, intent tags, and notes (optional).
   The parameter list displays additional options based on the intent type you select.
5. (Optional) Select the Include/Exclude entities check box to limit the defined intent to certain entities.
   1. Choose an action depending on your requirement:

      Action	Procedure
      Include	To add the entities on which the intent should apply, perform the following steps: Click Include. From the drop-down menu, do one of the following actions: Select a predefined entity and enter your search query. Select Custom query and enter a custom search query. If you select L3 Switch Manager or Custom search, you can use Add exception to exclude certain entities from the query result. For example, if you use a custom query to select all the Node Ids that are lesser than 3, you can add an exception on Node Id 0. Then, the defined intent applies on Node Ids 1 and 2.
      Exclude	To add the entities on which the defined intent should not apply, perform the following steps: Click Exclude. From the dropdown menu, do one of the following actions: Select a predefined entity and enter your search query. Select Custom query and enter a custom search query. If you select L3 Switch Manager or Custom search, you can use Add exception to apply the intent on one or more excluded entities. For example, if you use the custom query to select Node Ids that are lesser than 3, you can add an exception on Node Id 1. Then, the defined intent applies on all Node Ids except ports 0 and 2.

   2. To add another condition, Click Add Condition.
6. Under Alert Notification, select how you want to get the alert notifications.
   You get the alert notification on the configured email address or SNMP Trap destination. You can select multiple check boxes as per your requirement.
7. Click Submit.
   You can view the new intent on the Intents page.

Results

When you create an intent, VMware Aria Operations for Networks immediately verifies whether the conditions defined in the intent are met in your network. If the intent is violated, the system raises an alert corresponding to this problem and marks the intent status as Fail.