You start the management components for the management domain in a specific order to provide the necessary infrastructure, networking, and management services before powering on the components for cloud management.

You start the management components for the management domain first. Then, you start the management components for the VI workload domains and the customer workloads.

Startup Order for the Management Domain

You start the virtual infrastructure of the management domain first. Then, you start the components providing identity and access management and life cycle management to the relevant cloud management components.

You start VMware Aria Operations for Logs as early as possible to collect log data that helps troubleshooting potential issues. You also start Site Recovery Manager and vSphere Replication as early as possible to protect the management virtual machines if a disaster event occurs.

Table 1. Startup Order for the Management Domain

Startup Order

SDDC Component

1

Management ESXi hosts, vCenter Server, vSphere Cluster Services, and vSAN *

2

SDDC Manager *

3

NSX Manager nodes for the management domain *

4

NSX Edge nodes for the management domain *

5

VMware Aria Operations for Logs cluster
6 vSphere Replication for the management domain
7 Site Recovery Manager for the management domain

8

VMware Aria Suite Lifecycle *

9

Clustered Workspace ONE Access *

10

 VMware Aria Operations cluster and remote collectors

11

 VMware Aria Automation cluster

* For information on the startup steps, see below.

Verify the Operational State of the Management Domain

After you start up the management domain, verify that the main functionality of the management components is working according to the requirements. See the following documentation:

Starting a Management Domain with Infrastructure Service VMs

If the management domain contains virtual machines that are running infrastructure services like Active Directory, NTP, DNS and DHCP servers, follow the startup order for VMware Cloud Foundation 4.4.

Start the vSphere and vSAN Components for the Management Domain

You start the management ESXi hosts using an out-of-band management interface, such as, ILO or iDRAC to connect to the hosts and power them on. Then, restarting the vSAN cluster starts automatically vSphere Cluster Services, vCenter Server and vSAN.

Procedure

  1. Power on the first ESXi host in the management domain.
    1. Log in to the first ESXi host in the management domain by using the out-of-band management interface.
    2. Power on the ESXi host according to the hardware vendor guide.
  2. Repeat the previous step to start all the remaining ESXi hosts in the management domain.

    This operation takes several minutes to complete.

    vCenter Server is started automatically. Wait until vCenter Server is running and the vSphere Client is available again.

  3. Log in to the management domain vCenter Server at https://<vcenter_server_fqdn>/ui as [email protected].
  4. Restart the vSAN cluster.
    1. Right-click the vSAN cluster and select vSAN > Restart cluster.
    2. In the Restart dialog box, click Restart.
      The vSAN Services page on the Configure tab changes to display information about the restart process.
  5. After the cluster has restarted, check the vSAN health service and resynchronization status, and resolve any outstanding issues.
    1. Select the cluster and click the Monitor tab.
    2. In the left pane, under vSAN > Resyncing objects, verify that all synchronization tasks are complete.
    3. In the left pane, navigate to vSAN > Skyline health and verify that the cluster health score is 100%.
  6. If you have added the root user of the ESXi hosts to the Exception Users list for lockdown mode during shutdown, remove the user from the list on each host.
    1. Select the host in the inventory and click the Configure tab.
    2. In the left pane, select System > Security Profile.
    3. In the Lockdown Mode pane, click the Edit button.
    4. On the Exception Users page, from the vertical ellipsis menu in front of the root user, select Remove User and click OK.

Start the SDDC Manager Virtual Machine

Start the SDDC Manager virtual machine by using the vSphere Client.

Procedure

  1. Log in to the management domain vCenter Server at https://<vcenter_server_fqdn>/ui as [email protected].
  2. In the VMs and templates inventory, expand the management domain vCenter Server tree and expand the management domain data center.
  3. Expand the Management VMs folder.
  4. Right-click the SDDC Manager virtual machine and click Power > Power on.

    This operation takes several minutes to complete.

Start the NSX Manager Virtual Machines

You begin powering on the NSX infrastructure in the management domain or in a VI workload domain by starting the three-node NSX Manager cluster by using the vSphere Client.

Procedure

  1. Log in to the management domain vCenter Server at https://<vcenter_server_fqdn>/ui as [email protected].
  2. In the VMs and templates inventory, expand the management domain vCenter Server tree and expand the management domain data center.
  3. Power on the NSX Manager nodes for the management domain or the VI workload domain.
    1. Right-click the primary NSX Manager node and select Power > Power on.
    2. Repeat the steps to power on the remaining NSX Manager nodes.

    This operation takes several minutes to complete until the NSX Manager cluster becomes fully operational again and its user interface - accessible.

  4. Log in to NSX Manager for the management domain or VI workload domain at https://<nsxt_manager_cluster_fqdn> as admin.
  5. Verify the system status of NSX Manager cluster.
    1. On the main navigation bar, click System.
    2. In the left pane, navigate to Configuration > Appliances.
    3. On the Appliances page, verify that the NSX Manager cluster has a Stable status and all NSX Manager nodes are available.

Start the NSX Edge Nodes

You continue powering on the NSX infrastructure in the management domain or in a VI workload domain by starting the NSX Edge nodes by using the vSphere Client.

Procedure

  1. Log in to vCenter Server for the management or VI workload domain at https://<vcenter_server_fqdn>/ui as [email protected].
  2. In the VMs and templates inventory, expand the tree of workload domain vCenter Server and expand data center for the workload domain.
  3. Right-click an NSX Edge virtual machine from the edge cluster and select Power > Power on.

    This operations takes several minutes to complete.

  4. Repeat these steps to power on the remaining NSX Edge nodes.

Start the VMware Aria Suite Lifecycle Virtual Machine

Start the VMware Aria Suite Lifecycle virtual machine in the management domain by using the vSphere Client.

Procedure

  1. Log in to the management domain vCenter Server at https://<vcenter_server_fqdn>/ui as [email protected].
  2. In the VMs and templates inventory, expand the management domain vCenter Server tree and expand the management domain data center.
  3. Right-click the VMware Aria Suite Lifecycle virtual machine and select Power > Power on.

Start the Clustered Workspace ONE Access Virtual Machines

You start the three-node Workspace ONE Access cluster by using the VMware Aria Suite Lifecycle user interface.

Procedure

  1. Log in to VMware Aria Suite Lifecycle at https://<aria_suite_lifecycle_fqdn> as vcfadmin@local.
  2. Power on the Workspace ONE Access cluster and verify its status.
    1. On the My services page, click Lifecycle operations.
    2. In the navigation pane, click Environments.
    3. On the Environments page, in the globalenvironment card, click View details.
    4. In the VMware Identity Manager section, click the horizontal ellipsis icon and select Power on.
    5. In the Power on VMware Identity Manager dialog box, click Submit.
    6. On the Requests page, ensure that the request completes successfully.
  3. Configure the domain and domain search parameters on the Workspace ONE Access appliances.
    1. Log in to the first appliances of the Workspace ONE Access cluster by using a Secure Shell (SSH) client as sshuser.
    2. Switch to the super user by running the su command.
    3. Open the /etc/resolv.conf file for editing. 
      vi /etc/resolv.conf
    4. Add the following entries to the end of the file and save the changes. 
      Domain <domain_name>
search <space_separated_list_of_domains_to_search>
    5. Repeat this step to configure the domain and domain search parameters on the remaining Workspace ONE Access appliances.
  4. In the VMware Aria Suite Lifecycle user interface, check the health of the Workspace ONE Access cluster.
    1. In the navigation pane, click Environments.
    2. On the Environments page, in the globalenvironment card, click View details.
    3. In the VMware Identity Manager section, click the horizontal ellipsis icon and select Trigger cluster health.
    4. In the Trigger health collection dialog box, click Submit.
    5. On the Requests page, ensure that the request completes successfully.