Using Infoblox-specific properties and extensible attributes for IPAM integrations in vRealize Automation cloud templates

You can use Infoblox-specific properties for vRealize Automation projects that contain external IPAM integrations for Infoblox.

The following Infoblox properties are available for use with your Infoblox IPAM integrations in cloud template designs and deployments. You can use them in vRealize Automation to further control IP address allocation during cloud template deployment. Use of these properties is optional.

Note:

If you are using the Infoblox plug-in version 1.5, a local Infoblox property overrides a global Infoblox property for dnsSuffix, dnsView, enableDns, and dhcpEnabled properties. For example, if you specify a local (NIC-specific) Infoblox property such as Infoblox.IPAM.Network1.dnsSuffix and a global property such as Infoblox.IPAM.Network.dnsSuffix, the local property overrides the global property. In this example, the local property overrides the global property for the NIC with index 1 while the global property applies to all the other NICs.

The Infoblox plug-in version 1.5 is supported for use with vRealize Automation 8.9.1 and later. It is not supported for use with vRealize Automation 8.9 or earlier.

If you are using the Infoblox plug-in 1.4 or earlier, a global Infoblox property overrides a local Infoblox property for dnsSuffix, dnsView, enableDns, and enableDhcp properties. A global property applies to all NICs.

The following properties are available and included in the version 1.5 and later Infoblox plug-in for vRealize Automation. For more information about Infoblox plug-in versions and where to obtain the most recent version of the Infoblox plug-in for your IPAM integration in vRealize Automation, see Download and deploy an external IPAM provider package for use in vRealize Automation.

The Infoblox V1.5 plug-in enables you to create DNS A and PTR records for your Infoblox external IPAM integration. The plug-in supports the Infoblox host record. These records help ensure proper DNS operations by logging and asset management tools that query the DNS system. DNS A and PTR records are commonly used by IPv4 DNS systems. A host record is created by default. However, if the Infoblox.IPAM.createFixedAddress, Infoblox.IPAM.createAddressRecord, or Infoblox.IPAM.createAddressAndPtrRecords property is set to true, then a host record is not created.

Infoblox.IPAM.createAddressRecord
This property enables you to create a DNS A record for a VM's IP address in Infoblox. It is available with the Infoblox plug-in v1.5.
Infoblox.IPAM.createAddressAndPtrRecords
This property enables you to create a DNS A record and a PTR record for a VM's IP address in Infoblox. It is available with the Infoblox plug-in v1.5.
Infoblox.IPAM.createFixedAddress
This property enables you to create a fixed address record inside Infoblox. Possible values are True and False. The default value is False.
Infoblox.IPAM.Network.dnsView
This property enables you to use a DNS view when creating a host record inside Infoblox.
Infoblox.IPAM.Network.enableDns
When allocating an IP in Infoblox, this property enables you to also create a DNS record. Possible values are True and False. The default value is True.
Infoblox.IPAM.Network.enableDhcp
This property enables you to set the DHCP configuration for the host address. Possible values are True and False. The default value is True.
Infoblox.IPAM.Network.dnsSuffix
This property enables you to overwrite the domain DHCP option of an Infoblox network with a new one. This capability is useful if the Infoblox network does not have the domain DHCP option set or if the domain DHCP option must be overwritten. The default value is null (empty string).
When using an external IPAM provider such as Infoblox, you must specify a DNS suffix when provisioning a machine. While the DNS suffix is required, you can specify the Infoblox.IPAM.Network.dnsSuffix property in the machine resource code in the vRealize Automation cloud template.
An example is shown below in the Infoblox.IPAM.Network.hostnameNicSuffix section.
Infoblox.IPAM.Network.dnsSuffix is only applicable if Infoblox.IPAM.Network.enableDns is set to True.
Infoblox.IPAM.Network.hostnameNicSuffix
You can use this property to specify a NIC index suffix when generating a host name.
This allows you to provision a machine with more than one NIC such that the host names for each NIC are distinguished by a custom-defined suffix. As seen in the following example, you can provision a machine, for example my-machine, that has 2 NICs so that the host name suffix for the first NIC is -nic1 and the other is -nic2.
You can also specify a DNS suffix as shown in the example. The Infoblox.IPAM.Network.dnsSuffix property is used with a value of test.local to result in the first NIC being named my-machine-nic1.test.local and the other my-machine-nic2.test.local.
```
formatVersion: 1
inputs: {}
resources:
  Cloud_Machine_1:
    type: Cloud.Machine
    properties:
      Infoblox.IPAM.Network.dnsSuffix: test.local
      Infoblox.IPAM.Network0.hostnameNicSuffix: -nic1
      Infoblox.IPAM.Network1.hostnameNicSuffix: -nic2
      image: ubuntu
      flavor: small
      networks:
        - network: '${resource.Cloud_Network_1.id}'
          deviceIndex: 0
        - network: '${resource.Cloud_Network_2.id}'
          deviceIndex: 1
  Cloud_Network_1:
    type: Cloud.Network
    properties:
      networkType: existing
  Cloud_Network_2:
    type: Cloud.Network
    properties:
      networkType: existing
```
This property was introduced with Infoblox plug-in version 1.3. See Download and deploy an external IPAM provider package for use in vRealize Automation.
You can also specify properties by using an extensibility subscription.
For related information about Infoblox extensible attributes relative to this use case, see Add required extensible attributes in the Infoblox application for integration with vRealize Automation.

Using Infoblox properties on different machine NICs in a cloud template

The following Infoblox properties can support a different value for each machine NIC in the cloud template:

Infoblox.IPAM.Network.enableDhcp
Infoblox.IPAM.Network.dnsView
Infoblox.IPAM.Network.enableDns
Infoblox.IPAM.Network.hostnameNicSuffix

For example, to use a different Infoblox.IPAM.Network.dnsView value for each NIC, use a Infoblox.IPAM.Network<nicIndex>.dnsView entry for each NIC. The following sample shows different values Infoblox.IPAM.Network.dnsView for two NICs.

formatVersion: 1
inputs: {}
resources:
  Cloud_Machine_1:
    type: Cloud.Machine
    properties:
      Infoblox.IPAM.Network0.dnsView: default
      Infoblox.IPAM.Network1.dnsView: my-net
      image: ubuntu
      flavor: small
      networks:
        - network: '${resource.Cloud_Network_1.id}'
          deviceIndex: 0
        - network: '${resource.Cloud_Network_2.id}'
          deviceIndex: 1
  Cloud_Network_1:
    type: Cloud.Network
    properties:
      networkType: existing
  Cloud_Network_2:
    type: Cloud.Network
    properties:
      networkType: existing

By default, the Infoblox integration creates a DNS host record in the default DNS view in Infoblox. If your Infoblox administrator has created custom DNS views, you can overwrite the default integration behavior and specify a named view by using the Infoblox.IPAM.Network.dnsView property in the machine component. For example, you can add the following property to the Cloud_Machine_1 component to specify a named DNS view in Infoblox.

  Cloud_Machine_1:
    type: Cloud.Machine
    properties:
      image: ubuntu
      flavor: small
      Infoblox.IPAM.Network.dnsView:<dns-view-name>

For information about configuring and using DNS views, see DNS Views in Infoblox product documentation. For examples in the Infoblox integration workflow, see Define and deploy a cloud template that uses an external IPAM provider range assignment in vRealize Automation.

How to specify Infoblox properties

You can specify an Infoblox property using one of the following methods in Cloud Assembly:

You can specify properties in a project by using the Custom Properties section on your Infrastructure > Administration > Projects page. Using this method, the specified properties are applied to all machines that are provisioned in the scope of this project.

You can specify properties on each machine component in a cloud template. Sample cloud template code illustrating use of the Infoblox.IPAM.Network.dnsView property is shown below:

formatVersion: 1
inputs: {}
resources:
  Cloud_vSphere_Machine_1:
    type: Cloud.vSphere.Machine
    properties:
      Infoblox.IPAM.Network.dnsView: default
      image: ubuntu
      cpuCount: 1
      totalMemoryMB: 1024
      networks:
        - network: '${resource.Cloud_Network_1.id}'
  Cloud_Network_1:
    type: Cloud.Network
    properties:
      networkType: existing
      constraints: 
        - tag: mk-ipam-demo