VMware Cloud Services provide a wide range of offerings for cloud integration, management, and security. You can use VMware Cloud Services for any infrastructure that supports VMware, including multicloud and hybrid cloud environments. There is a wide range of VMware Cloud Services, offered on a subscription basis.
This article explains use cases for five popular services—VMware Cloud on AWS, Cloud Provider Metering, vRealize Network Insight Cloud, vRealize Log Insight, vRealize Automation, and S3-Compatible Storage for VMware Cloud Director.
In this article you will learn about:
- What is VMware Cloud Services
- How to use VMware Cloud on AWS
- What is Cloud Provider Metering
- What is VMware vRealize Network Insight Cloud
- What is VMware vRealize Log Insight
- What is VMware vRealize Automation
This article is part of a series on VMware Storage.
What Is VMware Cloud Services?
VMware Cloud services are services that enable you to integrate, manage, and secure applications on cloud resources. These services work for any cloud service using VMware and can help you centralize the management and maintenance of hybrid or multi-cloud environments.
VMware Cloud services enable you to determine how resources are used and where workloads are deployed while applying a single operational model. This enables you to standardize security, reduce management complexity, and improve your ROI.
You can use VMware Cloud services with either public or private clouds. When integrating these services you do not need to re-architecture applications or convert data. This can help you simplify app modernization and ensure high performance.
VMware Cloud services are available in a variety of technologies provided as part of a VMware Cloud subscription. This subscription offers a wide range of services. The following services are particularly helpful for monitoring and managing your cloud environments:
- VMware Cloud on AWS
- Cloud Provider Metering
- vRealize Network Insight Cloud
- vRealize Log Insight
- vRealize Automation
VMware Cloud on AWS
VMware Cloud is available as a standalone service. It is also available as an integration with Amazon Web Services (AWS). This integration was developed jointly by AWS and VMware and applies VMware services to AWS infrastructure. You can use this integration to extend on-premises or other cloud services to AWS.
When you integrate VMware Cloud with AWS you gain access to a single-tenant infrastructure built on Elastic Compute Cloud (Amazon EC2) instances. EC2 instances are optimized for high volume input/output operations and storage with low-latency solid-state drives (SSDs) based on Non-Volatile Memory Express (NVMe).
This infrastructure supports up to 16 vSphere host clusters on bare metal infrastructure. In your deployment you can control scaling with options for between three to sixteen hosts on each cluster you operate.
Additionally, VMware Cloud on AWS enables you to run the VMware Software-Defined Data Center (SDDC) stack directly on your hosts. It does not require nested virtualization, making configuration and management simpler.
When migrating workloads you have access to cold (manual), VM template, and vMotion (live) options.
Learn how to use AWS CLI with S3-compatible storage in our quick tutorial.
Cloud Provider Metering
Cloud Provider Metering is a service you can use to centralize and automate reporting on resource use. It is made up of two components—VMware vCloud Usage Meter agents and VMware vCloud Usage Insight. Cloud Provider Monitoring enables you to collect data from on-premise instances via the agent and analyze that data with Usage Insight.
Once reports are created, you can view, manipulate, or export data from the VMware Cloud Provider Commerce Portal. Additionally, reports are retained by Usage Insight for up to three years, eliminating the need to store data separately.
To use this service, you need to install a Usage Meter agent on any host that you want to track. The agent then collects data for all applications on that host and counts any licenses in use as billable. You can scale agents as needed to cover your entire environment and update agents in place.
VMware vRealize Network Insight Cloud
VMware vRealize Network Insights is a service you can use to deploy secure, highly-available hybrid and multi-cloud infrastructures. It enables you to leverage network visibility and analytics to optimize micro-segmentation of your components and services, and minimize risk during migration. This service also supports both VMware NSX deployments and Kubernetes deployments.
vRealize Network Insight Cloud includes features that enable you to discover services in your environment and map dependencies. It can also provide you with recommendations for troubleshooting issues and optimizing performance.
VMware vRealize Log Insight
VRealize Log Insight is a virtual appliance you can use to aggregate, analyze, and manage system log data. You can use it to monitor application logs, messages, configuration files, network traces, and performance data in real-time. It enables you to more easily manage and troubleshoot your environments and includes features for security and compliance auditing.
VRealize Log Insight works via an agent on each device you wish to monitor. This agent collects performance, state, and log data and sends it to a centralized server where it is aggregated and analyzed. You can access this data via the customizable dashboard. Customization options include visualizations, alerts, reporting, saved queries, and a search feature.
VMware vRealize Automation
VMware vRealize Automation is a platform that you can use to automate infrastructure management tasks. It includes features for self-service provisioning, role-based governance, and resource lifecycle management. The vRealize Automation is also extensible through integrations with existing VMware and third-party tools.
The vRealize Automation platform includes a service broker that enables you to aggregate content from across your cloud resources and manage content with role-based policies. This includes content from Cloud Assembly which you can use to manage your cloud with DevOps.
You can define vRealize automation via a drag and drop interface or as code with Code Stream. Code Stream enables you to create a pipeline in which policies are defined as YAML and can be managed through Git integration and APIs.
Learn more in our guides to VMware Data Protection and VMware Backup.
VMware Cloud Services With Cloudian Object Storage
Benefits of using S3-compatible storage for VMware Cloud Director:
- Proven interoperability with the S3 API
- Native integration with VMware Cloud Director
- VCD virtual appliance deployment model
- Limitless storage scale within a single namespace
- Self-service storage management for customers
- Helps cloud providers offer differentiated and value-add services
- Available as a pre-configured appliance or as software-defined storage
You can learn more about the cooperation between VMware Cloud Director and Cloudian on this page.