You shut down the components of the management domain in VMware Cloud Foundation in a specific order to keep components operational by maintaining the necessary infrastructure, networking, and management services as long as possible before shutdown.

After you shut down the components in all VI workload domains, you begin shutting down the management domain.

Shutdown Order for the Management Domain

Note:

If your VMware Cloud Foundation instance is deployed with the consolidated architecture, shut down any customer workloads or additional virtual machines in the management domain before you proceed with the shutdown order of the management components.

You shut down Site Recovery Manager and vSphere Replication after you shut down the management components that can be failed over between the VMware Cloud Foundation instances. You also shut Site Recovery Manager and vSphere Replication down as late as possible to have the management virtual machines protected as long as possible if a disaster event occurs. The virtual machines in the paired VMware Cloud Foundation instance become unprotected after you shut down Site Recovery Manager and vSphere Replication in the current VMware Cloud Foundation instance.

You shut down VMware Aria Operations for Logs as late as possible to collect as much as log data for potential troubleshooting. You shut down the Workspace ONE® Access™ instances after the management components they provide identity and access management services for.

Table 1. Shutdown Order for the Management Domain

Shutdown Order

SDDC Component

1

VMware Aria Automation cluster

2

VMware Aria Operations cluster and remote collectors

3

Clustered Workspace ONE Access *

4

VMware Aria Suite Lifecycle™

5

Site Recovery Manager for the management domain

6

vSphere Replication for the management domain

7

VMware Aria Operations for Logs cluster

8

NSX Edge nodes for the management domain *
9

NSX Manager nodes for the management domain *

10

SDDC Manager *

11

vSphere Cluster Services, vCenter Server for the management domain, management ESXi hosts and vSAN *

* For information on the shutdown steps, see below.

Save the Credentials for the ESXi Hosts and vCenter Server for the Management Domain

Before you shut down the management domain, get the credentials for the management domain hosts and vCenter Server from SDDC Manager and save them. You need these credentials to shut down the ESXi hosts and then to start them and vCenter Server back up. Because SDDC Manager is down during each of these operations, you must save the credentials in advance.

To get the credentials, log in to the SDDC Manager appliance by using a Secure Shell (SSH) client as vcf and run the lookup_passwords command.

Shutting Down a Management Domain with Infrastructure Services VMs

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

Shut Down the Clustered Workspace ONE Access Virtual Machines

Use the VMware Aria Suite Lifecycle user interface to shut down the Workspace ONE Access three-node cluster that provides identity and access management services to management components that are available across VMware Cloud Foundation instances .

Procedure

  1. Log in to VMware Aria Suite Lifecycle at https://<aria_suite_lifecycle_fqdn> as vcfadmin@local.
  2. On the My services page, click Lifecycle operations.
  3. In the navigation pane, click Environments.
  4. On the Environments page, on the globalenvironment card, click View details.
  5. In the VMware Identity Manager section, click the horizontal ellipsis icon and select Power off.
  6. In the Power off VMware Identity Manager dialog box, click Submit.
  7. On the Requests page, ensure that the request completes successfully.

Shut Down the VMware Aria Suite Lifecycle Virtual Machine

Shut down the VMware Aria Suite Lifecycle virtual machine in the management domain of VMware Cloud Foundation from 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 > Shut down Guest OS.
  4. In the confirmation dialog box, click Yes.

Shut Down the NSX Edge Nodes

You begin shutting down the NSX infrastructure in the management domain or in a VI workload domain in VMware Cloud Foundation by shutting down the NSX Edge nodes that provide north-south traffic connectivity between the physical data center networks and the NSX SDN networks

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 for the management domain or VI workload domain and select Power > Shut down Guest OS.
  4. In the confirmation dialog box, click Yes.

    This operation takes several minutes to complete.

  5. Repeat the steps for the remaining NSX Edge nodes for the domain.

Shut Down the NSX Manager Nodes

You continue shutting down the NSX infrastructure for the management domain or for a VI workload domain by shutting down 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. Right-click the primary NSX manager virtual machine and select Power > Shut down Guest OS.
  4. In the confirmation dialog box, click Yes.

    This operation takes several minutes to complete.

  5. Repeat the steps for the remaining NSX Manager virtual machines.

Shut Down the SDDC Manager Virtual Machine

Shut down the SDDC Manager 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. Expand the Management VMs folder.
  4. Right-click the SDDC Manager virtual machine and click Power > Shut down Guest OS.
  5. In the confirmation dialog box, click Yes.
    This operation takes several minutes to complete.

Shut Down vSphere and vSAN for the Management Domain

After you check the vSAN cluster health, you use the vSAN shutdown cluster wizard in the vSphere Client. The wizard shuts down vSphere Cluster Services, vCenter Server, the vSAN storage, and the ESXi hosts added to the default management cluster in VMware Cloud Foundation.

Procedure

  1. Log in to the management domain vCenter Server at https://<vcenter_server_fqdn>/ui as [email protected].
  2. In the Hosts and clusters inventory, expand the management domain vCenter Server tree and expand the management domain data center.
  3. If the management domain vCenter Server is not running on the first ESXi host in the default management cluster, migrate it there.
  4. Verify the vSAN health and resynchronization status.
    1. Select the default management cluster and click the Monitor tab.
    2. In the left pane, under vSAN > Resyncing objects, verify that all synchronization tasks are complete.
    3. Under vSAN > Skyline health, verify that the cluster health score is 100%.
  5. If any member host is in lockdown mode, add the host's root account to the Exception Users list.
    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, enter root and click Add User.
    5. Click OK.
  6. Shut down the vSAN cluster.
    1. In the inventory, right-click the vSAN cluster and select vSAN > Shutdown cluster.
    2. In the Shutdown Cluster wizard, verify that all pre-checks are green and click Next.
    3. Review the vCenter Server notice and click Next.
    4. Enter a reason for performing the shutdown, and click Shutdown.

Results

Connection to vCenter Server is lost because the vSAN shutdown cluster wizard shuts down vCenter Server.

The shutdown operation is complete after all ESXi hosts are stopped.