To begin monitoring your environment with VMware Aria Operations, you configure the vSphere solution. The solution includes the vCenter Server cloud account that collects data from the target vCenter Server instances.

Where You Find the Solution - vSphere

From the left menu, click Data Sources > Integrations > Accounts tab. Click Add Account, and then select the vCenter card.

Account Information - vSphere Account Options

Configure and modify cloud accounts on the Account Information page.

Table 1. Advanced Settings Options
Option Description
Advanced Settings Provides options related to designating specific collectors to manage this cloud account, managing object discovery and change events.
Auto Discovery

Determines whether new objects added to the monitored system are discovered and added to VMware Aria Operations after the initial configuration of the cloud account.

  • If the value is true, VMware Aria Operations collects the information about any new objects that are added to the monitored system after the initial configuration. For example, if you add more hosts and virtual machines, these objects are added during the next collections cycle. This is the default value.
  • If the value is false, VMware Aria Operations monitors only those objects that are present on the target system when you configure the cloud account.
Process Change Events

Determines whether the cloud account uses an event collector to collect and process the events generated in the vCenter Server instance.

  • If the value is true, the event collector collects and publishes events from vCenter Server. This is the default value.
  • If the value is false, the event collector does not collect and publish events.

Activate Collecting vSphere Distributed Switch

Activate Collecting Virtual Machine Folder

Activate Collecting vSphere Distributed Port Group

When set to false, reduces the collected data set by omitting collection of the associated category.

Exclude Virtual Machines from Capacity Calculations When set to true, reduces the collected data set by omitting collection of the associated category.
Maximum Number Of Virtual Machines Collected

Reduces the collected data set by limiting the number of virtual machine collections.

To omit data on virtual machines and have VMware Aria Operations collect only host data, set the value to zero.

Provide data to vSphere Predictive DRS vSphere Predictive DRS proactively load balances a vCenter Server cluster to accommodate predictable patterns in the cluster workload.

VMware Aria Operations monitors virtual machines running in a vCenter Server, analyzes longer-term historical data, and provides forecast data about predictable patterns of resource usage to Predictive DRS. Based on these predictable patterns, Predictive DRS moves to balance resource usage among virtual machines.

Predictive DRS must also be activated for the Compute Clusters managed by the vCenter Server instances monitored by VMware Aria Operations. Refer to the vSphere Resource Management Guide for details on activating Predictive DRS on a per Compute Cluster basis.

When set to true, designates VMware Aria Operations as a predictive data provider, and sends predicative data to the vCenter Server. You can only register a single active Predictive DRS data provider with a vCenter Server at a time.

Activate Actions Activating this option helps in triggering the actions that are related to vCenter.
Cloud Type Provides an ability to identify the type of vCenter that is used in VMware Aria Operations. By default, the cloud type is set to Private Cloud.

The cloud types available are: Azure VMware Solution, Google Cloud VMware Engine, Hosted Private Cloud, Private Cloud, VMware Cloud on AWS, and VMware Cloud on Dell EMC.
vCenter ID A globally unique identifier associated with the vCenter Server instance.
Deactivate collecting Guest File Systems with names containing Provide comma separated list of strings. If these strings are found in any guest files system mount point name, that guest file system will not be collected.
Activate real time monitoring The real time monitoring setting is deactivated by default. To collect real time data every 20 seconds change it to true.
Dynamic Thresholding This setting is activated by default.

You can find the vSphere Hardening Guides at http://www.vmware.com/security/hardening-guides.html.

Click Save Settings to finish configuration of the solution.