Starting with VMware Cloud Director 10.5, you can use Content Hub for centralized content management of application images.
Application Images
An application image is a catalog item that contains all application specific details, such as application name, application version, application logo, screenshots, and any additional information necessary to consume the application. After upgrading to version 10.5, all pre-existing catalog items, such as vApp templates, and media files, appear as application images.
External Resources for Application Images
With Content Hub, VMware Cloud Director can integrate with multiple external content sources, such as VMware Marketplace and external Helm chart repositories.
As a tenant, you can create catalog content resources only for external Helm chart repositories. You can deploy Helm chart container applications from the existing catalog content resources to Kubernetes clusters you own or to clusters other tenants share with you.
| External Source | Helm Chart Application Image | VM Application Image |
|---|---|---|
| VMware Marketplace | ✓ | ✓ |
| Helm chart repository | ✓ |
Kubernetes Operator
To leverage VMware Marketplace and external Helm chart repositories for provisioning of containerized applications, VMware Cloud Director uses a Kubernetes operator. A Kubernetes operator is an application-specific controller that extends the functionality of the Kubernetes API to create, configure, and manage instances of complex applications on behalf of a Kubernetes user. The Kubernetes operator runs on the Kubernetes cluster and does not require inbound network access to the cluster itself. You can deploy the Kubernetes operator in an isolated network topology.
